It has been almost a year since our community was established as the local branch of @steemSTEM.
We made a lot of progress, starting with only a handful of authors to more than 10 active authors today.
Steem(it), managed to survive as the concept besides the whole crypto market shrunk to 130 B$ from 800 B$ last December.

What we have done right?

The main idea was to create high-quality content that would be worth providing leading results in Google Search and that could be used as for the promotion of Steem/ Steemit/ steemSTEM – mission accomplished.
Next task was to have a sufficient amount of active authors so we could produce good content on daily basis – mission accomplished.

Where we failed?

We were very ambitious and probably way too optimistic. Our failures could be split in several categories:
• inability to attract high-quality individuals even if high rewards were promised. We planned to attract our top producer to mycelium, speleo-biologist who discovered several new species two bloggers for medical topics – but with no success
• we tried to attract student research associations – basically no response
• and we tried to attract institutes – and got several categorical NO!

If we want to make this community larger and self-sustainable, we need to develop different tactics how to approach them. In addition, volatility of crypto prices is forcing us to think about “classical” methods for earning.

Presentation of our authors:

We asked each of our authors to chose one post they consider to be the best one in 2018.

@svemirac , astrophysics

@svemirac is a PhD student of astrophysics who is preparing to continue his career in Australia. His favourite post was published under the title: "Space Debris - What Is It? Problems and Solutions". The very same article was mentioned on the official website of SERC!

@hidden84, crowdsourcing

@hidden84 is (almost a) PhD in crowdsourcing and naturally co-founder of Steemit community @crowdmind, together with @svemirac. If you want to see what is their vision, check: https://www.crowdmind.io/. The majority of his posts was published in Serbian, but there was one good post written in English as well: "What is crowdsourcing and why it is important?"

@rifkan, astrophysics

@rifkan is also (a future) PhD student of astrophysics. For this Magazine, he wrote: "Theory of Big Bang is one of the most interesting topics in physics and cosmology. I tried in this article to explain it as simple as I could. It was really amazing to write about the creation of the universe and its future as well". Enjoy his best post "Šta znamo o Velikom prasku, prvim danima našeg univerzuma i njegovoj sudbini?".

@tellurian, astrophysics

@tellurian is one of the youngest members of our community. She started with the series of posts devoted to Gravitational lenses in the Serbian language. This example is showing the pathway how the community can keep growing in the circle of friends / colleagues.

@scienceangel, molecular biolog

@scienceangel is a PhD in molecular biology actively involved in cancer research. She is the author of posts under the title "Lab Diaries". For this Special Issue, she wrote: "This is definitely the post I've invested the most of my time and energy in. Although it was at the same time the last one of that kind, because my enthusiasm for creating such content has diminished over time for various reasons, I still believe that scientific blogging can find its way to the success, if not on Steemit, then maybe on some other STEEM-based platform.

I hope that everyone will have great and prosperous 2019., and that you'll finally discover your aims/goals in life (if you already haven't) and that you'll dedicate yourself passionately in pursuing them, because - living a meaningful life is the most important imperative for happiness."

@zen-art, biology

In 2018, @zen-art was of the most active members, who became famous for extraordinary posts and interactions in the comment section. She wrote: "One of the reasons behind 2018 being an amazing year was the discovery of steemstem and yu-stem communities. Why? Because they recognized my mission and the quality behind it. Not to blow my own horn but I do have a pretty awesome mission, it is helping people to understand that they are awesome and what better way to achieve that then by biology, psychology, and science in general. Humans are extraordinary but often forget how easily they can be manipulated simply because they are not in control of their thoughts and emotions. Steemstem supports my efforts to write about cognition, behavioural analysis, and various methods that help people be happier and less cranky. I guess they are aware of how victim mentality does not help and rational thinking does. It is not your mother, teacher, government, media, stars or Gods. It is you. Always have been and always will be you. Want to live a happy life? Take responsibility for your thoughts and actions. The best way to do that? Live like you are going to die tomorrow but LEARN like you are going to live forever. Always be proud of yourself but never be satisfied because you can always be a bit better than you were yesterday. Do not take your dreams and plans to the graveyard with you. To all the current and future members of steemstem community, to all the brilliant scientists and science lovers out there, I wish you all the best in the upcoming 2019. I wish you that you become the best and achieve success in whatever you do. I wish you lots of smiles and satisfaction, amazing projects and fun all along the way." Enjoy one of her great posts about Endorphins.

@alexs1320, physical chemistry

@alexs1320 is a PhD in physical chemistry with a very strange career pathway, starting from chemometrics and EPR spectroscopy, continuing in petrochemical industry and now re-focus-ing to optics. He wrote: "Surprisingly, I will not pick any of my debunking posts, but rather my "big idea" about establishing a new Steemit community devoted to crowdsourcing based history".

@anasav, pharmacy

@anasav wrote: "This article tries to explain the mechanisms of meds. The main thing is to find out how the meds are affecting our body and what they can cause. What is happening in our organism when we take some medicine and how the drugs are entering inside of our cells? How do drugs make changes in our organism and how do they stop some of the processes? This is the whole field and we can still explore it and find out something new about mechanisms of the drugs." Check her post: "A Simple Step toward Pharmacology: Let us Find out How the Drugs Work"

@nikolanikola, electrical engineering

@nikolanikola is a future electrical engineer with a great series of posts about Artificial Intelligence. Nikola wrote: ""Kada sam se registrovao na Steemitu, nisam mogao da zamislim da će to biti mreža na kojoj ću da provodim više vremena nego na fejsbuku i da tu postoje ljudi koje zaista zanima ono što pišem. Shoutout za srpsku zajednicu i za yu-stem ogranak! Bio sam tu da ispratim njihov nastanak skoro od nule i jako mi je drago da vidim da su izrasle u stabilne zajednice koje konstantno dostavljaju kvalitet. Verujem da je to osećaj kao kada gledate vaše dete koje raste, iako se nadam da neću zaista otkriti kakav je to osećaj u narednih par godina. Želim svima srećne praznike i verujem da nas čeka uzbudljiva godina na ovom parčetu blockchaina""

@maticpecovnik , physics

@maticpecovnik was one of the first authors who joined Steemit. PhD student of physics is interested mainly in nuclear fusion. If you want to find out the answers to very specific questions like: "Are stellarators alternatives to tokamaks?" visit his blog.

@everett57, physics

@everett57 is a PhD student with incredibly good writing style, unfortunately only in English. If you have missed his posts, check his Rekvijem za Ludwiga Boltzmanna.

@doctorcro, medicine

@doctorcro was one of the first yu-stem authors who was overwhelmed with work and subsequently stopped blogging. If you ever decide to come back, we are waiting for you. @doctorcro had a series of posts "Improving health of Steemians".

@zoricatech

An enthusiast who wrote several STEM posts on various topics, including this post about Hermann's tortoise

Author: @zoricatech

@miroslavrc , photography

@miroslavrc made a series of test for vintage M42 lenses and he is an enthusiast in astrophotography.

Autrhor @miroslavrc

@marjanko , macrophotography

One of the best macro photographers on Steemit with incredible patience and skills to produce some magic with water droplets.

Autrhor @marjanko

@bil.prag , photography

A true master of the light with significant professional experience. Here you can see an example of his work: "Attempt of Shooting Perseid Meteor Shower".

Autrhor @bil.prag

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Happy New Year:

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@svemirac, @alexs1320, @zen-art, @scienceangel, @maticpecovnik, @hidden84, @bil.prag, @yu-stem, @bachuslib, @marjanko, @miroslavrc, @tellurian, @nikolanikola, @anasav, @rifkan, @zoricatech, @gorangoran, @whitewarlike, @nataschachem, @bojana.m95, @markovicmarko, @bela.skvo, @urost, @zmijavci, @doctorcro, @everett57, @senka, @labmonkey, @dzenanmavric, @nature.alchemist

Follow your passion

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