Vive la révolution - steem is here (or why I haven't been so excited for over 20 years)
I started working in the internet in 1994. I guess I was an early adopter.
It came about by chance.
At the end of the 80's and early 90's I had been working for Friends of the Earth in London. There I got my first taste of computing.
As the Local Groups Communications Officer I had the use of a PC with a 10MB hard drive and a dot matrix printer which I used to print out address labels for the monthly newsletter.
More importantly I had access to GreenNet, a 'private' network that an increasing number of the Friends of the Earth local groups were using to communicate with each other and the head office in London.
Then one day a couple of years after leaving Friends of the Earth the IT manager there, who had previously volunteered for me when I worked there, gave me a call out of the blue.
"You've got to come and see this new thing - it's amazing" he implored me.
Within a few days I was on a train to London and in his office.
Then he showed me the internet. All of it. Early in 1994 it wasn't big but I could see the potential.
Back home I quickly got an internet account with Demon, some webspace with Hiway, and I learnt how to make websites.
The first thing I did was to make a website for the network of local environmental organisations I was involved in. The monthly printed newsletter I produced went on the web.
I did a demonstration at a local shopping centre. People were fascinated. Other groups wanted to join in.
A fully fledged online community network was born - one of the very, very first in Britain.
Within months other similar community networks began to pop up around Britain. A conference was organised at the University of Sheffield to help share experiences and ideas.
I went to one talk that changed my life. I cannot remember the speaker but I do remember his words :
"Don't complain about the media - become the media."
I knew I had the tools at hand to do this.
With a supporting income from commercial website work I began to expand the local community network. I took on first a part-time freelance journalist, then a full time journalist, then another until eventually we had a staff of five. We were reporting local news, covering local sport and events and putting out dozens of pages of content every week. The site expanded its coverage to the surrounding county and its user numbers grew and grew and grew.
At its peak it had over 300,000 users a month.
They were exciting times. I was at the leading edge of local community journalism. We turned down a buy offer from a major national newspaper group. Then a 6 figure offer from a leading UK web company. We stayed independent and proud. We had something special going on. We had become the local media.
But then the rest became history. It just became business. We built websites.
I had my fingertips on the edge of a revolution but I didn't grasp it with both hands.
Now I see a new revolution stirring.
It is the blockchain. It is steem and steemit.
Every day as I level up a little further I see the potential of steemit revealing itself before my very eyes.
For some, perhaps many, steemit can be a handsome source of income.
But for me it is a source of wonder. A source of fascination. Can history repeat itself.
Do once in a lifetime chances come twice?
Every day I see another way the steem blockchain could help change the world.
It can put power, and money, back in the hands of people. No governments needed.
As @lyndsaybowes said in a recent post Fuck Basic Income.
Steemit is a leveller, it is an equaliser. In Venuezuela it can feed the hungry, in Bangladesh it can build a school.
In a developing country a good post on steemit can feed a family for a week.
With the coming of the 'add-ons' like DTube the steem blockchain has the chance to free content creators from the tyranny of YouTube.
And coming soon to a blockchain near you are SMTs - what new opportunities will these provide for the revolutionistas amongst us.
The potential to use steem for business and exchange is massive. We must be brave and take every opportunity.
I have not been so excited about the potential of a new technology since I employed that first journalist back in the 1990's.
The revolution is here, let's grasp it with all our steem.
You might also be interested in some of my other posts :
[[FICTION CONTEST] Christmas Day in 2050 - Announcement of Winners
SteemRadio - schedule of all the steemit radio shows - week beginning 25 December 2017
Homesteaders & Preppers on steemit - heading towards 300 by the new year? v11 [23 Dec '17]
888 Followers - Time for a Festive Season Giveaway for all my followers
Steemit coming alive in Wales - First meetup taking place on Saturday 10 February 2018 in Lampeter
The Steem is Rising - 2018 is going to be a good, good year - are you feeling the buzz?
SteemCommerce - Businesses accepting payment in steem (v 1 @ 15 December 2017)
I Believe in Steem - Five things I can do to help steemit grow
SteemTowns - connecting the virtual with the reality - would it be possible?
[ image from pixabay - Creative Commons CC0 ]
I too was an early adopter of using the internet, I remember Bulletin Boards, AOL CDs and DOS before Windows came along. Yahoo was the first
Portal. What an interesting ride this has been! So many opportunities right at our fingertips, like the early days of the net.🐓
Yes, it does feel like the early days of the net all over again. I'm certainly a lot older and hopefully a bit wiser to make sure I grasp the opportunities most fully this time round.
My first internet was AOL in 1996. I didn't own my own computer; it was my best friend and roommate's computer but I was the one to get us online (it needed a modem upgrade but we didn't know that. Talking to AOL tech help, I was writing code and shit and every time it didn't work, I called back and listed off what other techs had had me try. By the end, I was getting, "Damn, I don't even know how to do half of what you just said." Finally I was griping to a geeky friend who said, it's the hardware. So we got a 14.4 modem and viola! Internet! Don't ask me how none of the AOL people who had me writing code didn't understand "It's a 1993 Packard Bell" and think, hey, it probably needs a new modem! LOL).
I built a webpage on GeoCities and learned a little html from the "I found a cheat sheet and that's good enough we're gonna fuck with it until it's pretty" method. 😂
I love the little 'tunes' those old 14.4 modems used to play when connecting to the net.
Always on just isn't the same...
Fun times to live in. I would be thinking of investing furth in steem if not for the drama of whales going after people when break threw the glass top and going after people with a flag army. It really rains on my parade to know if by some chance I did become a popular some hater will come out flags blazing to keep a tight grip the rewards pool.
Don't let could have, should have, stop you, we have no guarantee of tomorrow so why borrow a trouble that may or may not happen?
Carpe diem.
They are issues for sure, but I don't think you should let them stall your progress on steemit.
Well said!
I remember joining my first bulletin board in 1980! My how things have changed! I am taking Steemit in my hot little hands and running with it! This is our future!
Run, run like the wind... 😊
Yes, we have experienced many changes, I am from generation X, I was born in 1975, and I feel fortunate to have been able to live, all the changes that have taken us to what the world is today, and I am excited to think, that I can see many more :) I do not know if the blockchain will stay by much, or be replaced by something even better that will change the world as we know it :)
Thank you.
I remember my father worked on a TRS 80, he was working with the mayor in the town where he lived, trying to help troubleshoot this new technology...haha, and he had a dos game that was like a treasure hunt. I recall him giggling when the computer typed an answer back to him.
A lote info!! Nice post god work!!! Keep on
This content makes my almost cry. Here the Venezuelan community is starting to see the potential of how the steem community begin to valorate itself the human talent and it never gonna be unvalorated. The restrit of a govermment is getting all the economic issue goes down and the hard fisical works is not any best paid.... This is a revolution of potenial talented community and we have the backup of the steem blockchain for trascend the human value... Thanks for your focus and i believe more in steemit as a social benefit equality!!
Totally agree. I was really young when I first logged on to AOL, pre windows 95. I didn’t quite understand the potential, I was like 8 or 9. As I got a bit older I remember using the AOL chat rooms, it was so strange talking with random people around the country. I didn’t really grasp the power of the internet until YouTube. The ability for anyone to reach a global audience via video was mind blowing. I think all of it just snow balled so fast, it became commercialized, centralized, trollified, and memified so rapidly, we couldn’t take hold of the potential. But your absolutely right, the blockchain and Steem specifically are giving us all a second opportunity to change the world and disrupt the powers that be. Let’s all encourage each other to fight for this one, and not let it go down like web 2.0 did.
Wow, what a journey through the ages of internet revolution.