Congrats on being so close to your goal. I agree, hanging out with steemians is very encouraging.

I also agree with your concept in regards to steemit.com. After being at steemfest and hearing more of what ideas are being worked on, I actually see the current concept of steemit.com fading away a bit. Until then, I think we should be accumulating all that we can. As you say, steem will be very valuable. In my opinion, it will be so because of all the other applications. Furthermore, once it is widely discovered the efficiency of the steem block chain, we are off to the races.