There's always going to be people upset they are getting flagged or downvoted as we call it these days. The discussion seems worn out, exhausting at times, but I'm thinking I do have a couple of points to contribute, and I hope I'm allowed to bore people a bit with them today.

To be a dangerous Hivean

It would appear I'm about to go on an unnecessary tangent, but I promise I will make sense in the end.

I would also say that even though I'm not a fan of Jordan Peterson these days (because of his politics really), there are lessons he's taught me that I find very significant to my philosophy of life, being this one among the most important:

"A harmless man is not a good man. A good man is a very dangerous man who has that under voluntary control."

There's a lot to unpack here, and maybe I won't be able to address it all in one post, but I want to focus on something implied by this truth, if I'm allowed to call it that.

We ought to be dangerous, we should want to be dangerous, have the power to right wrongs, while at the same type hope that we never have to.

The idea that we can live in a world without danger is naive at best. And, more importantly, the idea that the people will always do what's right is incompatible with observable reality.

If I was to apply these ideas to Hive, to our social experiment, I would say:

we should want for there to be people here who are dangerous, who can right the wrongs if the situation calls for it, while at the same time use this power only when it's absolutely necessary.

Let's make it more Petersonian for fun:

A hive user with no stake is not a good user by default. A good hivean is one that has stake, has power, can affect the network and user's experiences greatly, but choses to do what's best for hive not just for himself.

If I was to steal some words from the $LEO project, I would say: We need noble lions here.

But...

What if we declaw everyone?

I'm not going to sit here and tell you that I know why other Hive type experiments have failed. But I will say that I know for a fact some of them, like Whaleshares were built on nothing but good intentions.

As a matter of fact, I think I remember distinctly the reasons why Whaleshares, for example, came about, and I want to say it was because downvotes and drama had effectively pushed out some otherwise enthusiastic Hiveans (steemians at the time). They really thought declawing the system was the way to go, getting rid of bots and downvotes did seem like a good recipe for success. but, What happened?

As of me writing this post, and as far as I know Whaleshares is no longer operational, but there is still one "clone" out there, or should I say one fork who is giving it a go.

You know about Blurt?

I don't remember the drama to be honest with you all, and maybe that's not as important to my little exploration here. Maybe it's enough to say that the team who forked out into Blurt, wanted also to fix what they considered downvote abuse.

A capable team of once prominent Steemians/Hiveans, mind you, that ran many successful projects on this blockchain in the early days.

As we can see from the price action, the grass is looking not quite so green on the other side of the fence. Even if I was to analyze it's current situation without taking the price of $blurt into account, I would still find a network gasping for air, with very little users. As a matter of fact, trending posts have two upvotes and no comments, and I think that proves my point perfectly.

Is everything perfect?

Obviously not, and I hope I'm not sounding like a cheerleader here. All I'm saying is that as far as I can tell removing downvotes is not going to fix Hive magically, as some people think it will.

If you however believe that the system is rigged, that the little guy has no chance here, and that the evil downvoters are the ones keeping you down. Then, all I can say, and I say this respectfully:

What's your solution? A real one?

Because every single time someone tells me remove downvotes altogether what I picture in my head is a young man telling me how socialism does work, but it has never been truly implemented.

Food for thought, as they say

MenO

MenO