Curator Cat says: The Name of the Social Game is... ENGAGEMENT!
Steemit — along with the growing family of front end apps that access the Steem blockchain — is a Social Content Platform.
People can turn, twist, redefine and tweak that to their hearts' content, but no matter how you turn things, what we do here revolves around "creating something" and posting it online, in a group or "social" setting.
Today, I want to share a little more serious post with you... although there will be cat photos!
Are you paying attention?
In the Most Basic Sense
Again, it's not rocket science that the reason people (or let's just say "95% of people," to be on the safe side) create content and share it online is that they have hopes or desires or expectations of other people seeing it an somehow interacting with it.
Very few of us operate in a total vacuum.
Very few of us create something and just toss it somewhere, like you might do with a Kleenex after blowing your nose.
Now, yes, there's going to be a small number out there whose solitary purpose for posting — for doing ANYthing, for that matter — is going to be to make money. With them, we could be making tacos, playing tiddlywinks, doing crossword puzzles or something else, and their only concern would still be "what will I be rewarded for clicking this button?"
This post will be pretty meaningless to them.
Cats do too use computers!
Social Means Connecting
For the rest of us, a community like Steemit is pretty an actions with benefits situation. We engage in an activity which we (hopefully!) enjoy and the fringe benefit is that we get rewarded.
Around here we like cats, we like photography and we like sharing musings and stories. That results in Curator Cat's blog... which is pretty much an interactive endeavor. The Curator Cat blog would not exist were it not for the many interesting and friendly people (and cats!) we interact and engage with here.
And when we post... we don't do so with the thought "I wonder how many BOTS or SCRIPTS will discover this post?" We're looking for people; real connections.
Yesterday, I came across @conradsuperb's post entitled Attention ALL: Steemit Needs More Manual Curators for Future Success which is well worth a read! The post makes yet one more case for the importance of the human element of social sites.
Sure, it's nifty that you can buy bid bot votes and be part of curation trails so you don't ever have to actually do anything... but REALLY?
Sounds to me a lot like building a great pizza oven; getting all the ingredients to make perfect pizza... and then ordering Pizza Hut to-go, night after night.
What the hell is the POINT?
All kittens are striped, even black ones...
Social Media Gamification and the Human Factor
It's a well known fact that we cats love to play with things. If something is like play or a game, it's just more fun!
In the past few weeks, I have come across a number of posts addressing the issue of increasing the "gamification" aspects of the Steem experience as a measure for increasing engagement and interaction in our community.
I believe that would be a definite boon to the ecosystem.
I'll give a first-hand shoutout to a couple of people with initiatives that functionally demonstrate the value of gamification and how it increases engagement.
One would be @abh12345 who runs the weekly Curation and Engagement Leagues in cooperation with @curie.
I have been a part of the Leagues (highly recommended!) almost since I started on Steemit, and there is no doubt it has not only motivated me to be more active in the community, but it has also helped me build a following... and some friends!
But that's just my feeling about it. The actual numbers are far more convincing.
My housemate BeBe sleeps through almost everything...
Case Study: The Value of Gamification — Hard Facts
I spent a little time doing some casual number crunching (hey, I'm a CAT, not a mathematician!) using the figures from the most recent "Curation and Engagement League" standings and comparing them to @penguinpablo's most recent post of Weekly Steem Statistics.
The results are pretty telling.
From all of the Steem ecosystem, 43,275 "active" accounts produced 357,598 top level posts + comments for the week ending Sunday, January 6th, 2019. That works out to 8.26 posts per active user for the week.
From the Curation and Engagement Leagues, just the top 100 participants (there are about 350 active members in the Leagues) created 13,585 posts. That works out to 135.85 posts per active user for the week!
We can state that a little differently, too: Just 0.23% of the active user base created 3.80% of the entire ecosystem's content!
That would certainly suggest that this version of gamification has an impact!
A well-balanced cat!
Case Study: Making Minnows and Dolphins
The second gamification initiative that comes to mind was created and run by @paulag who runs the Redfish Power UP League and Wall of Fame which is also sponsored by @curie.
This initiative focuses more on the gamification of powering up, which is an essential element of long term retention of active community members.
If you're part of a "game" where your rank revolves around watching where you stand in terms of powering up... you're going to be a lot less likely to pull your stake out of Steem... and that's a different kind of "stickiness" (aka "Brand loyalty") we desperately need around here.
A similar initiative is run on the @steemcommunity account, here helping Minnows power up to become Dolphins.
I'll be watching you!
Playing the Social Game
The idea of turning social content into a game is nothing new... it can be traced back to early web message boards where users were awarded different "badges" for their different participation levels.
The long and the short of it is that most people are inherently competitive... and we like to see "how we're doing" in relation to everyone else.
Entire businesses have been built around "gamifying" social media, with various degress of success. Now defunct Klout.com was an early player in the game; subsequently we have had Empire Avenue ("The Social Stock Market") which is now part of the Kred organization.
Successful or not, each of these used gamification to build both loyalty and engagement... and that's something we can really use in the Steem environment!
Appreciate your readership! If this issue is something you believe is important, please consider re-steeming this post for additional visibility!
Have a wonderful day!
Long time no meow, @curatorcat. Hope you're doing fine?
What you state in your post is absolutely true. Engagement is the key to success/survival of this place.
And gamification is an excellent way to motivate people to do so.
Since I'm playing Steemmonsters, my level of engagement has dropped because of lack of time. Still, every time I see Asher's post on Sunday, and my name is somewhere halfway the list again, I actually feel guilty, lol. Just an example to confirm it works - for competitive people as myself, at least.
Hi there @simplymike! It's nice to see you... I have not forgotten you helped me get going in the start, here!
I see SteemMonsters as a definitely bonus for the Steem blockchain — and it's very interactive, in its own way. Not only that, it's the only "direct access point" to Steem we have... as far as I know, it's currently the ONLY way you can (effectively, even if it's indirect) buy a Steem account using your regular debit card. That's HUGE, in terms of onboarding people who aren't into blockchain and crypto.
I've been slacking off a little bit, myself, because there's SO much that needs to be done here... the Hoomans just don't have as much time for a cat blog as they once did...
=^..^=
I think with the almost year long decline in the value of steem, the people that are primarily on steemit, and the steem blockchain are those that are here for as an alternative to other more mainstream social media places. If it was all about the money people would be over on other sites that offer similar as the steem blockchain. There may be some others out there, I know of a few, but I am still here because, well chasing around a bunch of others looking for the pot of gold at the end of a rainbow, just is not my cup of tea any more.
About the cats, One of my chihuahua's loves his Loki cat. Even though Loki is almost 3 times bigger than him.
As long as there are people posting pictures and actually telling a little bit about them, or posting stories, or just posting friendly things, I think there will always be people being people on the blockchains.
I tried another blockchain, post had to be reviewed before they would be posted, the one post I tried to do did not have enough words, and was about another blockchain. Yeah they offered and still as far as I know offer their coin/token just for signing in. Then they made it difficult, they wanted to put a tracking cookie and wanted you to agree to it, so I have not been fully back in the account, I keep checking to see if they removed the cookie tracker, but they have not as of last check.
Steem blockchain for now is free of that sort of stuff, and I think that is one of the biggest sellers of steem blockchain. Not how fast or how many transactions it can handle, but mostly how people treat each other here, there are issue, there always will be issues when people are involved.
Is it gamification? Not so sure about that, I too have seen the gamification post, but I think most people, well at least 0.23% of them are real humans, and that is enough for now, and that number will grow.
I agree with your post 100%, well said. I like that i have not been attacked here by the Shitposters that run rabid on the Twatter / Fecesbook Socialist Media sites. I wish i would have came over here sooner.
I got a down vote on one of My posts awhile back from a psycho shitposter on here posing as a Legion Creep.
I see my Cat Friend has a downvote on this post. I am new here, So let me ask, why would anyone down vote a good post like this or my harmless cat post...?
Posted using Partiko Android
Can't really add much to what @bashadow said... the "random downvoters" are just some disgruntled people who got extensively flagged for plagiarism, spam and shitposting. The particular downvote I am thinking about (I get it, from time to time) is all but worthless... it's something like a 2% downvote from an account with 50 Steem Power and perpetually 5% remaining voting power.
It's effect is meant to be purely psychological, to make newcomers feel unwelcome and thereby "hurt" Steemit. I have learned to just ignore them...
=^..^=
There are reasons to downvote, most of it seems to do with greed. Some people do not want to see other post get a big payout, big payout being a relative term to the one doing the down voting. Some people think they can downvote anything for any reason at all. Then there is the "do as I say, not as I do crowd", that will down vote anything at all they do not like. It does not matter where you go in the world real or virtual, there are always those that want to control what you can say, or do. Only thing I can say is if it is a meaningless abusive down vote, report it to @steemcleaners, they may do something about it, they may not.
The number of meaningless "social Justice warrior" down voters are beginning to fade away. They have become meaningless to most of the people on steemit. Most of the down votes are at only $0.0001 completely meaningless, laughable in fact in most cases. Those down voters are so afraid of life and reactions to their down votes that they are very careful to have never uttered a word on the steem blockchain.
Some people like to dish it out, they just can not take it when it is served back up to them. Ignore them, or report them, only two real options. When/if you ever get high enough on the reputation chain to where their retaliatory down votes can not touch you then you could think about stooping to their low ego/self esteem level and down vote them as revenge. but it would get you nothing.
Hi @bashadow, thanks for stopping by and sharing your thoughts!
History (or at least my previous personal experience) tells me that there are always going to be "cash grabbers" whenever a venue even hints at the possibility that you can get rewarded for your efforts. History also suggests that they tend to be a pretty impatient lot, and most of them have wildly unrealistic "get rick quick" expectations.
In general, two primary outcomes are possible... (1) they suck a venue dry and things simply stop because all the "good actors" have left in disgust or (2) they discover it's just too difficult to make those hoped-for riches, so they leave in disgust, or in the pursuit of a pot-of-gold placed by someone else who was able to tell a better story about riches.
For me, the appeal of Steemit is that I can build stake in the venue I am using, and I am part of a system that has at least the potential to change the way we treat rewarding web content. I love the whole pay-it-forward and "gift economy" principle... we reward each other; we don't get rewards from some "central authority" that might go bankrupt tomorrow... or the owners run away with all the cash.
Any types of gamification helps make Steemit "sticky" for me. For example, I often check my rank on steemst.com... try to see if I can't keep on climbing. Same thing keeps me returning to Asher's leagues. Trying to become a Minnow, here... keep plugging away!
=^..^=
Very well polished piece that addresses some of the most pressing, and reoccurring issues, we users, experience.
It makes no sense that we are not all in this together, trying to help curate each other’s work across the Steem blockchain.
I think much of the concern is content visibility. As you said, the number of posts per week for the number of ‘active’ users is pretty high. Much of the content around here simply gets swept under the doormat, which, from there, just collects the dust from everyone’s shoes that walk in the door.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts and mentioning me in this dire message of hope for Steems future 🐱🙏🏼👌🏼
Posted using Partiko iOS
I think it's just important for all of us to find our niches here, and then to support each other's work. I may not be interested in everything someone posts... and if I am following 200 people I may not have the physical time to get around to everyone, every day.
Part of what we must also realize is that there's an education element involved here. People who aren't all that familiar with social media may just come here, post a few things, and not realize that unless they go around and "socialize" with other users, they won't get found. There's no "import your contacts from gmail" feature here.
Thanks for the support!
=^..^=
It’s a new wave, and a learning curve to this realm of social media is definitely required for overall success. I think this place has some real potential, and I’m glad we’ve found it before the herds...
Stay steeming, my friend
Bye for Meow 😊🐱
Posted using Partiko iOS
All interesting points. I'm trying to engage more with the community myself and comment more often when I can. Great read @curatorcat!
Thank you! In many ways, the best thing we can do is SET the examples of what we want others to follow.
=^..^=
Good kitty 🐈. You earned some catnip. Just don't overdo it like this one.
Posted using Partiko Android
Thanks for the catnip @anthonydavisii — I will stay away from getting completely baked like that!
=^..^=
Thank you @curatorcat!
There is certainly more than comments and up-votes by way of increasing engagement and retention, and one of these aspects is gamification. You are spot on with the assessment that people like to see how they are doing in comparison to others, and a little friendly competition never hurt anyone for sure.
When I started out with 10/15 names for my first ever curation league, I never expected to now be holding over 500 accounts (350 active last week) in a database, who have willingly put their name forward to be a part of the leagues.
For many, they are no longer there for the chance to win a little STEEM, but use the data as a gauge to how they are doing with both curation and engagement. Some compare to others, some compare to their recent history, both are sound approaches towards self-improvement as assistance to find a sweet spot here on Steem.
As I stated in my reply to you on this weeks' Leagues post, I've taken a bit of flak recently as a witness, and in reference to that I quote:
And so when I read posts like this, my motivation returns as I read that members of the community do see value in what my account (as one half of the SC witness), @paulag (as the other half) with the Redfish League, and the SC witness account itself provides.
Thank you very much for your support, I knew there was a reason I favoured cats over dogs :)
Gamification has a lot of value in social media simply because it helps make a venue "sticky," and when you're part of something like your Leagues... there's also a building sense of community there... you feel like you are part of something.
I know you give away prizes every week, but that really hasn't been in the picture for me... I don't have the social media time to be competitive in that (I think the highest I have ever finished — so far — was 28th), but I still love checking in to see who's leading, and whether we have any "hot newcomers."
I believe the @steemcommunity witness does add value; I would suspect most of your critics have technical developer blockchainiac leanings. My response to that would be "What good is a smoking hot blockchain if nobody's out there pounding the pavement to get actual USERS for it?" As I may have said before... that's akin to building a souped-up Ferrari in a small village in Alaska that has no paved roads.
=^..^=
I cant believe all 3 of our initiatives have been promoted like this. Myself and @abh12345 are witness partners on @steemcommunity and I echo what asher has already said in the comments. I feel very honored to see such post.
I also welcome anyone that want to join the leagues, they are load of fun, a way to meet like minded people, motivating and a way to keep track.
Thank you sooooo much @curatorcat. I feel like purrrrrring now
Your initiatives definitely deserve it, Paula... of course we need technology and developer savvy witnesses, but without community, you just end up playing the world's greatest show to an empty house.
I will certainly continue to promote the leagues, in my own small way!
=^..^=
My Hooman is just interested in the Pizza you spoke of..... lol
But I was purring over the photos, What a purr fectly catastic pair Shad & Bebe are...!
My Driver, that Hooman that I have to keep bugging so He will feed me, like I am right now, I just jumped up on his chest as He was typing this for me. He says we Got into Trucking for that "Pot o Gold" near the Rainbows End. Turns out it was a "Port o Potty."
Good thing I say, We don't want him using My litter box, alltho He digs thru that every day looking for the little treasures i bury for him...... LoLMeowLoL.....
#catsofsteemit
Posted using Partiko Android
Life is always better with a cat. Or several cats. Just keep reminding your Hooman of that!
Maybe there IS a pot 'o gold out there, somewhere... but being on the road as much as you are, remember to enjoy the journey and appreciate the many sights you take in along the way!
=^..^=
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Thank you for the support @pennsif!
=^..^=
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