Made Me A Minnow :-)

If you're reading this, I owe you a debt of gratitude, fellow Steemian. After a journey that started on April 1^st and has lasted for 225 posts, you all have made me a Minnow!

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Somehow it seems longer; it's only been almost seven months now since I've started posting here, but so much has happened since then that it almost feels like seven years. Not only the developments of the platform itself, but the development of the relationships with the actual people that make the platform has been a satisfying adventure. I've said it before, and I'll say it here again: nowhere else have I encountered such a passionate group of people. All highly creative, unique and individual, yet able to form a tightly knit community of communities; here I've met so many people I wish I'd met in real life.

Besides thanking you all, I would also like to make an apology here; it's ironic that I should become a minnow in a time when I actually don't have enough time to dedicate to steemit, and consequently to all of you, my dear readers. You might have noticed a lack of interaction from my side the last couple of weeks; it's a miracle that my UA-score hasn't already fallen of a cliff because I really struggle to keep up my promise of one post per day and have no time or energy left to read a lot of your posts, fellow steemians and fellow helpienauts... I really don't want to go into too much detail here, but my girlfriend's parents aren't doing well at all and need constant care, which we provide of course.

I don't know how long this situation will last, but I hope my time won't be freed up by one of them leaving this world... And then there's our day jobs; both my girlfriend and myself are under a lot of pressure with both of us having a chance to lose our jobs. This, combined with the regular day to day struggles of making ends meet, makes that I have very little energy left after writing my daily post, which has become my way of winding down after another long day.

Now don't take this as a cue to start worrying about me, I'm fine, really; I just thought I owed all of you an explanation of my reduced presence in this wonderful community. Today I made time to attend the weekly voice chat hangout on the Hive account@helpie Discord channel, and there I heard that a lot of people are leaving steemit, or are thinking about it. This has something to do with the plan to experiment with a 50/50 percent divide in curation awards so that half the reward goes to curators and content creators get to keep the other half. Although opinions differ on how this will affect voting behavior, I think we can all agree here and now that people will always try to game the system, some will always find a way around the algorithms to suit their short-term goals.

That's why I don't think any change on the technical side will solve any of the problems with possible unfair usage of the platform and it's reward pool. The platform itself won't ever change that, only the people that make the platform will bring about change by changing their, and each others mentality. And that's a big part of why I'm still so positive about steemit's chances; the communities and individuals I've met here look like they realize that the best chance for growth is to aim to grow the community. Take the hard fork we recently endured together; there were so many little in-fights about the possible consequences, about responsibilities and power concentration and unfair influence... But here we all are. Still on-boarding new users, Hive account@helpie still growing, and me being made a minnow by all of you.

We're in good shape, my dear readers and fellow steemians. Steemit is still a party and crypto-currencies are still the best way forward. And if I can be made a minnow, so can you ;-)

_{source: Wikimedia Commons}

Although I owe thanks to ALL of you, there's a couple of steemians that I don't want to be left unmentioned here.

Hive account@movingman, thank you for welcoming me as a newbie back in April, explaining the basics and showing me around this strange new world ;-)

Hive account@meno, what can I say that hasn't been said before about your wonderful personality? Thanks so much for being a guide, a mentor and above all a friend to me and so many other steemians ho found a home filled with kindred spirits in Hive account@helpie.

Hive account@curie, the best group of curators dedicated to encouraging starters on our platform. I often think the work you all do by manually curating posts is highly underestimated and undervalued, so I want to be sure to say thank you to all of you too <3

Hive account@zipporah, Hive account@nathankaye and Hive account@ankapolo, my soulmates :-) Further words are unnecessary here <3

Hive account@chbartist and Hive account@diabolika, thank you for being, both in your own ways, guiding lights and sources of inspiration during my journey here!

And there are so many more I should mention here; I'm pretty sure you know who you are, most of you already were or have found your way into Hive account@helpie ;-)

THANK YOU!!

Edit
I just woke up and realized why I slept so bad... I totally forgot to mention:
Hive account@informationwar, Hive account@commonlaw and all others at Hive account@informationwar; next to Hive account@curie I owe them sooo much! Where Hive account@curie specializes in getting starters up, running and motivated, Hive account@informationwar inspires all of us to keep speaking truth to power. Thank you all and please forgive this stupid oversight from me....

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Thanks so much for visiting my blog and reading my posts dear reader, I appreciate that a lot :-) If you like my content, please consider leaving a comment, upvote or resteem. I'll be back here tomorrow and sincerely hope you'll join me. Until then, keep steeming!

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