Check Before You Upvote!
Reading through Steemit posts has become one of my favorite pass times. I especially like the introduceyourself section because it is like a gateway where new Steemians enter and we can welcome them into this great community (sounds corny, I know). Alas, all is not well with our gateway into Steemit.
The Welcome Mat
Ah yes, welcoming those new Steemians into our Steemit Community. Greeting them, giving them tips to help them get their bearings in the social media capital of the world. Wishing them luck with their future endeavours. Is there anything better than just being nice to the new kids on the block?
The not so nice
Introduceyourself and gaming are probably my favorite sections and I visit them daily to see who is joining Steemit and what the latest is on the gaming front.
However I have been seeing a trend lately in the Introduceyourself section,
Perhaps it always was like this and I just hadn't noticed it until now.
I was browsing the Introduceyourself section, just looking for interesting new Steemians and saw a picture of a particular nice looking woman. Being a man, of course I checked the post (and by the looks of it so had a lot of other people before me). The woman had posted some nice pictures of herself modeling, but something was off.
A quick search on the Google image search engine revealed that this woman was actually a famous model.
Now I am not saying that it could not be possible for a model to join a cryptocurrency driven Social Media site, but the fact that she had not verified herself and that the pictures she posted were readily available on the internet made me question the fact that she really was the person behind the post.
From that moment on I became quite suspicious of all posts containing attractive looking women introducing themselves as new Steemians. And sure enough a lot of the pictures of these "new" Steemians turn out to be copy-pasted from the internet.
Check out this new Steemian, beautiful isn't she? Now do a google search of that picture and you will find that the picture belongs to a model, Kimberly Blanco.
Even more Copycats
Another time I was reading a rather interesting Bitcoin article about traders from LocalBitcoins in Belgium who were arrested by the police. The article was well written, so I was inclined to give the post an upvote, but then I noticed a comment from our old friend "cheetah" who had found a "similar" article. "Similar" being an understatement because the post and article were exactly the same, down to the pictures.
The poster had added the source (which was good) but why would I upvote something that had not been written by the person who posted it? Was the poster expecting a finder's fee for the article, or trying trick people into thinking that he had written the article? My feeling is that it was the latter.
Looking for attention
If you scroll down the posts in the Introduceyourself section you will see that most posts aren't even about people introducing themselves. The section is being used as a kind of promotion channel to get upvotes. These posts are cluttering up the channel and making it harder for new Steemians to get noticed.
The Takeaway
Check before you upvote
People who are not holding up a card or something else that says Steemit are a red flag. Also look for links to social media sites that prove that the person is who they claim to be.Google is your friend
Reverse search images on Google. Go to "Google images" and click on the little camera in the search bar. Copy-Paste the link of the image you want to lookup so you can verify who the person in the photo is.
The same goes for text, If you have your suspicions about the originality of a post, just copy-paste a part of the text into the Google search engine to see if you get any results.Bots are also your friends
There are quite of bots busy with identifying plagiarism, just be sure to look for comments by bots like @cheetah before you upvote a post.Don't reward people who are posting in the introduceyourself section but are not introducing themselves.
I am not so naive that we can completely stop people from abusing the system but I do hope that the spam will decline as soon as it becomes clear that copy-pasta and deception will not be rewarded.
How do you deal with Fake and Copy-Pasta posts? Let me know in the comment section.
Best Time To Post Follow Up
The Story behind Inside
Curation and Content
Signature Tips
After The Split: BCC and BCH
Thank you for sharing with us! I hope you enjoy the upvote!
yeah, I've seen more posts with photos of attractive women, it's usually fairly obvious so I avoid. about content we should avoid any kind of copying, but do provide links as references if you write a long story and relied on some online publications/articles for info sources.
Hey @clumsysilverdad, I just realized that I was not following you yet. I have corrected my mistake :)
So it's not just me noticing more and more beautiful women joining Steemit. Adding sources is a must and also adds value to your post. I don't think that someone should be upvoted if he/she just copied some article even if they name the source.
Thank you (-: Yes, I agree... I don't think that's healthy for a blogging site that is supposed to have user-posted stories, but I'm new to the format and learning.
If it interests you, upvote it. If it doesn't ... well then do not upvote it. I wouldn't mind people aggregating some info as long as it is not plagiarized. As for people being total phonies and posing as someone else ... they can at least come out and say it is a "fan page" or something like that.
But the point is that people are trying to pass off work as their own. The example I gave in my post had nothing to do with a "fan page" the poster called the girl in the photos her/his sister, Hermosa while the girl in the pictures is a famous model from Venezuela. What you say makes sense though but even then, they shouldn't be posting in #introduceyourself. A lot of people get tricked into upvoting content that is fake.
This makes a very good point. I have seen duplicate posts here from different people. It is one thing if its the same author re-posting on here along with another source but there area few that are not the original author just creating copy/paste posts. My thought on it is if I like it I will up-vote but if its not the original author and I can identify that I will not. I know that I do some copy/paste posts from sources that I have permission and even change the content as needed. However if I am blogging something that I copy and paste info into I definitely include the original source info and URL and it is only for small portions of my posts not the entire blog. I like to use some other peoples content as fillers on occasion. One spot that I don't always have ability to give credit is using pictures and clips on my posts. I do note who's it was if possible or just hope there is or isn't a watermark in the clip.
I also use pictures and clips in my posts from other sources but always add the source. If I find a source that has great info about a subject I am writing about I will add a link to the source and describe in my own words what the other writer is trying to convey.
Do you pay them?
@jerryperkinsii51
". I like to use some other peoples content as fillers on occasion. One spot that I don't always have ability to give credit "
If not...you have stolen their content!
good post, given me something to look out for.
Thanks, looking for all those new Steemian models can be hard work ;)
I see a lot of this, usually I'll spot them out by a comment left on a post, very generic, but I'll check them out. Then I'll note how there introduction claims them to be born in the states yet their grammar and spelling are way below standard, their photos are obviously catfishes, and yet somehow they have got up to a 41 rep. Usually a few of these accounts are strung together, each giving the other relevance, a micro chasm of up votes that succeed in building rep with generic comments. Usually these accounts prey on noobs who don't quite understand how Steem works. I wish their was a disposal council of elders/whales that these deceptive garbage accounts could be fed to for review, then eliminated. Community standards and use of service should dictate that there are improper ways to go about business. The easiest way to check for these deceptive accounts is to start with generic comments you receive, then checking them against other comments left by the same account. Follow this with a check of their introduction. Perhaps they have a limited grasp of English or are 10, in which case they may only need guidance and help. But if it still seems fishy... I've taken to adding to a mute list until stronger action can be taken, my vote is not strong enough to fight an army of trolls.
I haven't used the mute option yet, I think it is a good way to "drown out the noise". Thanks for the tips, these are good ways to see if you are dealing with scam artists.
I came across a photo the other day of a bird. I reverse searched it and found the original.
I suspect it was just a copy paste job but without knowing the identity of the steemit poster or the original poster?
Who's to say whether it was their photo or not? Tricky question.
I have 100's of photos all over the web with my ©mamulcahy or ©molometer on them.
I'm a big contributor to Google maps, YouTube and several blogs.
Some I may use on steemit.
It's easy to prove they are my work.
How can we call someone out without proper evidence?
Unless we find the original content owner we are on thin ice.
The signup process to steemit needs more rigor and ID checks if we really want stop the abuse. Dead.
I know this Problem very well. As a ocd curator I also have to check every post before nominating it, but try to Report this People to steemcleaner and you will get some SP as reward it is very nice.
Hey @jeanpi1908, I didn't know you could report these people. How do you do that? Btw I love the OCD reports :)
Go to steemit.chat and go to the chanel steemcleaner-linkdrop and drop thier links there
This post has received a 0.28 % upvote from @drotto thanks to: @banjo.
Very true, this kind of activity has been on rise for past two months
Yeah, to me it also seems like the fake posts have increased, especially in the #introduceyourself section. It would be a bad thing if this trend continuous.
For multi use abuse, there is a bot working great goes by name of @goodbot , i hope to cater fraudulent images new bot will come soon.