I'm attempting to be objective about this conversation, but I must confess its very difficult. As someone who has invested a lot of time into this platform, I can't help but to be kidnapped by my biases, however I will try my best, my absolute best to be fair with everyone who is participating of this difficult conversation.

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The Basic things out of the way

Yes, competition is good, it brings the much needed drive to a market and its usually(there is exceptions) the best way for price discovery to really take place. This is to say, that the free market decides what is best solely based on its competing nature. For this I believe that all of us who participate of the Steem ecosystem should not really be worried, but quite excited about the prospect of ideas being polished by a wider selection of developers and philosophies. So to me, the promotion of EOS on this blockchain or any cryptocurrency for that matter is not unethical, amoral or anything that dramatic. It just is, and we can't advocate for freedoms, for having a platform that is true to the idea of censorship resistance while attempting to make a list of biased exceptions. However, we must divide this conundrum into two to make sense of it all:

Users don't really owe any loyalty to Steem

If a product is better designed, better implemented, more profitable or what have you, then that product should win, and the users of this platform would be doing themselves a disservice for adhering to loyalties that won't give anyone participation trophies. To my knowledge there is no plan in the works from Steemit Inc to hand out lambos to those who no matter what they do, or don't, stick around and keep themselves powered up. As a user and someone with a small investment on the platform compared to our whales, I have to accept this and move on with my life. Yes, I may have big dreams for the Steem blockchain, I may want one day to live strictly off the ecosystem, but I must realize my dreams are my own and no one owes me a penny to make them happen. So, if users start to promote EOS, if the actual competitor of Steem ever gets launched and if they are actively recruiting on steem, I must not be a hypocrite (since I do the same on the mainstream platforms) and allow them to do their thing. If they succeed or not, will be entirely up to them and my interference will not be necessary.

But, real Investors can demand loyalty

And that statement is not outrageous or out of place. The truth is that we are an ecosystem that relies on heavy investment, if we did not have whales like @transisto @trafalgar that bought into the platform with shiny bitcoins, we would effectively be distributing a token worth mere hypotheticals. To reduce the experience of participating of the ecosystem to profits exclusively, is to ignore some of the less tangible (for lack of a better word) gains we receive from it. Social status (equivalent), relevance, purpose and other human constructs are hard to reduce to numbers, but none the less are unquestionably valuable to our life experience. In this sense, some of the whales who have bought into the ecosystem have done so possibly because they understand and value these less tangible dynamics and not only because of the gains they stand to make. I'm using the word possibly because I'm sure this is not always the case, nor does it have to be. However.... If we isolate the conversation from the social profits (best words my brain could come up with) the truth that lays before us is quite simpler to understand. And this chart tells a story we must all consider. https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/388385373828415507/451199817486565386/Steem_Generic.png

Steem vs Bitcoin - Down Trend

On this particular fact, on this chart, there is very little to discuss. To make this as simple as possible to understand, what this chart tells us, is that people who bought into the platform with Bitcoin, are having their Steem funds diluted against the bitcoin valuation of their assets. We could think of this as a tax, as a fee paid by the investors and users of the platform, but as I've said before the facts are quite undeniable. Because I want to make sure I'm being clear, I will attempt to break this down to a simple example. Let's imagine @iwannabeasteemwhale buys into our platform today with 1 BTC, in today's numbers he would get about 3000 Steem Tokens. This brand new user with be a minnow mind you, but lets continue with the example. If this user is able to double his/her size in one year, thus being a dolphin with 6000 SteemPower after 365 days, our natural appreciation of that would be - "Well, that's awesome, @iwannabeasteemwhale doubled his invesment"- and technically we would be correct only, and this distinction is key, only if Bitcoin remained at the same valuation for a whole year. The last line of the last paragraph should have sparked a light bulb in your head. As recent history has shown us, bitcoin the current undisputed king of cryptocurrencies refuses to stay put. The users who exited their bitcoin positions for steem moved to a slower moving train basically. Yes, against USD Steem will go up, I'm not implying a loss in Dollar valuation, I'm implying a dilution of your Bitcoin assets. So, we can conclude and we would be quite correct that the ones who mainly pay the "salaries" if we can say as much, to everyone on the blockchain are the investors who have used their bitcoin to buy heavily into their positions.

A Steem Witness gets his share

From this same pool, from the dilution of the Bitcoin valuation. This is to say, that all their wages are the equivalent of an inflationary tax, or fee on the users and investors of the blockchain. The bigger the investor, the more the investor is "spending" in bitcoin valuation to foot the bill of the ecosystem. So, we can conclude that if an Investor is footing that bill, if a whale has bough into the platform with their cryptocurrency assets, that whale has absolutely every moral right to demand loyalty from a witness who is paid to secure and maintain the blockchain, as a condition for offering his/her support.

The top 20 Witnesses and EOS

Are met with a choice, and so are we. They have the complete freedom to contribute to both projects as they see fit. We also have the complete freedom to vote for them or not, if we believe they are not acting in the best interest of the platform we have chosen to support. In my opinion the power to make this choice is independent from the list of contributions top witnesses may be making to the platform. Meaning, that we can't simply conflate the contributions they have made and will make with the right or lack thereof to support them in their endeavors. They are mutually exclusive. I know for a fact @jesta is one of the best developers we have on the platform, and his position as one of the top 20 witnesses is somewhat safe because of this verifiable fact. However, this does not mean that this fact gives him the equivalent of "diplomatic immunity" and that the investors of this platform should not question his current and future actions.

The conversation needs to continue

And even thought I'm practically a sand flea compared to our whales, I will hope that the concerns of the community, the smaller stake holders don't get ignored. In that sense I appreciate @lukestokes approach to this whole thing, and the somewhat emotionally charged conversation he has been having with @davemccoy on the matter. I'm walking away with a bitter taste in my mouth, I won't lie. But on the other hand I appreciate the honestly, although brutal at times that has been shared on the topic.

Until next time https://steemitimages.com/DQmW2fijoxrybX3Kg83HCgZZmZwF8SujXWvr3tn8YCUPCsw/meno%20logo.png