Steemit and Dtube vs. Every Other Platform (My First Week on Steemit)
My Fellow Steemians,
I have just completed my first week on Steemit, and boy what an experience. I feel as though I have not yet begun to scratch the surface of this amazing platform. But one thing that is abundantly clear, is that Steemit and this community is a massive game changer.
Note-For the seasoned Steemians I humbly ask forgiveness for my lack of knowledge and naivety of the Blockchain and the true seemingly mysterious working of this system. I am writing this from my own ignorant perspective and will learn more as time progresses. Thank you for your understanding, and gentle guidance.
In the early days of social media I found them to be intoxicating, This sense of connectivity and freedom. A platform for the masses. For me MySpace was the start of it all. My own little corner of the internet. Over the years I had shared my pictures, poetry, writings, thoughts and ideas with the world. I really poured myself into that platform, and the fruits of those labors were a handful of complements, mixed with a load of spam, and a sense of emptiness.
Then came along The Facebook. My brother had invited me shortly after a .edu email was not required. I found it to be stale in comparison to the customization features of MySpace. Never the less I created an account and put it on the back burner, and returned to MySpace for my normal usage.
Eventually things on Myspace became unbearable, laden with bots, spam, and advertisements. I then decided to log onto the account I had created to find out that it was just Facebook now. Something like 13 million people had joined since I had created the account. So I figured I’d give it the old college try, but not with the same gusto, nor openness that I had given MySpace.
Within a few months MySpace was officially a ghost town. Shortly after slaying MySpace. Facebook simplistic and uniform profiles changed. Within a couple months they really stepped up advertisements. They began allowing the same sort of customization as MySpace but to a lesser extent.
After investing so much time and energy into MySpace with nothing to show for it, and seeing Facebook going down the same route, I sorta stepped back. I would use it to keep in touch, and reconnect with others but there was no love in it for me. The data mining, and dopamine triggering machine that is Facebook became more and more apparent to me over the years. Once I started to see companies create profiles, and view pages of their employees along with potential hires, I called it quits. Why should I feed their system, with nothing in it for me.
I have for the best part of a decade, removed myself from interacting with social media. Up until the last two years I would only visit YouTube if I needed to fix something or if I wanted to hear a specific song. Occasionally to have a conspiracy binge for a few hours.
These last couple years I have been on YouTube, but would only watch. In order to interact I had to agree to countless pages of terms and conditions, I opted out. Like clockwork as soon as I began to considered creating an account, and joining the community. The Addpocalypse happened. Videos started being censored and hidden. Restricted modes were introduced, channels started being closed. The only positive to this, was virtually anyone who was worth watching couldn’t monetize, so I had a lot less adds to sit through. The reigns on free speech was tightening at YouTube, and a little fish like me would not fare well in their seas.
I had heard of Steemit, from some of the content creators I viewed on YouTube: 
Once I finally got my account approved, I read through the terms and conditions. To my surprise, nothing seemed unreasonable, and I didn’t even feel the need to have a lawyer translate it. That was an unusual pleasantry.
Upon first logging in, I had no idea what I was doing. I quickly brushed past the welcome page, instead trying to figure out what this whole place was about. Click to up-vote and someone gets a penny, WOW this is neat, click,click,click,click. Needless to say it was some days before I figured how the voting systems works. Leave a comment someone likes, WOW I get a penny, comment, comment, comment. It was like falling in love with social media all over again, but this time. It was rewarding me as I was rewarding others. It felt good and right. I felt valued.
This is why Steemit and Dtube is going to become the dominant players in social media, and Steem, a major crypto. It’s a self perpetuating system. The major holders of Steempower reward quality material on the site. This in turn adds value to the site which adds value to Steem. As we create more quality work we have more sway in rewarding value to others. This self feeding system does not rely on psychological trickery to keep people hooked. It just rewards them for producing quality work. Assuming of course your work is seen. This will improve with time. So will my understanding of Steemit and Dtube.
In a nutshell every other platform feeds off of it’s users. Be it through data mining, advertising, social engineering, and experimentation. Steemit and Dtube feed their users with Steem and Steempower. This simple fact, mixed with real freedom of speech, will in time allow us to topple the social media giants of today.
After collecting my first fraction of that sweet sweet Steem, It all became clear. This is a manifestation of the value I have added. I’m just a tiny fish, in this Ocean of Steem, but I’m hungry, excited, and eager to add value to our community.
-K
PS Remember don’t hate me I’mjustsaying.
If you found this post to be of value please consider Resteeming. Thank you.