Six Months of Rambling Around Steemit

Sometime last July my favourite torrent site KickAss Torrents went down. When it became clear that it was, at least for now, down for the count, I went hunting for other possible sources.

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On a Torrent news site I saw a comment with a reference to a new site that could be used for torrents. It was called Steemit. Curious I went to have a look at what could be new about this site.

That was six months ago today.

I didn’t find any torrents or any reference to them. I did find something else that caught my interest though. A site where I could get paid for writing. Well, I didn’t quite embrace that concept right off the bat.

I spent some time trying to get my head around how something called a cryptocurrency with the name of STEEM would actually pay me in money that I understood. It didn’t take me long to learn that money I understood is called fiat money. I had heard of bitcoin, so I had at least a passing reference.

I explored for a while, learned some stuff about the site and found the variety of content on the site rather interesting. Seems the cryptocurrency world attracts a lot of anarchist, libertarian sort of people, although to be honest, by the time I read several articles, I wasn’t sure I could actually define either group.

I Had Decided to Write

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Finding Steemit came at a good time for me. I had recently made a decision that I was going to pursue writing much more seriously. I had always wanted to write but kept letting other things get in the way.

Like a former friend pushing me into a couple of fields that while I could do okay, it really wasn’t an interest area for me. Instead of digging in my heels and following my own wants, I let someone else determine my direction because after all, I could make more money doing that than writing.

Problem was, because I really didn’t want to do the work, I had no passion, no drive to do it and I didn’t make any money to speak of doing them. Eventually, I woke up to the fact that all I was doing, was using that distraction as an excuse not to work on writing.

There was some other things going on with that friendship that was getting really painful so, I cut ties and decided that sink or swim, it was long overdue for me to go after what I wanted, not what others were pushing at me.

Enter Steemit

After my initial hesitation I decided to write a post or two and try it out. They bombed, I made a couple of cents on one of them I think. I was considering buggering off, then I reminded myself, I had committed to working on writing. Can’t be running at the first disappointment. In for a penny, in for a pound. Get busy and so some more writing.

About the third article I wrote a biographical piece on a local hero. I was shocked when I got upvoted by a couple of whales and made some serious money. That spurred me to commit even more. Just keep writing and keep working at it, the return will grow over time.

Reading and Upvoting

I spent time reading posts, upvoting and doing some commenting. I also started following people that I liked their posts and noticed people were starting to follow me. Cool, so, if I keep this up, I’ll grow. Good plan.

After a while though I started feeling guilty because I was spending so much time reading and upvoting but not a lot of time writing. I needed a focus. Then it hit me, I could write a bit of a journal where I share links and comments to the posts I most enjoyed reading that day.

The Steemit Ramble Is Born

Now that I had a writing purpose to read and upvote regularly, I didn’t feel guilty. I decided to start off with a personal 30 day challenge to post a Ramble every day. That was about September. I had been on the site about a month by then. Told you I was slow to get going.

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I started off by posting my intentions to do the challenge. Then I started to actually do it. Day by day the posts built. I didn’t earn much off them but I was growing my following and my reputation. I was also getting a chance to share some of the good work of some of the new people on the site. It was fun doing it.

I was getting some very positive feedback from people on the site. I decided to keep going and make the Ramble a part of my branding on the site. I got through October and then real life intervened. November and December are super busy months for me due to my commitment at a branch of the Royal Canadian Legion. I had to back off on posting, but I didn’t completely stop.

Where I’m at Right Now

So, here I am, on the six month anniversary of my joining Steemit. I’ve managed to post more in the last month, especially the Rambles. I want to keep them up and post on other topics going forward.

I’ve built up to 439 followers, almost at reputation 64 and I’ve built up just over 2k of Steem Power. It’s not as much as a lot of people on the site, but it’s steady progress and that matters to me. I’m looking to the longterm with Steem and Steemit, more than the short-term.

I’ve met some great people on the site. Come across a few not so great but the good exceeds the not so great. Learned a lot from other people through their posts. I hang out on both Steemit Chat and some Discord chats, like Steemspeak. I don’t always have much to say on either spot but I read, listen and learn a lot.

I’m delighted to have been able to encourage my sister @artemisnorth to do some writing on the site and hope she will find success here as well. She’s way more creative than I am.

I’m looking forward to Steemit and the various apps that is going to be built on STEEM and curious to see just how far this project will go. It is only a year old.

Here’s to another six months!

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