Meet me at the Global Block Builders Conference this week!

The day is finally here! After almost 24 hours worth of non-stop traveling, I've finally woken up in Austin Texas ready to join the Global Block Builders conference. I'll be there representing SteemPress and the Steem Business Alliance (@steemba) and will be giving a presentation on Thursday in which I share much of my vision for Steem and the biggest opportunities we have in front of us this year. But above all else, I look forward to meeting up again with so many awesome steemians who I've been happy to come to know from the two previous SteemFests as well as through the communities on Steem.

0 days left! Meet me at the Global Block Builders conference, and stay tuned for my recorded talk and more!

I'm sure many of you will have already heard about the event with so many other prominent steemians being present there. I'm particularly excited about this event, because I feel like we're at a "now or never" moment to get some much-needed momentum in the blockchain space and begin a new and bigger wave as the markets are coming around. I'll be explaining this in far greater detail during my talk (which should hopefully be recorded well and posted shortly after). Long story short, most blockchains (Steem included) have been guilty of becoming "solutions" in search of a problem, insisting on applying blockchain and decentralization anywhere and everywhere without a clear strategy for how it can be a value-adding service to users and actually address real problems that people are worth paying to solve. But I'm not going to dump the whole manuscript in here right now. I just wanted to say that I'm incredibly excited to be here, and think we will have the biggest year (yet) ahead of us if we do things right.

First time in Texas!

It's been roughly 6 years and a half since the last time I visited the States the summer of 2012. Then, I spent three months in Florida at NASA Kennedy Space Center during my studies at the International Space Univeristy. It's cool to finally be back, now doing my own thing, in the land of opportunity :). While I'm sure that most time will be spent hanging out with other Steemians (hell we're even renting a big house together!) I would appreciate any suggestions in the comments for things to do while in Austin as I'll still have a day for myself after the event to explore and relax.

Anyways, I'm sure it's going to be a very interesting event and that there'll be a tonne of fun hanging out (again) with so many good friends from the only social media on which I've made strong and lasting new relationships (beat that Facebook!)

Oh, and I couldn't be going without bringing with me some Norwegian treats in liquid form! So I grabbed a 10-pack of samples of the finest brands of Norwegian aquavit to share with the gang. And should it turn out not to be too popular, well at least it can help me sleep on the trip going back...

Picture from Schiphol Airport, Amsterdam before my second departure out of 3 going to Detroit.

That's it for now! Expect more pictures in the next few days ;)