The Eclipse Of Justin Sun: What will Steemians do?

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Here I am once again writing about this @justinsunsteemit guy because I feel like I am one of only a handful of voices speaking out against what is currently going on with the whole Steemit Incorporated purchase, the misconceptions around it, the confusion that has risen and fallen the last several days and all the discussion centered around the upheaval that has occurred.

Given that I do not have some huge stake or a bunch of fiat that I invested into the Steem ecosystem I feel like if I make some enemies along the way by 'going against the grain' it will not overly impact me. Perhaps more folks with large stakes should be making their own voices heard but hey I understand the gamble they are taking by either stepping forward or remaining silent and that it is their choice to make.

After all I am just a 'bottom feeder' in this ecosystem because everything I have here (in cryptocurrency) I have earned as a content creator that has just relentlessly kept plugging along sharing what I can to the best of my ability. As much as what I earn each month on here might seem like mere 'pocket change' to most... it actually comprises nearly half of my monthly income and thus has a massive impact upon my quality of life.

I generally try to do what I call 'sticking to my genre' concerning what I write about and what I share because it is not only 'what I know' but also I think that folks enjoy the consistency but all of that aside I just cannot sit idly by 'silence my own voice' and not say what is on my mind about what I see unfolding before me because the implications are incredibly ominous in my perspective. I am assuredly not so arrogant to think that my perspective is not biased and/or skewed but hey I think everyone's is to one degree or another and we are all absolutely entitled to expressing ourselves (or not) however we see fit.

What I have seen over the last several days is @justinsunsteemit saying one thing, backpedaling on it, saying another thing, then today doing more backpedaling and going back to saying what he was originally saying especially in regards to migrating Steemit to the Tron network and doing a token swap. Did that all sound confusing? Well it is!

Perhaps yesterday's AMA (ask me anything) was just intended to momentarily pacify everyone, maybe he fails to understand the nuances of what he actually purchased, maybe he is just doing his usual thing as a salesman/marketer/promotionist which obviously has worked well for him in the past but in this instance the folks he is pitching his 'pitch' to (specifically Steemians) are incredibly resistant to such tactics which as a side note is perhaps a part of why those same Steemians have worked so tirelessly to build and/or participate in one of the few bastions of decentralized censorship resistant platforms on the entire internet where authentic communication can take place in an immutable transparent fashion without the 'narrative' being influenced by advertisers, governments or mega-corporations. Sounds pretty damn good doesn't it? Well it is and it would be incredibly nice to keep it that way.

I do not quite know how to word out what all this stuff truly means to me or what I think the community should actually do in this moment aside from making their intelligent, logical, rational voices heard, having discussions, forming contingencies, preparing for the worst and hoping for the best but all that said a saying from my youth keeps popping into my head that goes roughly like this: A raccoon caught in a trap will often chew off it's own leg to escape.

Thanks for reading!

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23 comments
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The "investors" tout their role in STEEM, but it is we content creators who keep the project viable as more than just another shitcoin. If the new regime shits all over us, we leave, and Sun loses. I hope he understands that.

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(Edited)

Yup I absolutely agree with that. Calling myself a 'bottom feeder' was total snark and a jab at them.

The place might actually be better without some of the 'investors' but it would absolutely fail without content creators.

I think that at this point Sun realizes that he purchased far less than what Ned sold him the idea of purchasing. I almost feel sympathy for Sun but I have a general rule in life of only extending sympathy (or any real sentiment/emotion) towards folks that behave/communicate like actual human beings.

Edited this because I just woke from a nap and called Ned, Dan on accident! Guess it is time for some espresso.

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Disagree... Sun is going to learn he's got a lot more than what he thought and more coming. I don't believe he has a full picture of the capability of Steem or the range of D'Apps already available with more building. Nor did he fully appreciate how active and engaged the community is. He's going to learn.

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(Edited)

Those dApps run on the Steem blockchain and not on Steemit. He did not buy the blockchain. He bought the dApp Steemit.com and the company Steemit Inc.

Edited for clarity.

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I'm well aware of who owns the D'Apps and what Steemit is.

He also bought about 20% of the available Steem which makes him the major stakeholder. Thus he will be interested in what D'Apps are running on Steem and the coming development. Some of which is being done by the very capable development team at Steemit Inc which he does now own.

I guess I needed to explain the obvious in my first comment. My apologies.

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I am unsure if I see your point there. My understanding is that the 20% is not enough to vote in all his own witnesses.

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He has already stated he wont be using his stake to vote in witnesses. Yes, he could very definitely determine the top 20 at this point. The top witness on the platform has about 43million SP voted for him. Justin just acquired about 75million.

HOWEVER what I was saying has zero to do with Witness votes.

If you had just acquired 20% of the available stake of a crypto site. If that stake was worth several million even at the low price it's at, would you not find value in discovering there is a lot more activity and development on the platform then you knew it had?

It might be chump change for him but he's still a business man and he's made an investment.

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I think I see your point now. Thanks for spelling it out.

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Sadly something that I see happening now is that some of the curators that curate my weekly Fantastica Chronicles and have been very supportive have now apparently decided to distance themselves from me over my unpopular stance.

Which is fine and all and something that I knew was more than likely going to happen once I made a choice to take a proactive stance, ask some hard questions and point out some uncomfortable truths and basically not kowtowing (nor ass kissing) to the new 'big player' on the Steem blockchain.

No judgments there... just an observation.

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As of this moment nothing has really changed on the blockchain. A new person is now in control of the keys of the 21%-ish STINC stake. Someone else had control last week. The beat goes one.

It did wake everyone up about the potential corruption which seems intrinsic to DPoS; which had been talked about in old posts on my blog. Hopefully it has jarred Steemians enough to come up with a unique STEEM solution to such potential hostile take overs of DPoS blockchains by closing the potential of corruptions in the top circle of witnesses.

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I agree. Currently the most level-headed approach to thwarting a takeover is one presented by @therealwolf here: https://steempeak.com/hive-111111/@therealwolf/govern-and-protect-steem-vote-for-witnesses-now

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Witness voting is a great idea.

My thought was more to have a HF in the wings which could be deployed at a moment's notice which would not use ninja mined dated coins in a vesting for witness voting. Ninja mining was the original sin and has to be dealt with on a unique basis.

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There are multiple copies of the repos and HF to do that already. They were setup yesterday. :) That is the nuclear option though. Better to deal with it via civil diplomacy first but that being said the option is there and I find that very comforting to say the least.

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(Edited)

The repos have versions which would reconstruct the blockchain and remove the ninja mined coins. My suggestion is that through negotiations have Mr. Sun prove his intention to not use his stake in witness voting by approving an HF which bars ninja mined coins from influencing the witness voting process yet still retain their normal SP benefits elsewhere.

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(Edited)

From my understanding there is a plan similar to that being discussed. I heard it in this past Saturday's MSP Waves radio show.

Your suggestion though would go a long way towards bringing some balance to things. Personally I think perhaps burning the ninja mined tokens would go much further.

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Burning would be the solution yet it would be a lot to ask of someone who paid a few million for it. To force the purge would be bad karma for the chain in my opinion. It would throw imutability out with the cat. 😎

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I agree on both accounts. Forcing his stake out with an HF would dissolve/erode community trust.

He just paid over four million dollars to have a lunch date with a billionaire capitalist so asking him to burn a little 'stake' does not seem all that big of a deal.

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(Edited)

My guess is that firstly it was arranged as a business write off and secondly gave enough press that two little Steemians like us needed no introduction of who Justin Sun was. 😎

His investment in STINC was not a marketting stunt, in my opinion, but a business decision. My hope is that we will see more bridging between the two chains as opposed to any hostile takeover.

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I assuredly agree with all of that. I am absolutely hoping for the proverbial 'best of all situations' here and encourage others to do the same.

The biggest take away from all this is watching the Steem community banding together, asking good questions and taking a largely active role in the many dialogues going on around the topics at hand.

In other words seeing that sort of solidarity among such a diverse and intellectually opinionated (and well informed) group of folks is quite refreshing and goes to show that rational, civil and open communication fosters a compelling atmosphere for positive growth and decency.

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(Edited)

It does seem a pivotal time in the evolution of STEEM governance. Although, as mentioned, only the owner of the keys of 21%-ish of total stake has changed at this point. We should be thankful it was not the original 40%-ish of ninja mined tokens. We can thank @ned's incompetence for that.

My feeling is that a sensible nuclear option will be made available to the community before any noticeable and/or unexpected changes appear in future HFs.

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Having safeguards moving forward really is a 'win win' for everyone involved whether 'nuclear' or otherwise.

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