Calibrae - A Steem fork / my take on the situation

@elfspice has taken it upon himself to fork Steem (which he is entitled to do and which was probably inevitable) and appears to be making progress. Check out his blog for updates or join the discord channel https://discord.gg/AmyB6ee

Why is this happening?

In a nutshell, it's happening because people never fail to disagree :) Just as Bitcoin and Ethereum forked, so shall Steem. Differences of opinion, the asymmetric distribution of information, technical issues, ideological differences and the rate of change are all potential contributors to the birth of a new blockchain. After all, you have to consent to the rules of the blockchain and if those rules don't work for you, well you must find a set of rules that do.

For myself, I have been deeply concerned for some time about; the rate of development, the self or buying vote reward pool abuse (as I see it,) the dev fund and latent premine accounts, some premine account activity, the appearance of unresolved technical issues (especially relating to scalability,) the inexplicably appalling communications from steemit.inc and their equally appalling community leadership and perception management.

I feel that opportunities to address these issues have been passed up once too often and that the definition of insanity is to keep doing the same thing whilst expecting a different result.....so here we are.

I absolutely love Steem and Steemit. I've told everyone I know about it and I have been an ardent supporter since almost the beginning. I have risked precious time and resource on participating and trying to help it grow. I would like a great return on investment and to preserve the value I have so far, but I care about how that is achieved. What is steem and steemit? Ultimately it's an EXPERIMENTAL IDEA. Can we use a blockchain to build a social media platform that has the right level of security, utility and scalability to build enough trust to build an economy around it's native units of account? Can we use Steem to secure life, liberty and property? Well considering it's the first of it's kind, I think the signs are exceedingly encouraging!! I mean, well done Dan (and all those who contributed to the Graphene toolkit and the idea for a social media powered blockchain.) Well done Ned for supporting Dan. Well done everyone who has played their part to bring this community to life.

But......Steem has some serious issues that are persistent. I can no longer wait for clear information about status and what is being done to address those issues. It's time to act. Steem has been without serious competition, perhaps that is one reason for the issues, i don't know. Well now there is competition and I hope it works out well for both, one or the other. So far Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash seem to be doing ok.....though it is early days. I hope steemit.inc completely review their approach to leadership, communications and perception management and that they will be strengthened by the process.

I AM NOT AGAINST STEEM OR STEEMIT.INC. I DO NOT KNOW IF ELFSPICE HAS THE ANSWERS OR NOT. PERHAPS HE DOESN'T. I BELIEVE STEEMIT.INC HAVE ESCALATED THE LIKELIHOOD OF A FORK OCCURING AND I BELIEVE IN THE SINCERITY OF ELFSPICE. I AM NOT LEAVING STEEMIT OR STEEM. I WANT TO WORK HARDER TO GIVE BOTH A CHANCE. IF IT ALL GOES WRONG, SO BE IT, COULD HAVE HAPPENED ANYWAY. AT LEAST I CAN SAY I DID EVERYTHING WITH A CLEAR CONSCIENCE AND TRIED MY BEST TO PROTECT MYSELF AND THIS COMMUNITY BY RAISING UNCOMFORTABLE ISSUES, RAISING AWARENESS AND OFFERING SUPPORT TO THOSE THAT NEEDED IT.

My intentions

I intend to support the fledgling Calibrae community and @elfspice for the time-being. I've made a donation to help elfspice do the best he can do whilst he builds and gets things in place so others can help. I have no way to evaluate his technical capabilities, I just know that I have seen enough to want to give him a chance. He may fail anyway, but I believe in his sincerity.

I do not want to profit from any confusion or price swings related to market perception and do not intend to power down completely from steem ( I don't think it is possible to power down whilst delegating stake anyway.) I am supporting the Minnows Support Project and plan to continue to do so, whether it's in steem or calibrae, for now it's in steem.

I am doing what I can to hedge the risks associated with these experiments, I suggest anyone who has invested their time or money into steem to consider doing the same. You can opt into the Calibrae IPO here...

https://steemit.com/calibrae/@elfspice/calibrae-strategy-change-opt-in-rather-than-algorithmically-determined-opt-out

...just state in the comments that you would like to opt in.

Closing statement

I hope competition will galvanise steemit.inc and that Steem, Calibrae, both or another option will have a greater chance of succeeding as a result. I hope that Steemians or Calibrians or both are able to preserve the value they have gained (through investment of time or money) and that the community using this technology goes from strength to strength. The value is in the people who find utility in the tool and come to use and trust it. It costs you nothing to take a position in both other than taking a bit of time to read and perhaps contribute to more than one platform for a while....who hasn't been doing that to some extent anyway?!

Best of luck to all.

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Happy Steeming