I Need a Little Humor Right Now
Me:
But I never powered down, not even once. I invested real money in STEEM and always powered up my earnings. I'm a long term supporter of this platform and its technology.
Dude with the clipboard:
Yes, I'm afraid DASH, yes DASH was the correct answer. You should have been investing in Dash.
Sadly, I don't have any Dash. Or Ethereum (I bought some once but then sold it again). Actually, since early 2013, I've been mostly a bitcoin maximalist. I played around with other coins here and there, but never invested much. Steemit was it for me. The perfect combination of vision, technology, and philosophy that clicked and got me thinking beyond the Bitcoin blockchain.
Sometimes I feel like I backed the wrong horse. I've been meaning to get some Dash, Ethereum, Monero, Zcash, and the like, I just haven't gotten around to it yet. Maybe the recent price rises will come down, and I can jump in a bit. Maybe they will just continue to rise as the dollar collapses. I don't know. At least I paid off my house.
To make this post a little more valuable than just a some humor and me processing my various stages of grief at Dan's departure, I thought I'd highlight something which has been helpful for me (bah, I guess I am still just going through the stages). Check out Dan's recent comments:
https://steemit.com/@dan/comments
There are a few that stand out to me:
I never give up
(in regards to working on blockchain technologies)
New opportunities to pursue my vision of free market solutions to secure life liberty and property.
Ned's the captain. I'm the engineer. I build ships for others to sail. Steemits future depends on web development more than anything else and that is not my skill.
I proposed removing it. It was rejected.
(very interesting story here if you've been following the concerns over the "open source" nature of Steem and the closed aspects of its license)
Also... Aliens?
I have also seen impossible flying objects doing instant 90 deg turn and disappear over horizon.
Ah yes, humor. Another great way to deal with grief.
I really appreciated this personal reply to me:
You and I both. Steem is dominated by politics beyond my ability to control or fix. The code is in good hands, the team is more than capable of implementing any thing the community desires. lets hope the community choses wisely.
Dan is a genius. He's amazing with computers, as I've already talked about, but he may not be amazing with people. The struggle was probably too much. That said, another aspect I find interesting is the use of the world control.
Imagine for a moment you're orders of magnitude smarter than most people around you. You see them doing things you disagree with because, well, you're smart and you're convinced you're right because of your intelligence. At what point would you need to control others in order to save them from themselves? If you have kids, you know how tempting this can be. It's easy to have a pure, idealistic philosophy, but when it comes in contact with reality and impacted wellbeing... what then?
Control is, I think, ultimately an illusion.
I wish the best for Dan, I really do. I hope he continues to be successful in his vision to build "free market solutions to secure life liberty and property."
I also hope he doesn't leave a trail of uncompleted projects behind him as early investors and miners get rich off later investors.
I'm trying not to judge without context and understanding of what was really going down. All I can do is process my own emotional responses. I hope a bit of humor and some reflection on the last things Dan has said can help you process yours as well.
Peace.
And for now... since there's no other project I know of to compete... I'll continue to Steem On.
Dan will be fine and so will we. Get back on the horse and let's make this a great place. I don't involve myself with the politics, it is beneath me. I gave up my personal blog to be here and that was was a top 200K website! If it succeeds we will be rewarded if it doesn't I will start something myself with another blockchain. I also put all my eggs in Steem. I sold all of my other alts back in October. Oops, probably a $70k mistake but there will be other opportunities. Thank goodness I held my BTC tight except for the ones I was trading and lost.
Ouch.
As long as I've been here, you've been a champion for Steemit, @hilarski. I hope you are richly rewarded both for your efforts and the risk you've taken to help build this community.
As I "sit with" all the current turbulence, I keep going back to things I learned from previous experience with startups, but in IT and otherwise...
Dan is what I would call a "visioneer." He brings outstanding ideas and revolutionary projects with the potential to change the world... and we get things like Steemit. But (and I'm reading between the lines, here, perhaps incorrectly) creative geniuses are seldom all that good at the "nuts and bolts daily operation" of their projects... and often grow frustrated with those around them who insist on the daily functional implementation of projects.
We use these ocean metaphors a lot around here... and maybe Dan's a visionary shipbuilder, but shipbuilders seldom hang out and grow old and gray with their ships... they go off to build newer, faster, sleeker, bigger ships. But just because they walk off the docks doesn't mean all the ships they've built suddenly sink.
Maybe I'm just trying to sell myself a platitude, but I just am not seeing a "sinking ship" here. And the markets don't seem to be in selloff mode... Steem volume is super heavy, but it seems just as many are buying in as cashing out.
I also noticed the heavy Steem volume. Quite interesting. $432,985 already. Here's hoping Ned, sneak, and the gang will make great progress with the day to day operations and visioneer can't be bothered with.
Get to work on your DASH proposal and beat the rush. ;)
Been through that and they chose Amanda over me for marketing. I think they made the right choice ; ).
Have you tried funny hats and changing your hairstyle daily? ;)
Clearly, you need to work on your "Russian" accent....
You had me at "Aliens".
Sincerely, though ... thank you for this excellent bit of written processing. This is perhaps the best piece I've read from a long time supporter of Steemit that made sense to me.
And just one more time, using Tsoukalos in any context, is always a winner. Well done for the proper use of humor in a pivotal moment.
I'm glad I followed you!
Thank you for that compliment and thank you for the follow.
I bought 350 Dash at about $1.50. Was very happy when I sold them for between $5 and $7.
FML
Hah! Oh man. I'm so sorry. I've been around bitcoin enough to hear many stories of those who made 100X returns selling bitcoin at just over a dollar after getting it for pennies or less. Though it's the "right" thing to do, it still hurts when it just keeps going up.
Right now, I can't rationally purchase Dash at these prices. At the same time, if Dash continues to moon, could I be like the guy who wishes they bought bitcoin below $100?
Crazy times in crypto right now, for sure.
Yeah, the weird thing about crypto is that even when you do well, it's the opportunity costs in retrospect that hurt the most. I held larger amounts of all the currently rising altcoins in the past. Sold them all for decent profits, but it's weird to look at them now.
Steem is the first non-trivial crypto investment of mine which has gone bad. Assuming that it really is done now, which may not be true. We could find ourselves stagnating for years like Dogecoin and others, but it could still be that this is the 'depression'/'despondent' point in Steem's cycle.
Edit: Another thing to think about. I was on the dash forums just a few months ago. The depression and infighting was terrible. Yet, here we are now, they not only recovered but exploded in price.
Heh, yeah. Great points.
I also thought Dash was a mess based on what I had read about it. So much for that thinking.
Maybe it's all irrational and ridiculous. We're all just pretending anyway. Money, the shared delusion.
I just gave gave you some more SP to feel a little better. What is next for Steem? When are the new releases hitting the platform? I am losing badly too here. I put real money into the platform also and perplexed what I should do now. Is there any chance of a turn around? I mean last June I bought SP and never sold in the pump. Why ins't the price going up....??? A lot users here. I am OK since I hold a lot of ETH, and some other coins but damn I lost like like $15,000 here on Steem so far. Maybe this is like BTC in Jan. 2015 when it hit $170? What's your thoughts Luke?
I am just holding on to them. There is lot of moeny to be maid in crypto world... this is just he start.
We need to continue having fun! And move on!
Great to learn that you will Steem On!! Same here. Actually I changed my profile yesterday after knowing Dan's resignation ...
Nice! :)
I'll definitely be on Dan watch. You can be sure I'll be a beta tester wherever he goes. In the meantime, I still love Steemit and I'll keep a presence here until there's nothing left.
My concern is that early adopters do well at the expense of later investors. That's not a good track record to have.
From my perspective, I can't believe that Steemit is almost a year old and yet I barely remember life before it. I'm hoping that our developers and witnesses have the good sense to figure it out as we go along. Bring on the hardforks and the wherewithal to stay the course for all investors to have a harmonious outcome. :)
I'm very glad it's been so beneficial to you and many others. I just feel bad for those who have lost tens of thousands of dollars (or more) in investment money. That's not so beneficial for them. I hope they are made whole some day.
I know exactly what you mean. Ever since steemit came into my life, I think about it all the time. It's been a long while since I did that with any particular technology. Heck if I had a choice between my cellphone or steemit, I think I'd still choose steemit. Bizarre. :)
I know exactly what you mean! LOL For the longest time I used to say I needed an app intervention. But since Steemit came along I've been using my iPhone for MahJong before I go to sleep. :D
Good stuff