Naturally, I'm human, and my interests come and go

And the joy of this particular interest is always being vested and interested into its outcome due to the nature of the economy of Steem and Steem Power. After going through some tremendous challenges in my life, I just withdrew from many interests of mine to simplify my world. It has been tremendous for me and my energy levels, as well as giving me renewed focus in my life.

However, my passive draw on daily SP, given my relationship with @steemvoter, has been going on the entire time. And the price of Steemit has been massively climbing, along with all cryptos in the recent bull market.

And just like any human, this increase in value got me very curious.

I hadn't actively browsed Steemit in a while. What is so different? So, the past few weeks I've been casually browsing again, one of my favorite past times, other than dorking out on some Math.

The Layout

Night mode? Sweet! Easier to interact wallet with saved transactions? Great! New logo looking like Boo from Mario Bros with a mohawk? Sign me up!

C'mon, you know you saw it too!

The Content

My feed looks basically the same. It is my self selected echo chamber I set up from the beginning and modified along the way. Very happy to see some of my favorite follows like @winstonwolfe , @surfermarly, @sykochica, @condra and @cristi are still posting regularly. Disappointed many of my favorite math follows are not, with the community not really seeing much fresh content. Wishing @daut44 was still posting fantasy insights, but look like he gave that up a few months back as well. Hard to break through the echo chamber of constantly recycled content.

Speaking of which...

What the F has happened to Trending?

• I don't really know what in the world a @haejin is, nor do I care. But I do care that the battle with him and @berniesanders has been stealing front page content from others. I believe the fight to ensure there is a level playing field is just, I just don't want it to drown out all the other posts.
• If I was a newcomer to Steemit, with interest piqued due to the recent increase in price, I would be very intimidated with the trending page. Lots of internal Steemit subplots and content on governmental anarchist types of things. Not a whole lot of digestible content, IMO, that the average person can relate to. Just my opinion, I know everyone has a differing opinion of what average means to them.
• Loving the content like the @neilstrauss posts, very fresh, the types of posts I would come back to read.
• Where is @ned? would love to see more regular posts on the status of Steemit. Ups, downs, challenges. Doesn't matter if there is bad or good news, just would love to see more regular communication.
• Not sure if I would feel comfortable making a post as a newbie, but the new layout I believe would make me more comfortable to comment. That is a huge plus, IMO.

If I was a newcomer to this, would I come back to this site?

Maybe. Depends on the tolerance of the "normie" user to wade through a sea of content of meta posts, crypto anarchy, and penny stock cryptocurrency speculation. Maybe this isn't a community for "normies", but if it wants to be a community that sees its Steem value rise, it might be wise to consider supporting content that appeals more to folks not swimming in cryptocurrency news every day.

$6 per steem is cool, but $60 is even cooler. I am not sure of the ability of this to grow 10x with it being mostly a niche community. But, in the end, maybe that is what is best for it. Only time can tell.

I know I have been thankful to have Steemit as a sounding board through good and bad times, and hope others feel comfortable doing so as well. Here's to a wonderful new year that brings everyone the best!

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@team-leibniz