Three days in, over $200 USD in earnings, and my burning passion for Steemit and DTube is undescribable.
I joined Steemit only three days ago and the amount of potential for the platform is incredible! I have a fire burning in my heart to do the very best I can to help myself and my peers thrive. Not even a month ago, I was sitting at my computer trying to find any way to make money to pay rent. I saw no potential in my YouTube channel which I had been posting to for a year. In that time I had only gathered 800 subscribers, a boatload of hate comments, and 5 copyright or guideline strikes from YouTube. Videos that I had put hundreds of hours into were being demonetized and censored.
I'll tell you a bit about myself since I don't feel I've given a proper introduction. My name is Jack Novotny, I am 20 years old, and I chose the alternative lifestyle of not going to college and repelling job offers. With the power of the internet, I learned web programming, Java, C++, and C# all from YouTube videos at the age of 12. By the time I graduated high school at 17, I knew that I did not need a school or a job to get the experience I was looking for. My passion for travelling and filming took off when I was 18, and I moved to Boulder, CO all on my own. I spent 6 months working a full time job just trying to pay rent before I realized I was working more than I was living my dream. Using my knowledge from YouTube videos, I bought a camera and took to the road.
In only a year I had gained so much experience. Nothing comes close to the feeling of driving down a two-lane highway in the middle of the night with your music on blast and the stars above. My love and passion for what I was doing kept me burning like a candle. From the people I met, the videos I made, and every moment I shared with others, I was in bliss. Unfortunately not all of us can live this incredible lifestyle.
Life is like a roller coaster, I had hit my highs and now it was time for my lows. Nothing I was doing paid me. Confusion and frustration hit me as I could no longer afford to do the things I love. My work was not being appreciated, but instead, shoved away and buried under the ad-hungry content that surrounded me. The only thing I could do was go along with it and try to be the same. But for those who know me, that's not how I roll ;)
I continued to make the videos I wanted regardless of if I made money from them or not. From over 120 videos, I made $10. Connections seemed to be coming to me at the right time to propel my passion further, but I still had to look for odd jobs to pay for rent and bills. I had come to the point where I would rather be homeless than have to work a wage job to survive. That was until I met the right connection at the right time. Someone who had informed me of DTube.
I was a bit skeptical of the platform at first. You make loads of money for uploading videos? Seems a little fishy to me...
After literally 30 minutes, I was already so entranced by the Steem platforms that I didn't even realize my pot of spaghetti was boiling over.
Everything about it hooked me! A platform without censorship, a platform that will pay me for content, and mostly a community that interacts as if you were face-to-face. Nothing could beat this. It's a genius plan from masterminds that is surely to fix almost all problems social media is facing right now.
Impatiently I waited for over two weeks for my account to be approved while trying to learn every last thing about the Steem blockchain and the platforms it supported. There's something for everyone! As soon as my account was approved, my first video went up titled "FIRST DTUBE VLOG (Why I Quit YouTube)". The genuine story sparked a lot of conversation and my video was featured on the front page. My second video went up this morning and I am already starting to find connections I never would have made on YouTube or Reddit.
To wrap it up (sorry I have a lot to share), Steemit, DTube, and IPFS's are the future of social networking. The community the platform is attracting is full of geniuses and genuine content creators. I look forward to the future of decentralized platforms and meeting all the great minds who are pioneering this new technology.
Jack