Three months on Steemit - I guess this is my job now ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Things sure do have a habit of taking on a life of their own don't they? When @messykitchen told me about Steemit three months ago I had no idea of the impact it would have on the trajectory or my life, it's a biggie! At the start I was merely intrigued, having already made some positive blockchain experiences over the years I figured "Why Not?". So I began throwing some posts at Steemit, at first mostly older work and existing content without much method or mean. I was a little lazy about it and kinda opted for mostly images with little text so they didn't attract much in terms of upvotes or value. As I have learned since then, you get rewarded for expanding on your process, getting a discussion going and putting effort into your presentation. Fortunately the Steemit community is very helpful and kind. I've received so much quality feedback and advice from more excellent people that I can count on how to improve the quality, communication and style of each consecutive entry. Build on it and you will develop a flow of sorts!

The question and challenge will be whether we can turn this digital garden into a viable vocation. The first three months have shown me that this is a potential route but we need to be pragmatic and consider financial implications and time constraints also. Swinging a digital creative venture such as this one on your own in a first world country is a test. Still I am intrigued, still I'm thinking "Why Not?". The blockchain is here to stay. To make this reactor hum we are going to have to combine and refine several elements. I'll make some attempts to illustrate my strategies but first let's have a look at some stats and benchmarks to see how we have progressed.

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Last Benchmark - Jan 12th	Current Benchmark - Feb 12th	Change
Followers: 260 Following: 123 Own Blog Entries: 198 Posts & Comments: 1390 Est. Account Value: $1,247.97 SP: 203 RP: 51.1 Delegations: 4.3 SP	Followers: 442 Following: 206 Own Blog Entries: 284 Posts & Comments: 2018 Est. Account Value: $1,060.60 SP: 257.752 RP: 54.1 Delegations: 81 SP	+182 +83 +86 +608 -187.37 +54 +3 +76.7

Aha everything has gone up except our account value. Let's examine why. For starters I am investing far more in delegations now. Pay it forward and support younger fish, projects and friends. You sacrifice a little bit of your own voting power this way but you strengthen the community which is a good pay off in my mind. If you have under 500SP a tool like SteemPlus works wonders if you also wish to delegate. You can also delegate and invest in projects like MinnowBooster to bolster the overall Steemit economy and receive a "wage" or "stake" in return! Another reason for slower gains in the overall account value was the general upheaval in the Cryptocurrency market with the big correction after the new year. Slowly recovery has set in and Steem and SBD have moved up to acceptable values around the 4 USD mark again. Still trying to find a good balance of Powering Up, Paying it forward, Paying myself and preserving some savings. This process is always a bit in flux methinks due to the nature of a volatile market. As Steemit gains traction and builds a larger userbase eventually Steem and SBD will become more independent from Bitcoin and co. and thus should hopefully become more stable over time.

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Next we need to give ourselves enough tasks and content to produce regardless of how the general cryptocurrency economy is looking. In essence we are mining by posting to the steem blockchain. My goal is to post at least once a day but to prevent myself from posting nonsense I've got a couple of quests and projects lined up. Quality control is important and you should continuously seek to up your level. Fail upwards!

My Tasks:

Commissions:

• Hummingbird mixed media painting for @Mammasitta on canvas.
• Card Deck, at least 16 face cards + 1 Joker. Finished illustration, animation and a print for each. Hopefully get a complete deck printed by the end of the month.

Articles:

I consider Steemit an excellent place to practice my writing. I'd like to publish a 1000+ word article at least once a week. Here are a couple of topics I'm currently working out.

• Animated Gif and Timelapse tutorial
• Concert & Venue reviews
• The "Boteconomy" on Steemit
• Build a PC - Ryzen 1700
• DSLR Camera tutorial
• SpaceX and Spaceships in development.
• A monthly summary like this one :)

Casting:

I believe the dLive platform has become more stable recently so expect some Steemit exclusive streams from me along with the occasional link to my Twitch.tv activities.

You can catch the Order of Chaos and I stream new and classic games live on my twitch channel at twitch.tv/zeroooc!

Communities:

• @SteemArtists is a terrific and benign initiative by @spaceginger to bring together talented artists on steemit, showcasing and promoting quality artwork and to cultivate local talent here on Steemit. I encourage you to come by our Steem Artists Discord Channel. There is a pretty sweet community emerging here with talent worth supporting methinks.

  Roles:
  Moderation, Quest Giver, Tech Support and Sponsor.

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• #Steemit-Austria is my "home base" in the german and specfically austrian speaking world. Tons of good humor, talent and support to be found there.

  Roles:
  Moderation, Tech and Moral support.

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• #SteemitBloggers has been my "go to" channel pretty much since I started on Steemit. A community that has a high level of quality control and engagement. Always some very kind and helpful people hanging out there.

  Tasks:
  Chill in the chat more, regular contributions and support confirmations.

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• Order of Chaos

  The OoC is my own gaming/streaming/technology server. It is the backbone of this entire operation. A matter of the heart if you will.

  OoC has its roots as far back as 1999 when Nikki wanted to make his own Starcraft clan. We are a Happy Bunch of International Gamers and Scholars based in Vienna. We have since held competitive positions in Warcraft 3, WoW and Starcraft II among others. We practice the manner game (when we don't derp).

Challenges & Competitions:

I'd like to participate in at least two art contests a month. I really like the Design a Characters and Trial by Comics challenges so I'm eyeing those. Additionally I think one full week challenge like the #colorchallenge is viable once a month.

Additionally I have been hosting my own contests in the last month! The Sketch-Off has been super fun to host and I've been able to pay out more than 35SBD in prizes so far.
Check out Episode 1 (Year of the Dog) and Episode 2 (The Club of Antiheroes) to see the awesome creations people have come up with. Sponsoring art on Steemit is a delight and I plan to do a lot more of this kind of content in the future.

Gamification:

Man the current rate of levelling up in reputation reminds me of the stretch from 50 to 60 in the vanilla World of Warcraft. If we gamify the Steem experience a bit perhaps it will aid us in making it easier understand and more fun to use, especially for us digital native types. Let's put all those hours spent on video games to some additional use. I appreciate that there is money involved, but perhaps we can emotionally distance ourselves from the financial aspect a bit and have a little more fun with it. As you build your profile, over time you become more experienced and stronger. Of course all of this implies and relies on that you post somewhat consistently. Level 60 is certainly a goal, let's see how long it takes.

I try and see it like this:

• Reputation = Level
• Voting Power = Damage
• Steem Power = Hit Points
• Savings = Armor
• Liquid SBD = Mana
• Delegations = Buffs

R&D:

Some things I'm currently looking into or would like to learn more about also in regards to future posts. Always gotta keep reading! Perhaps you guys know some good sources?

• 4k Video Editing
• M2 drives and data transfer rate upgrades
• Ryzen 1700x overclocking techniques
• the origins of graffiti
• 3rd Generation Blockchains
• Ruby
• Raspberry Pi/Linux/Kodi

Badge RePo:

I like making special "badges" in Photoshop to sign big posts with or to celebrate perceived achievements. Worked up quite a collection already! Feel free to use these any way you wish.

Signature	One Month	Two Months	Three Months
Steem Artists	Blockchain Rocket	STEM	Gaming
1st Sketch-Off	2nd Sketch-Off	Hints and Infos	Minnowslayer

Hint of the Day:

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I've compiled all previous hints into one Compilation Post for your guys. A Hint about Hints!

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If you like you can check out my previous two reviews, getting pretty comprehensive at this stage!

My second month on Steemit in review - Benchmarks, Recommendations and Tools

My first month on Steemit in review - Lessons and Observations

If you're feeling generous you can visit my Tip Jar.

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Looks like I've got my work cut out for me. Feeling positively inspired though so let's see what kind of damage we can do in the next month. I wanted to thank all of you for the amazing support so far and I do believe we are only just getting started. Time to hustle!

keep on swimming,

Nikki a.k.a. ZeroOoC

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