Goodbye Vimm, we’ll meet again one day

Hey everyone, it’s with sadness in my heart that I am departing from the Vimm team. When I began in the Vimm team me and Chiren where both without a job working on the project non-stop. In the beginning of September I started working full time to be able to pay the bills, I figured that with the slow but steady growth of the platform the two where easily combinable.

One week later DLive sadly and unexpectedly removed Steem from their platform. Despite them being our closest competitors and Vimm being created because of a different philosophy I do feel that them leaving was a sad day for the Steem and gaming community. Before their departure I had the wildest dreams of our 2 platforms competing for the same marketing segment and challenging each other to provide a better experience and lure new people to the Steem blockchain. Sadly, they had a different vision for their platform and while I still don’t see why they had to remove Steem from their platform (some of you might remember me saying that I don’t know why the platform wouldn’t be able to integrate payment/upvote options) they should do what they feel is best.

For vimm the departure of DLive brought in a huge influx of new users showing their support and sympathy for Vimm. I’ll never forget that our platform went down 3 times in the first 2 weeks (which was a good thing as we were able to address a lot of memory leaks etc). Since I just started my job and Chiren was still unemployed I secretly hoped that Steemit, Inc would consider giving us the delegation they previously gave DLive. This would have enabled us to start working full time on the platform together with all our new users, pay for the monthly costs, reward our users according to how their content is being consumed as well as give us some marketing options to target a healthy growth.

Sadly, that delegation never came which was probably a business decision from Steem than something else (we kept touch with their Business Developer and had a call with him so they are aware Vimm exists). I can’t be angry at that since I, as many of you know, Steem, Inc has had some problems alienating themselves from the community which they are now luckily addressing and I am truly happy about their engagement lately. While the delegations from the communities have helped to keep us running (really thank all of you guys) it doesn’t help us to pay our food and rent.

Since we are half a year later it’s time for me to reflect on the situation and do what I feel is the best. Chiren is still working as crazy, combining a part time job with Vimm. While I haven’t been able to work as much as I wanted. Don’t get me wrong, I still spend time on Vimm but I can’t give it close to the attention that it deserves. As such, I have to be fair with the whole situation and admit it’s time to take a step back. I will still help out with the things I’m working on as well whenever Vimm needs help with something but it’s best that someone that is full time busy with Steem and can help the platform with acquiring resources takes my place and help it reach its potential. New changes are still being made daily, and while we don’t communicate it enough to the outside world the platform is really improving on a daily basis.
I hope that the person replacing me is someone that is full time involved in Steem and can bring in the connections and resources Vimm needs to grow and be able to give all of you, the users, the best possible Stream experience.

This is by far the hardest decision I’ve made in a long time, and it is one that stings. But I rather see Vimm grow at a speed that the staff, the users, viewers and streamers deserve with someone in my place than at its current speed with me. Vimm needs and deserves full time attention especially for @chiren and the rest of the Vimm Staff.

The last 8 months have been incredible and I can’t express how much this project and all the amazing people I’ve met through Vimm mean to me. I will stay as a curator on the team (so maybe my title was a bit too dramatic) and as a streamer of course. Meeting all of you, the communities and seeing all these new communities being forged is what really made it worth my while. Stream on!