Disclaimer: This post is not intended to be about 
, but, I must first give a short history of my journey on Steemit, to help provide context to the more critical matters.
Wait, what? So I provide content, and I can get paid for it?
I don't need 1000 subscribers to get monetized like YouTube?
I also don't need to buy a domain name, pay for hosting fees and someone to design a website for me?
On top of all of that, I get direct access to a 'Top 2000' website with excellent Google Search visibility?
Shut the front door!!
I'm sold, Where do I sign up??
These were my thoughts from October 2017, when I decided to close down my struggling website and join Steemit.
How I started:
After a few weeks, on the platform, trying to learn the ropes, I realized the importance of community. More importantly, I discovered the need for adding value to a community.
My first few, half-hearted, blogging attempts gained no traction. I was trying to provide daily content. This high frequency meant I couldn't put in the research, time and effort needed to structure a piece of art I was proud. Especially one which people would be willing to spend their valuable time reading.
I then stumbled upon the 
For those who don't know, the group was founded by two scientists, 
Under their umbrella, the enthusiasts can share their research and ideas with one another. All, with confidence that their work will reach like-minded individuals who appreciate and respect it.
The use of their tag, does, however, come with strict guidelines and rules.
The content should be 'well-written,' original work and backed by research.
Steemstem sounded perfect for me.
So, I dug through my archives and found an old essay which I wrote in University. It was about the use of Performance Enhancing Drugs in Sport.
I got an 'A' for that essay, so, I was pretty confident that others, in the community, would see the value in it.
Luckily, I was right:)
And that was not the last piece of advice or comment I received from them. They have continued to critique constructively, give praises (when deserved) and show interest in the topics I present.
The team is giving this type of care and attention to hundreds of posts, under the 
At the end of each week, they select their favorite articles and present them in a newsletter for the whole community to see.
On top of it all,
Oh wait, there is more. The founders organized an official
Check out this post on the trip here.
The individuals, who attended, were even helped out through subsidized lodging, transport, and food
The Problem:
So while Steemit wars continue between berniesanders and hajien, useless posts, without substance, get upvoted to trending, and thousands of newbies are spamming peoples articles, there are communities like
who are providing value to the ecosystem.
Imagine if telephone calls were unstable, you couldn't talk to the people you care about, do business deals, and every second call was a spammer trying to sell you something? The potential 'network effect' would be lost as no one would want to purchase a phone.
If Steemit wants mass adoption, their reward pools must be equitably distributed to the people who deserve it. This, 'fairness,' will ensure that the tide brings in waves of knowledgeable content to the shore, and the backwash takes back all the garbage.
For this to happen, the delegated power must go to projects like
As it stands, the
This is sad because we have posts written by medical doctors, physicists, psychologists, sports scientists and many more professionals, who, are barely making it on the science trending page and are getting suboptimal payouts for their educated contribution to the ecosystem.
I urge everyone to look through the top trending on all the 'main' tags. Count all the posts which give little knowledge, entertainment or value whatsoever to the community. I think you will all be, sadly, surprised.
So how can we fix this and not turn Steemit into a 'broken' phone?
Provide value through your blog:
Firstly, we need to change our posting strategy from: "How can I post, as often as possible, and make the most money NOW" to "How can I add the most value to this platform to improve its longevity and growth."
If we all had to choose the latter, the platform would eventually end up rewarding us beyond our wildest dreams.
Instant gratification is not sustainable.
Spread the word:
Secondly, we need to invite steemit inc,
and any other significant account holder to study what is doing.
Let them look at the quality posts, get in contact with the founders and observe the community chat group. I am confident they will see the value in what
The future of this platform should rest in the hands of competent communities like
Your upvotes are valuable:
Lastly, I stress the need to save your vote for those who you feel deserve it most. Many people support authors, but, never actually read their posts. They do this all, for the sake of curation rewards. Just because someone consistently receives a high payout, does not mean their posts are high quality or add value to this platform.
Rather sacrifice your few cents of curation rewards and give your vote to the writers, video creators, and musicians who will help build steemit into the best social media platform on earth. Because if this has to happen, all of us, the early adopters, will be rewarded tenfold.
So I urge everyone, who have invested their time and money into Steemit, to check out the work of
This fantastic team needs delegated power to maintain and support the fast-growing community they are building.
I have one more cool story to tell:
I think we can all agree that there are two types of influencers in this community.
You have the guys who promote projects and coins purely to pump the prices, promising 100x returns, for their benefits.
On the flip side, you have the guys who care about the tech, the team behind the projects and their potential benefit to the world.
There is one guy in particular who has stood out to me from this latter group. He goes by the YouTube name, BTCBusinessconsult. His mom calls him Andreas though.
So why am I promoting this dude?
Well, I can only explain through my story.
The day I almost lost all my blog money:
After my blog started picking up steem, towards the end of November, I started saving all the SDB rewards from every payout. So, 19 posts and more than 200 hours of research, writing, and illustrations later, I reached my target for an ICO I had wanted to invest into.
I signed up and sent the entire amount, including a little fiat money I had also saved.
After 24 hours, none of the ERC20 tokens, I purchased, reflected in my wallet.
I started to worry.
Big time!
I went to their website and read the 'how to invest' part again.
The first time I went there, in my excitement, I must have missed the most critical sentence.
"WE DO NOT ACCEPT ETHEREUM FROM AN EXCHANGE"
My heart sank to the pit of my stomach.
After many curse words, followed by a few very manly tears, I turned to the only person I thought could help me. Andreas BTCBusinessconsult.
I never knew Andreas past his videos and the telegram chat rooms. Contacting him was a leap of faith.
I explained my sob story to him, and he replied with something like:
"shit, I think you lost all your money."
My heart sank further down towards my knees.
He then replied again, saying: "wait, give me a minute."
A few moments later, he replied again.
Together, we managed to retrieve my transaction data from the exchange.
Andreas then sent it out to the admin of the ICO.
Ten minutes later I received a message from one of the founders of the ICO.
He said: "I hear you have a little problem, I think we can fix it for you."
My heart jumped straight up, into my chest, where it belongs.
To cut a long story short, they managed to retrieve my lost tokens and all ended well.
Naturally, I was filled with gratitude towards Andreas for his help, so, I offered a portion of my coins to him, as a token of my appreciation.
He declined my offer and replied: "Just, pay it forward."
So this is why I have written this blog post. I have decided to 'pay it forward' by letting everyone know about the excellent, diligent people behind
I urge everyone to continue this 'movement.' Write a post about the people who have added value to your lives, within this FUD filled crypto space.
Don't forget to use the tag #payitforward
This way we can all keep track of these wonderful people and give them the recognition they deserve, above the FUDsters and con-artists.
Follow Andreas BTCBusinessconsult
Sources:
Special thanks to the community for supporting the first steemSTEM meetup at CERN
The steemSTEM meetup at the LHC - My Recap
Helpful Guidelines For Crafting SteemSTEM Content
SteemSTEM Winter 2017-2018 Project Update
Being A Member Of The SteemSTEM Community
*All images with the EH logo were created by
*All the pictures and official
