I can only speak for myself and sometimes this opinion is shared by others and sometimes not. I never noticed the sticker (maybe it's not even on the frontend I see), it does not trigger me in any way. Now that you focused on that sticker, it still does not speak to me. I prefer staying indifferent to those badges.
Someone possesses authority in certain areas and there I can listen, or respect, or accept it as valid. In other areas I do not find it in the same person. So I really do like to not care about badges or titles or whatever people are endowed with. I like to go by the individual and single encounter. By case and moment. The same person can at times be idiotic and brilliant. It really depends.
For the badges - it's just a kind of advertisement (how I see it):
Imagine that you think you have a good idea and want to highlight other bloggers. You programme a badge or sticker that you henceforth give (by automation) to those who you think generally publish good content. Anyone who can programme something like this can do it. So you are one who makes such a private initiative. That's what it was.
On Steemit and Hive, this kind of thing has been done by the hundreds.
The views on automated actions have always been controversial. On the one hand, they have advantages because manual work is saved, but on the other hand, they have the disadvantage that - once set up - the programme runs for itself.
Mostly you can bet that the enthusiasm for such a thing is flattening and the initiators forget or no longer feel like updating the whole thing. Which can be critisized. For me, it's just not important enough even to critisize it.
Lucy had, by the way, admitted that he was wrong about this sticker, thinking it was initiated from mega.
Do you think people care about those stickers if they read through a blogpost? They will make their inner judgements on its contents. They may only refer to the part of the content which speaks to them and to the rest they may remain silent. Which is alright. Let people decide for themselves how they perceive something, is my motto.
Otherwise, if an audience lets itself be impressed by stickers or whatever signs I would not want to have them urgently as my audience, would you?
No and I'm not personally impressed by the stickers either but the point is many are as it looks like an official endorsement of their content (which it is) regardless of what content they put out a year down the line. A few people have postulated that PT might have had his account hacked or even given it away as his content seems to have changed. If this is the case the the badge should be taken down.
I care not who initiated them and did read Lucylins apology over them but that wasn't my beef anyway. I have no issue with the founders personally except for their treatment of Lucylin.
If those stickers are not impressing you why would you care that they impress others? Why would that be important?
If that is what you aim for, you must go into touch with the initiators and talk to them directly and convince them in doing so. To not appear as someone who wants revenge or making up fronts, you also would have to find other bloggers with the same badge on which your negative qualitative judgement fits and point that out. But if you have a strong feeling of revenge, you could openly admit it and also step into the fight. Arm yourselves and go battling, because, why not? Be open about it if something aggravated you.
If, on the other hand, you are keen not to be associated politically, which is extremely difficult, then in order not to appear partisan, you would have to ask critical questions of both camps and not just one of them. At the risk of not getting any more upvotes from either camp. Biting the hand that feeds you requires that you be willing to forego that feeding. As long as you don't do that (obvious to others), you're stuck with the classification.
Which can lead to people being unwilling to touch certain features - like the sticker - towards you, because they in turn might fear that this could be construed as partisanship on their part.
Now you might scornfully say "what a weak performance! One must do what is right!" Yes, that would be nice if such perfection took place. An alternative could be to just give time and the initiators might rethink their initiative or whom they give stickers and quietly change some things without telling anybody. To not lose face, for example.
Did you respond in the consistency and critical enquiry mode to Lucy or ctime etc. as you did to the others?
I will leave our conversation with some questions
The answers are not for me, I am not expecting a response to them and would like to put an end to our so far exchange.
Greetings to you.
An apology would be nice, that would be all I require but apart from that I am keeping my distance from the people involved and from the politics.
I'm over it. Am cracking on as usual. xxx