Hi,
This is my first post here on Steemit, so lets see how it goes. I must say, I am pretty impressed by what Steemit is trying to achieve by introducing this "work online" platform. I mean, how many times have we gone to these "work online" websites where you "earn while you sleep"?
I know I have, a lot of times. The thing is, the real ways of earning money online, in most cases, takes a lot of effort. A couple of years ago I finished college and at that time, I had enough of hard work. I wanted to earn money online like all these other people I never knew. The classic picture with a man or woman laying on the beach with an open laptop pretending to make money always got me. I was naive and most of all, lazy.
So, after a lot of trail and error, I started working in the real world. Experimenting with blogs, youtube, hosting, web design and many more. I never got to that sweet spot. As a software engineer, I thought to myself that I will get a fantastic idea one day, and then I will nail it. Couple of years later, still no fantastic idea :-/
Then it came, the blockchain hype. Naturally, I jumped onto the band wagon, like all lazy people do trying to make a quick buck, and I have to admit, it has been a bumpy, yet intriguing ride. The blockchain carries a tremendous amount of value, and I see it being with us for a while. However, I do think it is a bit over-hyped like machine learning was 2 years ago. Great ideas, but lets be honest, today people oversell the smallest of achievements. A bunch of people get excited, invest thousands of dollars, afraid to miss out...and then silence with a peep every now and then. Or perhaps I don't see it, maybe today it is more difficult seeing the value of ideas than it was 10-20 years ago? I personally feel a bit overwhelmed at times navigating through all the noise.
Nevertheless, at the time of writing, I feel the blockchain is a little over-hyped. Build a normal app, add "blockchain" at its core and like magic, the app is now worth twice as much.
I believe that in a couple of years, more platforms like Steemit will come to launch. Thanks to the blockchain, I think with the low transaction fees from some cryptocurrencies, money can be transferred with ease between users online. Cryptocurrencies will allow people to earn money from things like posting, upvoting or commenting just to name a few examples. Advertising will no longer be occupying this space almost exclusively, together with the content creator.
I mean, how valuable is the content without the viewers, right?
This is great. Advertising might become more personal. Instead of paying the person posting a video or a blog, the viewer will also get paid. Perhaps ads will become more interactive and the viewer will be paid by interacting with the advertisements? Perhaps they will pay us for gathering personal data? Maybe I can watch a movie with advertising in between, and get paid for it?
What does this concept have in common with the blockchain? Decentralization. That there, is the real hype. This is where we all work together to achieve a common goal to allow every individual almost equal chance of achieving something in life.
The future will allow us, to be paid interacting with content online much more than ever before. As a person always on the internet I am excited as I spend hours online. I feel we are in the beginning of this new age and people might have 10+ different incomes going forward. Perhaps this is the 9-5 job killer age we have been waiting for? Perhaps I am dreaming, again. Who knows? Either way, I think exciting times are ahead.