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RE: 😨 Are You Scared Of UPVU Yet?

in WORLD OF XPILAR3 years ago

I've been following that case on the courtlistener web site for months (years?). I just found it through web searches, and bookmarked it after I did (the full docket is here). Coincidentally or not, at least two of the big Steem vs. Hive price swings and some days with large STEEM trading volume corresponded with publications on that web site. Unfortunately, I can't read most of the stuff that's out there because its paywalled.

I see no mention that 15 million have been returned already.

Yeah, I don't think it has been returned yet, but as I read the conclusion and the footnote on page 8, roughly 14 million should be coming back and another 8 or 9 million remains in dispute.

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 3 years ago 

I wondered about the implications upon the price of STEEM and whether it was a buying or selling opportunity. I came to the conclusion it was neither 😆

The URLs for the PDFs have a consistent format so I tried guessing it for row 89. I failed.

If the ruling was on the 30th, I'm quite surprised nobody's reported on it. I can't see anything on HIVE either. It looks like you're the only person watching 🤣

I wondered about the implications upon the price of STEEM and whether it was a buying or selling opportunity. I came to the conclusion it was neither 😆

I did the same. It's impossible to know what Steemit will do with the Undisputed portion or what Bittrex will do with the Disputed portion, now that they have the greenlight to make an interpleader deposit in the form of USD. I guess Bittrex will sell, but they'll try to do it in a way that doesn't shift the market.

FTR, I'm definitely not the only one watching. Steem had some really high-volume trading days that corresponded with court actions. I guess the media lost interest after the Hive FUD campaign, but traders were definitely watching. ;-)

 3 years ago 

https://hive.blog/@ theycallmedan/posts

I wonder if it's worth keeping an eye on this guy. He appears to be one of the people trying to sue Bittrex. Although it's probably unlikely he'll write about it having lost the case.

Looks like something happened today. No details outside the paywall, though. : -(

image.png


On another note, now running around 6-7 votes per block.

 3 years ago 

How much does it cost to open documents?

I don't know. I don't have a pacer account, but I just found this, which suggests that it might cost less than I would have guessed:

Access to case information costs $0.10 per page. Depending on format, billable pages are calculated in two different ways. For HTML-formatted information, a billable page is calculated using a formula based on the number of bytes extracted (4,320 bytes = 1 billable page). For PDFs, the actual number of pages is counted (1 PDF page = 1 billable page).

The cost to access a single document is capped at $3.00, the equivalent of 30 pages for documents and case-specific reports like docket report, creditor listing, and claims register. The cap does not apply to name search results, reports that are not case-specific, and transcripts of federal court proceedings.

The image above links to the page with the Pacer links (or here it is) if you're interested. I assume pacer accounts are available for free, but I don't know that for sure, either.

 3 years ago 

Ah, thanks for the reminder - the cheating delegations have been removed so I'll do another list 🙂

It'd be so great to know what's going on there - "Set Deadlines AND Order" either suggests an appeal or a timeline for returning the STEEM to Steemit. I suspect the latter.

My guess is that Bittrex made their interpleader deposit to cover the "disputed Steem" on April 8, and the "deadlines and order" have to do with filings for additional hearings on that part of the case, especially considering that an "Amended complaint" was added today. I figure that is removing Bittrex as a defendant and replacing one of the John Does with Steemit.

Pure speculation, but I wouldn't be surprised if Bittrex has already delivered the "undisputed Steem" to Steemit inside the exchange.

 3 years ago 

Pure speculation, but I wouldn't be surprised if Bittrex has already delivered the "undisputed Steem" to Steemit inside the exchange.

It's possible although they'd either have had to have done it as lots of smaller transactions or such that it isn't added to the STEEM blockchain - there are no large transactions currently appearing.

With any luck, one of the future documents will be "free to view" and we'll be able to join the dots a bit better. There's still no word of it in the press that I can find.

It's possible although they'd either have had to have done it as lots of smaller transactions or such that it isn't added to the STEEM blockchain - there are no large transactions currently appearing.

If Steemit has a bittrex account, it wouldn't necessarily show up on the blockchain at all.

 3 years ago 

🤔 Yes - I've never really understood that. Sometimes, I see money move from one exchange to another but I don't know if things show up if it all happens within the same exchange. It's possible that we won't see it. We'd have seen it if it had made its way onto the platform so we know that hasn't happened yet.

 3 years ago 

The number of votes per block should be lower again now... would you mind checking?

I restarted about 10 hours ago, and it has averaged 5 votes per block since then.

 3 years ago 

👍 Thanks - Back to normal 🙂

Update again today. No idea about the details, but based on price action, I guess it was good news for Steemit.

 3 years ago 

It could be - I was also told that Binance are launching STEEM/USDT trading pairs which will make STEEM much more appealing to traders. It could be a combination of both but good news all round!

Yeah, I saw that after I posted this comment. My intuition says that the new binance trading pair would have more to do with the price action. However, it was the high trading volume that prompted me to check the web site that day, and see that it had been updated, so I can't shake the speculation that the two are somehow related.

 3 years ago 

It's definitely possible! It's a shame that those documents aren't free. We're due another freebie!

I expect us to see a lot more volume now - going via BTC / ETH was a pain in the butt so removing this barrier will be great for traders to get in and out more easily. And if things are easier, they're more attractive 🙂

I expect us to see a lot more volume now - going via BTC / ETH was a pain in the butt so removing this barrier will be great for traders to get in and out more easily. And if things are easier, they're more attractive 🙂

Agreed. I also think it's encouraging because I remember this.

From new listings of STEEM on ALL the greatest exchanges to integrations in critical hardware products.

Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but since new exchange listings were on the 2020 roadmap, and this is the first time it actually happened (AFAIK), I'm hoping that maybe it signals a renewal of interest in ecosystem development. I'm not sure, but my understanding is that someone generally has to pay something to get a new listing.

And I definitely agree that it's time for another freebie. ; -)

 3 years ago 

I'm not sure, but my understanding is that someone generally has to pay something to get a new listing.

I think so - I think a fee needs to be agreed but the cryptocurrency also needs to be one that the exchange trusts. So just being listed in Binance is a good indication of their trust in STEEM.

In my short time trying to understand what's happened to Steemit, I remember reading that open letter as well as many of the comments that it received. Even I came to the conclusion that Justin Sun was capable of saying the complete opposite within an hour of saying something. I'd love to think that we'll see a lot of things progress and change but I still see very little to suggest that's the case. I did see some promising news that the steem.dao might be used to convert SBD to STEEM which will subsequently get burned in order to stabilise SBD to nearer the dollar mark and reduce the circulating STEEM. Whether or not this will happen, we'll have to wait and see 🙂

I'm wondering if that exchange listing is related to this and this, in which case STEEM might be used for collateralization, as described here:

image.png

Pure speculation, but the timing is right.

I did see some promising news that the steem.dao might be used to convert SBD to STEEM which will subsequently get burned in order to stabilise SBD to nearer the dollar mark and reduce the circulating STEEM.

I saw that too, and I think it's better than the status quo, but I'd really rather see the DAO used to fund development. That would also create selling pressure to drive down the price of SBDs, but it would have a growth focus instead of cannibalizing the ecosystem.

Between the DAO and the "undisputed STEEM", someone really ought to be able to fund a great deal of high quality development for the ecosystem. If they're going to uncork the SPS, I'd love to see Steemit and/or the witnesses put out an "RFP" to real software houses and see what comes in.

Yeah, he's one of the plaintiffs. I doubt if he'll have much to say, though. I always assumed it would end with a settlement and non-disclosure agreement.

Given the history, in principle, I would hope that any returned STEEM would be used to grow the ecosystem. We'll see.

 3 years ago 

Given the history, in principle, I would hope that any returned STEEM would be used to grow the ecosystem. We'll see.

I'm not optimistic on this point. I think that if TRON were going to invest in the platform, they would already have done so and this is an opportunity to "cut their losses" a little bit more. I hope that I'm wrong.

I sort-of agree. The only counter I have to that is that Tron demonstrated some amount of investment and commitment when they deployed the TRX reward supplementation. I see four possibilities:

  • At this point, Steemit is basically on its own as a standalone entity with only nominal ties to Tron. Which means they are largely resource starved (although, they could still fund some decent development with the SPS if they choose to unleash it).
  • Tron has been waiting for clarity on this lawsuit before proceeding, and getting back 2/3 of the community funds is enough to restart investment.
  • Tron has been waiting for clarity on this lawsuit before proceeding, and will continue to wait until the final decision. This has two branches:
  • Steemit wins and Tron renews investment
  • Steemit loses and Tron walks away

I have no guess as to which, if any, are correct.

 3 years ago 

Tron demonstrated some amount of investment and commitment when they deployed the TRX reward supplementation

That's true - it crossed my mind as I typed the comment - there's potential to do so much more.

Steemit is basically on its own as a standalone entity with only nominal ties to Tron

I could be wrong but don't think that's the case. Underneath the hood, Steemit can be considered as 2 sub-entities working together. The steemcurator 01 and 02 accounts are run by the original Steemit team - everything else is run by the new Tron team. The developers and booming accounts for example are both run by Tron employees. So if we want progress with Steemit, we need Tron developers or... the original Steemit team run the project. This could be different since Justin Sun stepped away.

Tron has been waiting for clarity on this lawsuit before proceeding, and getting back 2/3 of the community funds is enough to restart investment.

I hope so... and there's huge potential for these funds to have a positive impact. It wouldn't cost a lot to get a digital agency with NodeJS experience to write a new front-end. They'll be able to work with the current codebase so that all of the existing security features can remain in place. In my opinion, this will provide the greatest differentiator between us and other blogging platforms.


I don't know if you can answer this... my perception is that new people who join the platform don't buy STEEM and then power up. They just blog and expect to earn STEEM. Those that do buy STEEM and power up delegate it to a service like UPVU (i.e. investors). So bloggers don't invest money. Do you know if this perception is accurate?


Related to the increase in votes per block - the scammy delegation abusers are back again so I'm back to smashing them down 🙄

The developers and booming accounts for example are both run by Tron employees. So if we want progress with Steemit, we need Tron developers or... the original Steemit team run the project. This could be different since Justin Sun stepped away.

Interesting. I knew that the developers (who don't seem to be very active) had Tron affiliations, but not that the booming accounts did too. That explains some things.

my perception is that new people who join the platform don't buy STEEM and then power up. They just blog and expect to earn STEEM. Those that do buy STEEM and power up delegate it to a service like UPVU (i.e. investors). So bloggers don't invest money. Do you know if this perception is accurate?

I have a similar perception, but I don't know. I have always thought it was a bad idea to expect authors to power-up, anyway. Creating and voting are two different roles, and IMO we shouldn't expect them to be done by the same people. Many people simply don't want to be bloggers and I can imagine that many content creators don't want to burn their time on content discovery. I think this is something that the Steem community has had mostly wrong from the day that I joined. IMO, a healthy ecosystem would have somewhere around 100-1000 times as many voters as content producers, and content producers would be free to "take the money and run" as long as they're producing attractive content.

On the bidbots, I've been thinking that it really wouldn't be difficult to fix the mess. Elaborating on the syndication idea from a few weeks ago, what if delegators didn't have to post daily tank pictures in order to get returns? What if they got their returns in beneficiary rewards, instead?

So, using UPVU as an example... They say that they currently dedicate 10% of voting power for community votes. What if they stopped doing that and, instead, dedicated 10% to a stable of quality content producers that they select? Then, they make the agreement with content producers to set 90% of beneficiaries to their delegators, in a proof-of-stake style rotation?

  • Eliminates the spammy content
  • Brings in quality content
  • Leaves room for passive investment
  • Theoretically, their rewards could even go up because the posts that they support might actually get organic votes, too.

Not that it'll go anywhere, but just thinking out loud. Maybe the problem isn't as intractable as it can seem.


Related to the increase in votes per block - the scammy delegation abusers are back again so I'm back to smashing them down 🙄

I wondered about that. Jumping from 6 to 8 in a day is a big change. Related: Do you happen to know if there is an account that's fairly reliable and actively downvoting plagiarism? I had delegated some to ac-cheetah, but I noticed that it seemed to have become dormant, so I pulled the delegation back.

 3 years ago 

I knew that the developers (who don't seem to be very active) had Tron affiliations, but not that the booming accounts did too. That explains some things.

That's right - the booming accounts are overseen by somebody called Joanna based in Singapore. Users who choose booming votes have access to her and I believe she then passes on a list of posts to the developers to upvote (which is why the votes are often clustered).

Did you see this post that I reblogged? - https://steemit.com/hive-101145/@happyberrysboy/happyberrysboy-posting-2022-03-27-19-36

It's by one of the UPVU developers with their ideas for future changes to UPVU. I suggest sharing some of your ideas with him and seeing what his thoughts are. He's suggested a few bits that could reduce the spam which will hopefully come to fruition.

Do you happen to know if there is an account that's fairly reliable and actively downvoting plagiarism? I had delegated some to ac-cheetah, but I noticed that it seemed to have become dormant, so I pulled the delegation back.

At the moment, no. papi.mati should be giving me the keys to ac-cheetah once his power down's complete - which I believe it now is. I haven't pushed him because I'm not sure I want the responsibility again (I previously ran @endingplagiarism and it was horribly demoralising).

Just repliedd to the developer, here.

Let me know if you start up with the plagiarism again, and I'll send a delegation back. I understand your reluctance. It's hard work without much reward, and people don't have much tolerance for the inevitable errors.

Aside from going back to the rewards algorithm, the only other way I can imagine it being sustainable is through a LifeLock style subscription service where content producers elsewhere on the Internet pay to have their content protected. That would be a major undertaking, though.