I think that real life events are definitely the way forward. I havn't managed to make it along to anything since steemfest2 and without the magic of actually spending time with people in physical space its felt really difficult to drum up any enthusiasm for my activity on the blockchain. In my opinion there has to be a palpable sense of community and belonging outside of the digital environment. Most people just don't have the time/energy/technical affinity or even interest in the grand concept to spend their hours fiddling about with a digital interface in order to scrape together a semblance of community. The blockchain has to aspire to augment 'real' community in order to be relevant enough to grow when the financial rewards arent so attractive. I was initially super excited about earning some money for being creative but it was meeting the people of steemit and making friends and feeling like there was some like-minded people who I could feasibly have a drink with that got me so hooked. Obviously because its so global and everyones spread out, it hasn't been so simple to continue to manifest that feeling and my involvement here has tailed off massively, BUT I know for sure that if I had a local steem community who met for drinks occasionally that I would be very excited to be a part of it and it would inspire me to take more interest and put more energy in to the multifarious mindbending tentacles of this continually mutating revolution. I suppose it would probably be up to me to start that group....... oh crap