As everyone probably has noticed by now, Steemit.com has been offline off and on for the better part of the last 8+ hours. You can read more on the Steemit Blog but the short story is Steemit.com is under a DDOS attack.
Yet here we are, all the dApps are working fine. I am able to blog, comment, read other blogs and comments perfectly fine. All I had to do is choose another UI (dApp) to access the Steem blockchain.
It's really remarkable how powerful blockchain technology is and how resilient it is. While Facebook, Google, and Whatsapp with considerably more resources are struggling to maintain a usable user experience, Steem persists. This is why we need to focus on more dApps and front ends to truly decentralize the Steem blockchain and user experience.
When MIRA is released and Hivemind is improved and used in more areas, this blockchain will be stronger and more resilient than ever. The ability to have an average joe run their own full node on 4-16GB of ram will be an amazing step forward in decentralizing and strengthening the blockchain.