Facebook vs Steemit

So, in the last couple of months or so I have pretty much dumped Facebook in favour of Steemit. I'm now trying to think about why I love it here more than I do over at Facebook.

There are many reasons, but I think the primary reason is that I don't know anyone here in real life! I only judge people by their content and their comments, and I build a picture of them in my mind. On Facebook, everyone is crafting a public persona (they probably do here on Steemit as well) that often doesn't mesh with my view of their real life self. Especially among musicians, there is a tendency to humble-brag, to name drop and to appear more busy and important than everyone else. I feel like people here are comfortable in themselves, hidden behind their relative anonymity, and just write about stuff that interests them.

I like that Steemit isn't trying to aggressively curate my feed. I see lots of things in my feed to I'm not interested in, but some things that I am. I'm an adult, I can choose for myself. I can mute people and unfollow people without having to deal with the real life consequences of doing that.

I love the supportive communities here. Hive account@teamaustralia, Hive account@newbieresteemday, Hive account@classical-music and Hive account@minnowsupport are great initiatives that help us new people find our feet, and give us a feeling of not shouting into the wind. Maybe I got lucky and managed to stumble upon supportive people, but I have a feeling it is not too difficult to find people who are willing to help others out! I won't mention them, but I've had nice and meaningful interactions with people who I don't think I would have crossed paths with in real life.

I love that I can try and set aside some time each day, to try and clear my mind and write about something. I haven't done this since school, and I LOVE it! I don't really care if no-one is listening or judging, but just getting my thoughts out onto a "dear diary" sort of thing is just really fun!

Facebook has nothing to offer me in comparison, just photos and stories of people that I know or have met in passing, all trying to outdo each other and clamour for attention.

I'm not saying there isn't things that I wish were different on Steemit.

I don't like the 7 day window for payment of rewards, it's okay for individuals like myself, but for an orchestra account (Hive account@musicapoetica) it isn't great for the posting of live video and audio that has been the culmination of days of work and rehearsal and can't just be pumped out day after day.

I'm not sure I like the visibility of reward payouts, it does induce a moment of jealously and anxiety. I know, I could just not look, but I'm human!

I'm not sure I like that some people are in it for the game of getting tokens and then cashing out. It is a waste of a good platform.

Anyway, I plan to stay. Facebook is off the phone and I think I will use it to sell stuff, I keep the Messenger for contact, but I think I'm a happier person for not seeing all the posts on Facebook!