This is just a post for ranting. Very negative feeling ahead. **Warning: do not read as it will spoil your breakfast, lunch and dinner depending on which time zone you are.

So today, @anyz posted this article The Steemit Tragedy of The Commons, i must say it is well-written and addressed most of my concerns about steemit's future. In particular, i refer to current steemit's content which is, i believe to be a race to the bottom in content quality.

WHY? Let's break down....

Copy-and-paste science content

Let's see here. this copy-and-paste post here https://steemit.com/news/@nkdk/scientists-have-created-nanorobots-that-can-travel-down-the-bloodstream-and-precisely-target-cancerous-tumors was worth SD 563 before @smooth and several whales downvoted this. But let's face it.

As the number of users grows, even with @smooth's army of curators, how many such copied and pasted content can we catch?

COMPARE THIS WITH several content such as

@justryme90 Science Lesson: DNA (Part 4, What is DNA Damage? SD 10.32

@ben.zimmerman Age-related cognitive decline SD 0.15

@lemouth The bestiary of particle physics - this is how I introduced particle physics to CERN summer students SD 349.19

@nonlinearone @deviedevon on environment @claudiop63

and many other steemians who wrote original content on science, engineering and mathematics alike.

I am just feeling so disheartened and unbalanced about the poorly distributed rewards. You can argue that quality content is subjective blah blah blah. But you do can distinguish a good science post versus copied content like this, isn't it? Obviously, people upvoted randomly and not based on good science.

Is this the kind of rewards scientists are getting for contributing original and quality content which is good science post at steemit?

This is stranger than strange and stranger than fiction. But, actually it is not that strange. It brings me to another point why they are not upvoted enough.

Selfish whales and dolphins

And amidst all this uneven distribution, there are also squabbles and political fights between whales and dolphins. I am a baby dolphin. I joined early June, around the same time line as many other big dolphins. If i had actively wrote on steemit in my blog all the time, i would have become a fat dolphin by now. But, by choice, i did not because i sincerely believe that steemit can be a place for non-steemit content. I also used to think that steemians are sensible and altruistic. HOW WRONG WAS I!!!!

Obviously, i have not been voting "correctly" like them because i really have been upvoting on content i like and not been racing for the curation rewards. We should expect many big dolphins and whales to be upvoting content posted by new steemians and helping new steemians but obviously they are not going to waste their voting power on posts that were not potentially upvoted by whales.

Trending content obviously not written by non-expert in science

I also do have a BIG problem with content on the trending page and obviously not written by non-experts. A few real-life scientists and professionals talk about it briefly here about verification of our advanced degrees at Verify Your Degree #proofofdegree A New Tag For Verification of Advanced Degrees You can see our discussion there.

@business mentioned that scientists should be given more weight than layman here at steemit because c'mon, we are the real scientists who can really endorse. We know, understand and can interpret the state-of-art and landscapes in our respective fields much better than laymen at steemit.

Why do our opinions not carry more weight when it comes to science at steemit?

All in all, Steemit is not stable

Relegate this blog to only post exclusively on #academiaspotlight

I had wanted to write about my research on environment, life cycle assessment and 3dprinting when i wrote about moving my phd research to steemit. It was a great feeling having @ned support. He was the first whale to upvote. But, i worry now that the research content that i am going to upload is going to cost me dearly in the future such as copyright issues and not being able to get fair incentives for original content.

For this reason, i have decided to relegate this blog to blog exclusively on #academiaspotlight issues and not any of my original content on #science #academia because of the following reasons:

1. Help and encourage new steemian
2. Increase profile of new steemian
3. I still get to write on science
4. Reserve my own content, be it for my own blog, or for future academic pursuits.

That's it. That's just what i want to say. Enough ranting. The sun will still rise from the east tomorrow as usual. Good night.

P/S: Copied and pasted science content that got way more reward than original science content put me off and has an serious disincentive effect on steemians who blogged on science here. As much as i want to be accountable for my post about moving my phd research to steemit and also to @ned who supported by upvoting it, let's face it that steemit is not a good platform for good science as of now. And we know that science and engineering knowledge are very precious and valuable because they can be turned into IP or papers. A message for all steemians who see this. Please vote wisely.