Quick Thought on Steemit Catfish

A recent post has identified the rise of identity theft on steemit. Some savvy individuals have taken it upon themselves to create introduce yourself posts that are nothing but lies. Now that we know these posts were lies we feel like our trust was violated.

Perspective is Reality

In an effort to cope with this violation, it is helpful to remember how this person made us feel when they made the post. That feeling was real, even if it was ultimately an illusion. They gave our community something we wanted and spent time and effort producing original content.

Many people who have posted pure fiction and gotten upvoted because we liked what we saw and we appreciated the effort. The catfish introduction posts are just another form of fiction writing that appealed to the voters.

In other words, the individual gave us all what we were looking for and put at least as much effort into their creative writing as other posters.

Going Forward

As Steem grows it is important that we move away from #introduceyourself posts and look for higher quality. People should still post in #introduceyourself so that we have a public record of who you are. One day that post might just enable us to recover your account if you get hacked.

I encourage people to stop voting on introduce yourself posts, but instead use the post as means to add people to your list to be followed. This way you can see more content from them in the future.

#introduceyourself is a great place to discover new writers that might be worth following. That alone should be enough reason to post an introduction. Financial rewards will come later.

Summary

Don't fret over spilt milk. People are going to game the voting and that is part of the "cost of doing business". Over time we will learn and voters will become more savvy. These catfish are just helping us learn. That which doesn't kill us will only make us stronger.