A response to people who Call Steem a scam..
The majority of articles I find, or that are sent to me when I am defending Steem in other parts of the cryptosphere are mostly very old. People seem so excited and ready to throw them in your face when Steem come up as a discussion.
A lot of it lies in the original bitcoin forum thread where potential miners were not told correctly how to mine. Nextgencrypto was there, he knows. I was not there I don't know exactly what happened. This is the part of Steem I do not defend since I am not sure how to properly do so.
Much of the scam claims assert that the 'dev and his friends' are in power, that they just upvote posts in order to give people hope so that they will give the next person hope. Again in the beginning I was not there. I am not 100% on the validity of this and it was in the past regardless.
All I can say is that today, the distribution is much more spread out then it was back then. The steemit account has proven that it is not acting in a harmful manner for Steem as many people speculated back then. Much of the scam claims and FUD that came out, was simply because people did not understand thoroughly how it worked. It was a brand new experiment. How could they?
I can very easily use my blog today to cast away much of those past lies and FUD. In those articles they claim that if you say bad things about Steem and Steemit your post will find its way to being censored. That you are only rewarded based on your ability to onboard others to the Steem blockchain.
I started using Steem without knowing a single soul here. I had no inside track. I had no huge follwing to onboard by the community upvoting me. Still I got upvotes. I was able to donate things in my city and get paid for it. I was able to have a little free library built and have my posts and the community who helped by upvoting, pay for the whole thing. It was even built and installed by yet another community member on he Steem blockchain. All of these things I did contradict the original articles that are so often brought back up in crypto communities elsewhere on the internet. Old, outdated articles.
My most recent post was not so nice to the Steem blockchain or the Steemit platform. I was feeling it though so I had to say it. It was well received and had many good discussions in the comments. Not censored, not hidden, and not ignored. you can read that post here
Sure after 1 year here I am not making 100$ for each post. I can jump up and down and scream scam like some people have. I choose not to because I can guarantee that in one year here I made more than the years and years I spent on Reddit and Facebook. On this blockchain you are rewarded based on the time you put into interacting with the community, and the quality of the content you put onto the Steem blockchain.
I might even say I am over rewarded for the quality of content I put on here. I don't know though. I guess that is all about perspective. If as my investment will indicate that I guessed, one day a post that gives me 10$ will be worth 10X as much as it was when I posted it. When I see 10$ in rewards, I look to the future and see that my rewards are more than likely much more than that since in the future Steem will be worth much more than it is now.
I am glad that if I have doubts about Steem, I can address them on the Steem blockchain. I can have a very good discussion with the community., and even though my article had negative connotations it can still be rewarded. I never get to have that good of conversations on crypto twitter with the millions of people there, and I most certainly never get rewarded for the time i spend on there creating content. I know this. I mostly made a Twitter account just to promote my Steemit blog and to be able to have conversations with the people who are not on the Steem blockchain yet for some reason.
Scam is a word that is thrown around to much in the cryptocurrency space. Anytime that word is thrown at Steemit, I just laugh because i know in the end it wont stick. It has been thrown at it over and over, and yet here we are.. using the Steem blockchain.
Using is not something that can be said for the majority of blockchain projects in existence today. Most of them are still not usable.
Thank you Steemit, the creators of the Steem blockchain, and the biggest thank you to the community who has kept chugging forward through all the FUD, all the lies, and all the misinformation that is all to easy to come across in this space.
I am sorry for being critical when I am. I am thankful that I can be however.. without being cast aside, censored, or ignored. i encourage good debates. Those are the times that I can really learn if I am open enough to new information. I try my best to be open and receptive. To listen without thinking about my retort first. Thanks for letting me be human and question things.
If you are on twitter, follow me and say hi here
Woot woot,
I agree 100%. I just noticed on was in the 10year club on reddit. I was part of the twitter beta program and have participated in every form of social media that has come up since 2008. In my 6 months of being active on steemit I have had more rewards than all the others combined. I think people are wary because of the whales and how they may or may not behave. But if any of us were fortunate to have gotten in at the right time and known how to benefit from the system we would have. That was not the case for me and I'm not bitter. I think of the votes I get from you @drpuffnstuff and wonder how much money I will have in 10 years just because you voted for me lol. I bet it is going to be quite a bit. Once people find their voice and their community on steemit there is no stopping it. The only "scam" possible is the manipulation of the currency. However that happens with every form of currrency every day on earth and I see how market makers operate in crypto so I get why people are hesitant. But I think we are here at the right time in the development of crypto,
I came into steemit without knowing anyone too and as far as I know, steemit is far from being a scam. It has exposed me to amazing people and ideas. I learnt about the blockchain while on steemit and over the months, steemit has become my main source of income. For sure it has its flaws, but it's definitely not a scam. It's a blessing
No, it's not a scam. But it could have been better. Allowing the consensus to finance moneymaking schemes is a disgrace.
People fear what they don't understand and Steemit's 'business model', for lack of a better term, is completely different from the standard advertising model. So, people start shouting "scam!"
I'm not too familiar with how the distribution was done apart from reading some old posts and how there was some screw up. I think the distribution has become a lot more spread out over the two years with more 'dolphins' to spread the love around :)
We have an opportunity here, nothing more nothing less. In spite of the past, even with the future still uncertain. What we do with the opportunity is totally up to us. We can cry and moan, we can rail and wail, we can simply leave without a word, we can fight for something better, or we can put our nose to the grindstone and do our level best and see what comes of it.
Any of those are within our right and ability to do.
No worries with me as far as being critical goes. Do it. Not everything here has to be the way it is because there's no other way. There are many things that can and should be improved. We just need to find the way to improve them. Maybe some things are outside our capabilities. That doesn't mean we can't have a say, so I concur with what you said. We can say what we need to say without censorship or being ignored.
We just might not be seen by anything but bots. :) Yeah, I know. I had to slip that in.
One of, if not your best article for me personally Puffy. Knowing that you are well immersed in the "cryptosphere" thus gifting you the ability to view the happenings with a unique perspective is something I value, and I'm sure others do as well. There is no way Steemit can be viewed as a scam, bias certainly, favouritism absolutely, but that is the way of the Steemian. It's a popularity contest of sorts, just on different levels depending on what people want from the platform. It's not the crack of social media, with instant gratification for making weighty posts, but a long and at times unrewarding job, but isn't everything when we first start out. The fact that you have helped your community from your earnings on Steemit is commendable dude and when I read this, it made me think that everyone should adopt that outlook on this platform.
Glad you are on here Puffy, keep hitting them out of the park dude. ;-)
as Einstein said " try not be the man of success rather try to become man of value " this is what exactly what you are .
Good post!
(I have new drawings. I hope you look at them)
I especially agree with the part about Steem being worth 10x more than when a post pays out. IMO, that's the important part. Along with the feeling of connection that comes with social interaction.