Fair enough, I didn’t realize you were so deeply into your own blockchain project, of course you prefer to concentrate on that. Entirely reasonable response. As you say, let’s keep the door open for possible future discussions on ways that our two ventures can collaborate. I think the crypto industry as a whole is stronger when people work together and leverage synergies rather than taking an attitude that projects must always be in direct competition. I am also quite interested in learning more about your project once you are ready to make more information public.

I’m sorry to hear you’ve been set back by nasty health problems. Two sayings that immediately come to mind are “what doesn’t kill us makes us stronger” and “nothing in life worth doing is ever easy”. Imagine how much sweeter your ultimate success will then feel, after overcoming such adversity.

I’m no technical expert on EOS, but my understanding is that it generalizes the Steem architecture, combining the best features of graphene technology (high throughput, low block time, DPoS) with the full smart contracts capability of a platform like Ethereum. Whereas Steem is a blockchain built for a single application (social media), it will be possible to build many different applications on EOS. I’ve heard it said that the Ethereum VM could be implemented inside EOS, as could Steem. What seems really innovative to me is that EOS takes care of all the plumbing such as account management, storage (each contract can have its own database), token management, etc. In that sense it truly feels like the first real “blockchain operating system”). I think its closest competitors will be Cardano and Tezos, though EOS looks to be farther along in its roadmap than either of those other two platforms. Taken together, I feel that offers the potential for the next evolution of Steem to be built on EOS, hopefully one that solves the current problems inherent in Steem such as concentration of voting power and whatnot. I admit I have yet to read your arguments on consortium blockchains though, so will have to go through that and see if it alters my thinking.

It’s sad that you were banned from Bitcointalk.org. Anyone should be free to express their opinions and make rational arguments as long as they also respect the opinions of others. That’s one point in Steem’s favor; you are free to speak your mind here (as long as you don’t care about possible downvotes!). Okay, so maybe that just leads back into a discussion of Steem’s problems as downvoting acts as a tool of censorship, nevermind. xD

I’m not quite as concerned as you are about regulators cracking down on ICOs. I do think it’s worth keeping an eye on regulation and expect we will see a great increase in regulatory oversight in the next couple years, but I’m hopeful some reasonable middle ground will be reached. No doubt we’re in for some turbulence ahead before things settle though. I’m making an effort to keep about 20% of my portfolio in cash so I’ll be able to make it through any crypto winter that may come, and buy things at a discount when the opportunity arises.

I hope you’re enjoying it. After all, we’re not just doing this only for money are we, although salting away a nestegg is part of the motivation?

My primary motivation is simply to live a freer life, able to do what I want when I want, pursuing my passions and enjoying quality time with my family. Money is a secondary concern, in so far as it serves to enable the above objectives. One Steem truism that I live by is “write to write well, not to make money,”. So it is with trading, investing, and many other things in life. Money is just the natural consequence of doing things well.

You certainly have given me many things to think about, and a long reading list of topics to follow up on. I’m glad I stumbled across your blog! Thanks very much for sharing your thoughts.