Someone mentioned the Appics onboarding process of pretty girls and the competition it will bring to my rewards as if it is an unwelcome intruder into my Steem world. Lols.
It is about time.
While I am happy to earn STEEM and will always be grateful for every STEEM I receive whether it is through reward, curation or interest earnings on my stake, earning currently near worthless tokens is not the end goal, is it. I am waiting for the competition, I am waiting for the professional teams of personality creators, I am waiting for the onboards with millions of followers across SoMe platforms, I am waiting for the point that what I create is near irrelevant for most people other than a narrow set who value what I have to say.
The truth that most contributors need to recognize is that the heady days of earning a lot of Steem from posting is drawing to a close, and if there even 500k active real posters each week, most of the content that is currently produced will be lucky to earn anything at all. Perhaps a self-vote? Is yours worth anything?
You know what else I am waiting for?
Once those people arrive, this changes:
And the higher it goes, the more it attracts, like gravity. However, this doesn't change:
That is all the STEEM that is in the pool and it won't be long until less is printed each day. But with price, this of course changes:
That means that whatever is in that pool is worth more than it is today. Even with only 20 thousand active users a week, 165,000 dollars doesn't go very far at all. However, at 10 dollar STEEM that same pool is worth 8.25 million dollars, and that goes a great deal further. How hard is it to earn 1 STEEM today for an active user? that is a 20 cent payout. That means that every one of those STEEMs earned would have a value of 10 dollars and every STEEM coming out of that pool would too. With a bit of work you can earn 20 cents online, how many can earn 10 dollars? Well potentially on Steem that could be literally 800 thousand odd people.
Of course, that isn't the way it works because some of that Steem goes to witnesses, some to interest, some to SPS, some to voters and some to the contributors. But, that is still likely going to be paying more to daily contributors than any other platform in history.
At 20 dollars?
Each vote of mine distributes about 3 STEEM, so I send out about 30 STEEM a day. On top of this, my baby account is distributing 7ish Steem-Engine tokens of varying values to hundreds of people on a trail. What will those STEEMs be worth for those who have received them? Depends if they hold, right?
I have held.
I love earning STEEM on my writing and while I am sure there are more than a few who will disagree, I think as far as it goes and at least on Steem, I am not too shabby. Over the last 3 years I think that I have pretty well proven that at least in what I produce, I am not much of a flash in the pan or without the Stamina to make it through good and bad and, I definitely live what I write when it comes to my approach to Steem.
Bring on the competition - please, please, pretty please, with a cherry on top.
Because, that is what I have been working toward and I hope the content they bring blows mine out of the water and I hope that the attention they garner makes the Steem microcosm I create for today, the massive and diverse content and economic ecosystem that I think it can become.
I don't care if the content that takes Steem mainstream is @Appics fitness models, deplatformed 
For now, what I look forward to is the current people of Steem who have stake and give a fuck, to work toward making the Steem experience one that is smooth, fun, attractive, compelling and holds enough content, excitement and drama to keep people entertained, keep them coming back, keep those Time on Site numbers high and keep them building, growing and learning to own the internet - rather than being the pathetic consumer class that we currently are daily feeding the multinational conglomerates - and thanking them for the ass-fucking they give us in a thousand ways.
But, that isn't a smooth process it seems and that is to be expected because, Steem isn't a place filled with business professionals, it is a place filled with randoms, many of whom first came here to earn a crust because they were struggling financially in IRL. They heard there was a place to earn crypto, they came, many failed, they left.
The difference needs to be that when the next bullrun comes and the masses hear about a place to earn crypto and arrive, there is a place they want to stay because not only do they earn crypto, but there is a place for them to create, a space for them to play and the chance to play a part in the direction of it all as owner, contributor, investor or developer - and a consumer.
It makes me laugh that people think that I am somehow afraid of competition or insecure in my position here. I am not insecure here on Steem because,I own it. I own my little piece of the blockchain, I own enough Resource Credits to interact as much as I please, I own enough Steem to help others take some ownership for themselves too.
I am looking forward to the new arrivals and I openly welcome the competition.
I am waiting.
Til the time I no longer can, I will keep writing and earning and distributing similarly to what I have done for the last three years. You can do as you please, you can join me, you can compete against me, you can bring friends here, you can leave, you can create your best, shitpost your worst, vote, downvote, lurk and curse in the darkness behind your keyboard at those who perform better than you, smile at the content you love and wish to support, you can cheer-lead or you can complain all you want.
Have fun.
You might not own Steem, but at least own your experience.
Taraz
[ a Steem original ]
