Someone asks me why they should start their journey on Hive or how do they begin or why they should even begin. Its simple, I honestly would begin with telling them to join because of the potential rewards, (the money). I know people on this platform like to beat around thebush and make it seem like we all didn’t initially join because of the rewards but that htat will be false because in all honesty 90% of people here joined because of the rewards or at best the potential rewards. Now, as you get on the platform and make your first post, especially if you had no one on the outside world to guide you and put you through, youd find its not as glamorous as you might think and the big payouts you see on the timeline are for old users who have spent alot of time here and have built a community amongst themselves. Now at this point its easy to throw in the towel and give up. You make your first few posts, they barely get noticed, maybe you earn cents or nothing at all, meanwhile you are seeing people getting huge payouts and wondering what exactly you are doing wrong.
The truth is, most people who join Hive underestimate just how community driven the platform is. This is not TikTok where an algorithm randomly pushes your content to millions overnight. Here, people have to actually know you, interact with you, recognize your name and slowly build trust with you over time.
That is the part many new users fail to understand. Hive is rewarding but your write ups are less about going viral and more about building reputation gradually. You could spend hours writing something meaningful and still barely get engagement. Meanwhile someone who has been here for years can casually post something simple and receive much larger support. To a new user, that can feel unfair, but over time you begin to understand why it happens. Most of the older users with bigger payouts did not get there overnight either. Many of them spent years building relationships, powering up consistently, curating content, commenting daily and staying active even during periods where the rewards were low like now. What you are seeing now is the result of consistency compounding over time. Which is why even if hive coin is pretty low right now, im still hopeful because the potential is still there and ever present.
That is why if I was convincing someone to start their Hive journey, I would tell them not to obsess over payouts in the beginning. Ironically, the people who focus only on money usually leave the fastest because they expect instant returns and i feel that is how it actually is when it comes to even business in the real world. The people who survive long enough to actually grow are usually the ones who eventually start enjoying the process itself and grow steadily.
The interesting thing about Hive is that after a while, the platform slowly shifts in your mind. You may join for money initially, but over time it starts feeling more like an investment, a personal blog, a social network and a digital asset all combined into one big hive mind. Every post adds to your history, every interaction builds your network and every bit of Hive Power slowly increases your influence on the platform itself.
Of course, Hive is not perfect. There are cliques, favoritism sometimes exists like in the outside world too, engagement can feel repetitive and the growth can be painfully slow at times, but despite all of that, there are still people here and who continue to be here, and they are still here for a reason, its left for you to find out.
So if someone asked me whether they should begin their Hive journey, my answer would still be yes.