The Critic Issue 2 - The Good The Bad And The Ugly

Welcome to your safe space for criticism. In the interest of some balanced opinion, I will be providing the voice of criticism to Steemit. That's not to say that I'll be whinging and whining and complaining (that's not my style), no I'll be adding some much needed constructive criticism to the platform, with my very own brand of @cryptogee cynicism.

So without further ado, let's dive into the second edition of The Critic.

The Good - Extended Reward times and commenting

Those of you that know me and whom have been following my blog, will know that from a fairly early stage in Steemit's development, I have been petitioning for longer reward and comment times.

My thinking was simple, I have come across articles on a variety of platforms that have been years old, yet have still been of tremendous value to me. In fact when old articles like that get commented upon, they will often find themselves back on top of the trending list for whatever platform they are on.

I have always had a problem with the way Steemit articles had a 24 hour burn time, in which the author had just one solitary day to promote their article, and curators had one day to vote on them.

The amount of times I came across articles days after they had been written, that I wanted to vote on, was too numerous to count.

However this has now changed with HF18, and I must say it is refreshing to find an article five days after it was written and still have time to vote on it. So in the interest of balanced criticism, I want to offer a loud bravo! to the Steemit devs for making this so.

Also being able to comment, and reply to new comments on old articles is very welcomed, in fact not long before HF18 I saw a comment which I couldn't reply to on an old article, which was frustrating to say the least.

Critic Verdict: A Step in the right direction; although the ability to edit old articles would be a big plus. Especially for those of us out there in Steem Land who have tutorials that may now be out of date.

The Bad - Delayed Signups

Hopefully this is about to be fixed very soon, however we are still getting reports of delayed signups. In other words, there are people out there who are ready and willing to join our fair community of Steemians, and they cannot do it instantly.

This for me is unacceptable, why oh why should someone have to wait longer than it does to ping them a confirmation email? I have heard of a couple of people not only having to wait, but not having any indication as to how long they will have to wait.

Do our Overlords want this platform to grow or not? I'm assuming the answer is yes, growth is the key to any business, let alone one that relies on human, social interaction. To thrive, strengthen and grow has got to be at the heart of any strategic plan.

I have heard excuses like "...but we're in beta", which to me is a pathetic excuse, if there is an ability to sign up then that signup should happen within minutes, not hours, not days, and definitely not weeks.

I feel the upshot of this, at a time when Steem is rising in price, and therefore regaining some popularity, is damaging to the platform.

Critic Verdict: This needs to be fixed and fast, we have already squandered a chance for mass adoption last summer, it will be very depressing if this happens a second time.

The Ugly - User Interface Updates

I could talk about a few things here, however I will keep it down to the UI (User Interface), after over a year of it being practically the same, I feel it is time for a change. Being able to adjust your profile settings was definitely a good thing, as was the addition of a personal feed.

However there are still lots of things left to be desired. I for one, would like to see some kind of grouping capability, whereby I can group types of posts, led by tags and titles, into an easy to reach group which I can access with a single click or two.

Secondly the case of the disappearing tags is also just not on. I believe I've mentioned before, that I had a motion graphics, industry professional, join and leave Steemit because of the tags.

This individual actually spent more money on his post than he recouped in rewards, however he was happy to do so, as he felt that Steemit had real potential to be an industry disruptor. At the moment, most people within that industry post their show reels on Vimeo.

However there is no hierarchical voting system with that platform, and he felt that Steemit could be a real game changer for a lot of editors, directors, motion graphic artists, and film makers in general. He was so excited to be the first industry pro to be on Steemit, however water was quickly poured on the flames of his enthusiasm, when he realised the tag he started faded away into oblivion after 30 days.

Critic Verdict: This type of thing is short-termism in the extreme and needs to be fixed, the money and the expertise is there, so please Steemit inc. make it happen, let's have sticky tags that are easily accessible.

REMEMBER GOOD CRITICISM CAN TURN INTO EXCELLENT FEEDBACK, DON'T BE AFRAID TO VOICE YOUR OPINIONS. LET ME KNOW BELOW OR IN CHAT WHERE WE SHOULD BE PUSHING FORWARDS WE CAN CRITICISE AND BE POSITIVE AT THE SAME TIME! LET ME KNOW BELOW!!

Cryptogee