Introducing Steem to the Rustin Golden Knights Marching Band

Summary: Introducing the marching band families and staff from West Chester Rustin High School to the Steem block chain, and introducing the @rgkmb-unofficial account on the Steem block chain.

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Organization of this article

• Summary
• Organization of this article <- You are here
• Introduction
• For Band Boosters, Parents, Students and Staff
  • What is Steem
  • For the band boosters
  • For parents, students and staff
    • Contributing Content for posting
    • Get your own Steem Account
• For the Steem Community
• Video of the band at the 2015 Citrus Parade

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Introducing the unofficial fundraising account for the Rustin Golden Knights Marching Band!

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Original photo by @remlaps

Introduction

I am pleased to announce the creation of the @rgkmb-unofficial account for the purposes of demonstrating the Steem block chain, as an experimental fund-raising tool, to the Band Booster organization for the Rustin Golden Knights Marching Band.

The Bayard Rustin High School is in the West Chester Area School District, located in West Chester, PA, about 30 miles west from Philadelphia. This experimental account will be attempting to raise funds to support the school's marching band.

This introductory post will be slightly different than most, because in addition to introducing the @rgkmb-unofficial account to the Steem community, this post is primarily intended to introduce the marching band families to the Steem block chain.

This account will operate from the end of the 2017-2018 school year until the end of marching band season during the 2019-2020 school year. During that time, all rewards will be converted to "Steem Power" at prevailing rates in order to earn interest and increase the account’s voting influence.

The account will liquidate funds twice. Beginning on or about January 1, 2019, 95% of all rewards so-far collected will begin powering down. After the 13 week power-down period, all liquid Steem will be converted to US Dollars at the prevailing market rate, then passed on to the relevant taxing authorities and the Rustin Band Boosters.

After the 2019-2020 marching band season, the account will be 100% liquidated and all funds will be disbursed in the same manner as above.

The account is operated by Steve Palmer (@remlaps), and the fund-raising goal for calendar year 2018 is to collect enough funds to reimburse the band boosters for the cost to pay one student’s trip to the Citrus Bowl Parade and Disney trip in December, 2018. The band boosters estimate that the cost for one student will be 1,450 USD.

Note that this plan does not constitute acknowledgement of a debt in the event of lost or stolen keys, or any other unforeseen circumstances.

For Band Boosters, Parents, Students and Staff

Original photo by @remlaps

In this section, I'll provide a (very) brief overview of the Steem block chain, along with a description of how different parties can help with fundraising on the block chain.

As an example of what's possible, I'd encourage you to look at the post, Project Spotlights: 4,000 Steem Raised for Non-Profit in Philadelphia, Art + Infographics [5/21]. From January until May this year, fifteen (or so) members of a graduate course at nearby Temple University raised 4,000 STEEM ($12,520 at current prices) for the non-profit Wagner Free Institute of Science. They had the assistance of a professional consulting team, so we probably can't expect to do as well, but I believe that with help from the marching band community, the more modest goal of sending one student to Orlando might be attainable without any funding for professional services.

What is Steem

Steem is a public block chain (database) that enables people to set up accounts and use them to post publicly viewable content. The novel idea behind the design is that, unlike traditional blogging and social media platforms, all people who contribute to the database should share in the value that is being created. In order to accomplish this, the database has several cryptographic digital tokens (think of green stamps or video arcade tokens) built into it. These tokens can be exchanged for US dollars. People who participate in this online economy can earn tokens in several ways:

1. Authors of posts and comments receive rewards that are directed by the platform's voters.
2. People who vote early, but near 30 minutes, for high-payout articles receive a portion of the article's payouts, as a sort of "finder's fee." (voting before 30 minutes incurs a penalty to level the playing field between humans and programmed voting).
3. People who purchase or earn tokens and commit to holding them for a period of 13 weeks or longer earn interest. These people also gain influence in deciding how the rewards get distributed.

You can sign up for an account using either of the following links:

• https://signup.steemit.com/ (1-2 week waiting period for a free account)
• https://busy.org/i/@rgkmb-unofficial (rgkmb-unofficial should receive a referral bonus of 10% of your first 30 days' block chain rewards, but I haven't actually tested this)

Depending on your individual preferences, once you have an account, you can access the Steem ecosystem through any or all of the following sites (as well as many others):

• steemit.com (blogging platform)
• busy.org (social media platform)
• steepshot.io (photography)
• d.tube (video)
• dsound.audio (music and other audio content)
• memeit.lol (memes)

Take great care with your password and keys. Once lost, there may be no way to get them back.

For security reasons, after the initial account set up, it is recommended that you normally login using your "Posting" key, and only use your "Active" key when you're accessing your wallet. It is not recommended to ever login to a web site with your password, which should be kept offline (or encrypted) in a safe location.

You may wish to consider a tool like Norton Identity Safe or Password Safe for safely storing passwords and keys.

This description is necessarily oversimplified, so to learn more, you may wish to read the following:

• Steemit FAQ
• Steem Blue Paper
• Steem White Paper

For the band boosters

This account is created as a proof of concept. I also created the account, @rgkmb, which the band boosters can claim from me at any time until the end of the 2019-2020 school year. To help raise the fundraising prospects, please forward this post to the band parents, students, and staff.

As noted above, my 2018 goal is to raise enough to reimburse the boosters organization for the cost of sending one child to this year's Citrus Bowl and Disney trip. Whether we accomplish that goal or not, all funds raised by this account (post-tax) will be distributed to the band boosters organization in early 2019 and again in early 2020.

To really maximize our potential will require particpation from other members of the RGKMB community. We succeed or fail together.

Questions? Feel free to contact me by phone or e-mail.

For parents, students, and staff

Original photo by @remlaps

If you would like to help with fundraising efforts, you can do so in several ways.

Contribute Content for posting

First, I will share posting authority for this account with any person or people that the band booster organization designates. This would enable you to vote, comment, or post from the @rgkmb-unofficial account. Posts can include anything: articles, photographs, youtube links, or memes, for example, but they must not include content that is protected by copyright or other intellectual property restrictions. Also posting must be of sufficient quality so that this account does not come to be seen as a spam account by the Steem community. No "link dumping", plagiarism, or high volume posting.

Note that content on the block chain is permanent. Once posted, there is no "undo", so it is important to be thoughtful and prudent when posting.

If you don't have access to post directly, you can create content and e-mail it to me or to Christopher (@cmp2020) and we will review it and post it for you from the @rgkmb-unofficial account.

Like all content on the block chain, any content that is posted by the @rgkmb-unofficial account becomes eligible for rewards, the amount of which will be determined by 7 days worth of voting from all other Steem account holders.

Get your own Steem Account

Additionally, you can use one of the links from above to get an account of your own and use it to support the @rgkmb-unofficial posts by up-voting them, resteeming (reblogging) them, and sharing them on other social media platforms like Facebook or Twitter.

You'll notice when you get a new account that you have very little voting influence. On this platform, voting influence is directly proportionate to stake, so if you'd like to increase the amount that your vote contributes, you can buy Steem Power in a number of ways. The way I would use is to purchase one of the cryptocurrencies that is available from the web site, coinbase.com; then convert that to Steem Power using the web site blocktrades.us. I strongly recommend, however, that you do your own research and find a way to exchange that you understand and are comfortable with.

Important: Cryptocurrency prices fluctuate wildly and might even go to zero. Do NOT invest more than you are willing to lose. You do not need to spend any money to use the platform, and you are always free to begin withdrawing your own account's earnings at any time.

If you don't want to put money into the site, you can still increase your voting influence by investing your time and creativity. You can receive steempower by receiving votes for content that you place on the blockchain in the form of posts or comments from your own account.

One important point to note is that whether you invest with money or by creating content, any investment you make in the block chain continues to be owned by you. The value will fluctuate as time passes, and you can track it using the web site coinmarketcap.com. You are free to begin the 13-week liquidation period and withdraw your own stake at any time.

(Cliffs Notes: post anything from your own account to gain rewards for yourself. Post band/school related content from the @rgkmb-unofficial account to collect rewards for the band boosters.)

Before we move on, here are some local accounts that you may want to follow: @astronomyizfun, @cmac, @cmp2020, @petenelson, @remlaps, and @sameskinder2020.

And here are some music related accounts that you might also want to follow: @bengy, @classical-music, @classical-radio, @musicapoetica, and @soundlegion.

For the Steem Community

Original photo by @remlaps

You can look forward to future posts from this account on some or all of the following topics:

• Historical aspects of the West Chester Area School District
• The history of the Bayard Rustin High School
• Who was the school's namesake, Bayard T. Rustin?
• Information about the marching band
• Information about the band director and staff
• News, scheduling information, and photos from marching band activities, including practices, football games, parades, competitions, and fund-raisers.
• Who knows what else...

If we're lucky, we'll have some other members from the school's marching band community joining us. Please help me to welcome them and to demonstrate the transformative potential of the Steem blockchain!

Thank you for reading this far. In closing, here is a video I found on youtube with the band at the Citrus Parade in 2015. The video was posted by youtube user, caa1000 on Jan 1, 2016.

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Posted by Steve Palmer (@remlaps)