Hello there fellow LF users! As a new year is poised to begin, I wish to look back at my experiences in 2020 as well as what has happened and where I am hopeful we might be going in 2021.
First, I want to talk about how I came to LeoFinance in the first place. As a veteran user of the HIVE platform, I was very discouraged starting the year. My enthusiasm for HIVE and DeFi as a whole was majorly decreased, especially after the cruelly centralized takeover of Steemit by Tron foundation's founder Justin Sun. Seeing just how easy and rapid a takeover like that could be, I immediately lost hope in Steem, and really any social network based on crypto. I had basically resigned myself to working a regular job.
Then, COVID began, and the pandemic really opened up a lot of opportunities to continue on the path I was on before. Making more content centered on entertaining and helping people, while also making a difference in the lives of my audience was the best thing I was able to do. With everything closed there was more time, so I started gaining a following. First, on TikTok, then later on other platforms in the crypto space, like Leo. It was actually 
The possibilities with this are endless.
But of course, we have to address the less positive aspects of the year. In March, my mother was diagnosed with Stage 3 lung cancer. It didn't look good going in, and to be honest? I was scared. Scared not only of losing my mom but also of seeing her suffer, as I had heard others speak of seeing their loved ones suffer from COVID. Ventilators are not pleasant, especially when attached to someone you barely recognize.
Thankfully, mom is still here with us, and is doing much better now. She isn't in remission, but she is recovering little by little. Because of her, I have hope for the future.
There are many things I hope for in 2021, and many of them are linked to LeoFinance and the continued work of so many here. With Nathan Mars's help, I hope to bring more people into the fold here as we being necessary mainstream attention to LeoFinance and the HIVE ecosystem as a whole. It is more important now than ever that we begin scaling up our growth so we can start a new wave of adopters next year, without which we may just become the next Steemit, bought out because we couldn't independently support it. I pray that does not happen and that we will continue to rise up to the challenge of decentralized media.
I have many ideas for new features and improvements for Leo, including making the LeoDex platform accessible for people to add articles to it, as I feel it would be a great resource for new users to consult and learn many things about Leo and cryptocurrency in general. Right now there are few articles included there and most have subjects that are shallow in depth, which I assume is not the intention of the Dex. Many of us here probably hoped for a wealth of information to crowd the page when we opened it up, and found a dearth of anything beyond basic information which, while helpful, means little to the veteran user, and makes it more of a footnote than an actual integrated tool for everyone.
I also believe it would be great if the video creators among us, like myself, would dedicate some of their time each month to creating advertisements for the platform that could drive attention and users our way, if only to make the momentum begin to shift in our favor. The way we do this is through social change and new connections with people. Networking over the next year will probably be our biggest asset both here and on platforms like Twitter and YouTube. If we can generate the hype and enthusiasm we ourselves have in others we can see growth beyond anything we might have imagined in years past.
I have emphasized growth and momentum several times in this article, and I think it is important to explain why I have done this. I myself firmly believe in the power that Decentralized Media can have in the coming years, but I have also experienced the sheer backlash and resistance there is to new ideas and spaces being established on the internet. Too many people are invested in making the already popular platforms bigger without driving the competition. Without competition industries stagnate and companies become lazy and complacent. This is exactly why sites like Facebook and Twitter have been able to get away with censoring whole political factions based on what the CEOs believe should be promoted. Here on the blockchain everyone has an equal voice. This is what makes our platforms so important. If you can drive the will of the people through a platform, so can you free that same will from the shackles of oppression and conformity. We can instead allow our ideas to be transformed into better and better versions through dialogue and consensus. This is truly why I believe in this platform. Because here, I can speak my mind without being told I'm wrong for having an opinion.
Donate some crypto to help me continue to make great content for you! Any amount is greatly appreciated!
HIVE Wallet:
Ethereum
0x20724CD5B92FCEB84589EC2299809410D0684D7D
Litecoin
LbPgCn12oCWLm8hYBfpyvBWcDvycqsJaDV
DAI
0x20724CD5B92FCEB84589EC2299809410D0684D7D
XRP
r3cd7zYEoYahYZZjn7kh96hHDQqLbcP3xm
Thank you all for reading this article and for supporting my endeavors here on the LeoFinance platform. I continue to learn and grow more and more as I work towards the goals I have for next year! I wish you all a Happy New Year and hope to see you again here!