Idea: Integrate Robot9000 into the Steem blockchain?

in #steemit8 years ago

Hey Steemit,

I've one of those crazy ideas again. I was thinking, what if we could integrate Robot9000 into the Steem blockchain?

What the heck is Robot9000 ?

Robot9000 was created by the folks behind XKCD, Randall Munroe and his crew.
Here is a link that describes it:
https://blog.xkcd.com/2008/01/14/robot9000-and-xkcd-signal-attacking-noise-in-chat/

To sum up how it would work: basically Robot9000 would reject repeated posts or comments.

For example, one person could write "nice post". If a second person wrote "nice post", this would be rejected by the system. They would have to write "very nice post" and so on.

A system like this could greatly enhance the quality of dialog. People would need to write full and unique sentences or paragraphs to avoid collisions with previous posts/comments. Once your post or comment has more than 20 words in it, the odds that it will collide become astronomically low.

Anti-spam!

What would this do for Steemit? It would be fantastic for fighting spam! No more people spewing out "Nice post! Follow me I'll follow you!". The system itself would reject this sort of thing, neatly and elegantly, without me having to police it.

It wouldn't even need to use the entire history of the Steem blockchain. Looking back for only a month could be sufficient. (So you'd be allowed to write "nice post" once per month.)

Downsides of this:

  • It might be hard for a new user to figure out why they can't write "nice post" on a post they like. The user interface would have to do a great job of explaining it.

  • This would be devastating for poor @ionlysaymeep .

What do you think Steemit?

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Well this is one of those things that might seem good in practice but is really dangerous. There is no way to accomplish this in a way that maintains the integrity of a blockchain.

Good news is someone can make a bot that flags based on this. - their influence will rely on their stake in the network. They better hope it works well, it will be their stake on the line.

There is no way to accomplish this in a way that maintains the integrity of a blockchain.

Hmm, I don't think I agree with that. A post or comment is simply a transaction that's added to a block. The software "Steemd" that us witnesses run accepts these transactions. Implementing Robot9000 would simply be an extra check on the previous blockchain for duplicates before including the comment into the block.

It seems doable in theory at least.

You are certainly right, the witnesses could implement something. The problem I have I that there is no way that this could maintain the integrity of a decentralized blockchain. Steem already has weak points with DPOS consensus, this would be a whole new attack vector.

What constitutes a duplicate to some may not to others. I think it is important to keep the blockchain free of as many of these checks as possible and let the actual economic incentives do the work for us. If posts like that become so low value that they are harming the platform, well then some stakeholder is going to have a bot that downvotes them.

Trust in the economics and game theory - if you make it more complicated, there are more points of failure. The economics are extremely complex as they are.

Ain't no love for a "Meep" no more...Smh:P

Might have to go with meep meep then meep meep meep oh this could get ugly

Then followed by a meep meep meep meep...Concluded by a meep meep meep meep meep...Well you get the picture:)

I always loved Meep guy. Upvoted all of his Meeps... Im sad now....

Would this work for one account posting the same exact thing in the comment section on everyone's post?

Yes, this is the exact scenario that Robot9000 would target and eliminate.

I wish I received steem every time I have seen the same accounts posting the same thing over and over in comments. Robot9000 is just what the steemit doctor ordered!

this is nice idea to prevent people who use a bot or some autonomous thing.

I think even after 5 words it seems the odds of having the exact same comment drop dramatically!

Yes, that's a good idea, so people no longer use the same word in the comment field, it makes perfect sense and the system is also smart, I agree that ..
Thank you @neoxian

I think it isn't a bad idea, even though sometimes one wants to express a simple word of appreciation under a post overloaded with comments — nice! great! breathtaking! I agree, I totally agree! … — and the author would be flattered even if already read 99 identical comments… or maybe it isn't addressed to the author of the parent post but to the author of a comment…

It could become a race to write the new shortest sentence which expresses the same “concept” already expressed but in a different way.

It's a feature that should be tested on the road…

It's been used elsewhere, like at 4chan and at Xkcd's boards.

You already told implied that (it is used by xkcd) in the post. But each community has its flavour and may react differently to constraints, even if well motivated and reasonable.

Spell it back to front and then write back to front.
Like peem peem
Peem peem
pEEM
Correct it with higher case and lower case alphabetical

That wouldn't really help too much against Robot9000

Meep would definitely be devastated but I actually love the idea. Most of my comments are unique unless I'm welcoming new Steemians and recommending they practice the 3 C's. I wonder if robot9000 allows for a whitelist?

I read one of those 3C's messages. You still personalized it to the user, making it a unique message, so you'd have no trouble with robot9000.

I don't like too much when someone it just say "nice post" but I don't know how to respond to such a comment with just Thanks so basically I'm in the same situation. It must be done something about this because many just say nice post just to be on your post and maybe they will bee seen by others and vote. When i see a nice picture about a flower and i realy like that flower what can i say? If I watch and like many flowers it is almost imposible do not say the same thing even if you like it so much. i thing the bot it can be done but reset in every day and not get flagg for post the same comment just somehow comment hide or delleted but lets be fair when this place it start it was a freedom place and everyoane can post anithing and now we make rools in every day here and i think it will become like other social networks if we just make rules. I dont know what we can do to be a better place or how but Steemit must be a place where we can have the freedom of speach.

Nice comment ;)