I'm losing track of time, but must be 5 years ago now... 2017? probably.
Unlike most people (I'm assuming) I wasn't looking for a place to make money from blogging - I was looking for a crypto construct that attempted to have a viable internal economy! very few of those, even now ;-) So I found Steem from doing that search.
Once I'd figured out how to earn STEEM from blogging (comments and then more comments, folks!!) I started to look at the economic setup - how to make money from money! Sadly, I saw that it was largely based on pigs at the trough economics... and every "improvement" made it worse. I still think such an internalist cryptoeconomy may be feasible, but I also see great resistance, even from those who may benefit long-term, that it may be easier to start something new rather than morphing something existing. The blockchain is also as complex and delicate as a mechanical watch that it is way easier to break things than fix them. Anyway, that's my background to all this.
To add, the "making money from money" idea came from a very practical problem: how to support a growing community of users? just giving people votes doesn't work as the number of hungry feeders grows faster than the available pie.
;-)
hence, I constructed a community fund.
So I didn't have to beg to anyone, nor become dependent on anyone :-)
One gracious investor did step up, and we've been friends ever since.
Thanks for taking the time to share this with all of us. Very interesting. My experience is quite different. I was looking for a place to share my story and travel photography, and insights into the lifestyle of a perpetual traveler as well as ad another revenue stream.
I never even heard of bitcoin until about the same time I heard of steemit in early 2017....basically I was too busy venturing through the world and intentionally limited my computer time to basically just emails and trading (traditional markets).
I'm a real outdoorsy adventure loving kind of guy....never one for the "screens" too much. Apparently that lifestyle choice had me falling short on amazing opportunities like getting into crypto earlier, but that is OK. I got in early enough and I'm not complaining.
What you say here makes so much sense...
"The blockchain is also as complex and delicate as a mechanical watch that it is way easier to break things than fix them."
On that other blockchain no name needs to be mentioned, one of "them" we're bashing blurt how there hasn't been any or many forks. Just reminds me of what you say above. Also reminds me of what you say below here as well.
"Sadly, I saw that it was largely based on pigs at the trough economics... and every "improvement" made it worse."
Your last comment below reminds me what we need more of.
"So I didn't have to beg to anyone, nor become dependent on anyone :-)
One gracious investor did step up, and we've been friends ever since."
This is key isn't it? People helping other people each with a role they play. Like a symbiotic relationship in the animal kingdom. One of my best friends @teamsteem, maybe you remember him, certainly was an amazing supporter of the platform, helping the price rise and increase membership. His mega up-vote power came almost entirely from a surprise delegation. The guy totally surprised him and dumped huge steem power into his hands completely out of blue. This is just cause he was a smart "teamsteem" player that was good for steem, and good for this person's investment.
Not really sure where this is going. But I certainly enjoy learning from what you have to share and conversing with you. I'm currently building a position in Blurt, and will start doing things similar to @randula in terms of delegation and encouraging others to come to the platform. I'll continue to devote time to help this place grow, even if it means more screen time! hahaha Frankly I'm starting to become very fond of the people here and enjoying my time on blurt.
It's a much different angle than my days on steemit/hive where I was just a travel blogger networked with other travel bloggers. It got so boring over there, cause I know if I spiced things up and shared anything of what may be considered a controversial opinion I was at risk of down-vote. So here I feel the freedom to speak my mind without worry and it's refreshing to say the least.
I'm enjoying my new roll and with a far clearer understanding of how things work here internally and economically. I'm looking forward to a very bright future here on blurt. Let's just not fork this place to death and turn it into something unrecognizable a year from now. ;)