So I have been on steem for more than six months and it has been a worthwhile experience for me. Many of you who have been following this account know how passionate I am about earning.
Did you just say earning Nonso?
Yes. And I do not think I am the only one. Although I did not start this journey on steem to become rich financially--which is still a possibility I am not quick to dismiss. It will be great if someday I can buy a house or a decent car with my steem earnings, but for now, it's all about sustainability. I just want to earn enough to cater for basic things like data, to do one of the things I'm passionate about---steeming.
In my quest to become crypto rich, I joined a few communities after a few days on steem. My early days on this platform was quite confusing I must confess. I was posting regularly and I did not earn. That was frustrating. So I had to do my research and I discovered communities. I joined a few African communities and they all welcomed me with open arms. It was a big relief for me finding people who share the same demographics as myself. I had people like @samest who taught me the bits and pieces I know today about cryptocurrency and steem. Coupled with other groups of wonderful individuals I seldom talk to anymore.
The strategy then was to engage and earn, even with contents and individuals I did not fancy, but the end justified the means. The end being attracted a whale or two to your page.
Well, I must confess that it did work out for well for me, for a while. I will be leaving 10-20 well-detailed comments per day. It earned me so huge upvotes. However, something happened during that period that changed the game for me. I discovered dapps.
I am not going into the discussion about dapps today. The whole point of this story is to show that I am not that selfless, and you don't have to do either to succeed on steem.
My discussion today is on an is an issue which is very close to my heart. It's about the African communities on steem.
Personally, I feel all (and yes I am generalizing) African communities are failing. Some have been able to keep their heads above the waters for some time now but general performance is below average. We do not have active African communities on discord anymore. Many might attribute this to the drop in steem price. It's really heartbreaking because we have a large number of Africans -- Nigerians to be precise, on this platform who are not really doing well. The African communities have little or no influence on the steem ecosystem. Some might attribute this to the fact that there is not an equal playing field for the African communities with their foreign counterparts but I have seen people/communities do much with less. I think their major problem, and I am speaking of African communities, is their focus, which is to enrich its leaders/members and not empower them.
Don't give me fish, teach me how to fish
I think the African communities have done little in curtailing this wrong earning mentality that persist amongst most of their members. Rather than host contest and giving out free steem, why not educated your members on the importance of building their stake? How many active minnows/dolphins do we have in these African communities? How are we (being inclusive now) suppose to build something substantial in the future if we are not part of the conversation or building strong communities?
Most of these communities and community leaders have migrated to whaleshares, which is not a bad thing, but it leaves a void here.
The bigger picture. Strong members equal a strong community, not the other way round. We need to build capacity, we need to empower the people who make up the community.
My goals this year are quite personal and would require a lot of time and attention, thus, I cannot embark on building the type of community I want to see here. Notwithstanding, I had this idea some months Link1. Which basically involves minnows/orcas/dolphins taking one redfish under his/her wings and building that individual up to minnow level. This does not involve any community approach but it would improve the capacity of many on this platform. I have not found anyone yet and to be honest I haven't been searching much lately. Like I said earlier, my focus is on African community and I want to help someone within this community to achieve something meaningful here.
For the month of February, I will be going monitoring two communities I am aware of via their hashtags #wafrica and #bigwaves and discovering new steemians I can support with upvotes. I got 12k delegation some days back and I want to spread the love. I'm not self-voting, it really isn't necessary. I will still earn something decent for myself from the other project I am involved in so why not spread the love?
So that's all for today. I want to thank everyone who has made this journey interesting for me. I hope to add more value to the steem blockchain. We can all do something with what we have.
I like to talk about crypto and random things on my Twitter account @iAM__NONSO. So join me in spreading the word about steem
Please, I need your two cents on this issue. Please go to musing.io and drop a comment:
https://musing.io/q/nonsowrites/fkpuj36qw
Picture source:
https://pixabay.com/photo-3152585/