I joined Steemit on June 14, 2017 and needless to say, the past six and a half months have been an incredible experience for me. I was never a "social media" person, I don't uses Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or any other platform like that so it took some time to watch the interactions between users to see how it all worked before I decided to join - and I am happy I did.

Finding My Place

There was a true community feel between people which seemed more genuine than the shallow selfie with likes mentality of the other mainstream sites. The interactions, community challenges, networking, and contests were all part of the draw for me and I joining in helped me network and connect with like-minded people pretty quickly.

I have a background in photography, art, and graphic design so the seemingly endless offerings of contests gave me a place to showcase my abilities and begin earning extra rewards for my efforts. I enjoyed taking part in weekly photography and drawing contests that let me dust off skills I haven't used in a while and connect with people of similar interest.

Very early on I made the extra effort to help different Steemians promote their community building challenges like @Stellabelle's "Get Your Ass On Steemit" and later "Purge Nights", @Sykochica's "Steemit Business Card Challenge", and @Merej99's massive "Community Engagement Challenge aka The Beast". These were perfect examples of how much good can be done here when we all work together.

Projects like these were the springboard to later months as I devoted more of my time towards building and supporting communities here on Steemit with the purpose of helping others in ways we can't by ourselves as "minnows".

In time these contests and challenges lead me to the @OfficialFuzzy's BeyondBitcoin community where in time I stepped up to take on an ever increasing amount of responsibilities and leadership roles across the network of Whaleshares, EOSTalk, Bitshares communities. We have had a wild year of ups and downs, but the purpose of these communities is genuine - to find synergies between build Dan's DPoS chains and help build and support projects that utilize them to fairly benefit all users. This is something I have and will continue to post about, the power and compatibility of Bitshares > STEEM > EOSIO can be harnessed to build great things, or be ignored and allow a few bad-intentioned individuals to hurt us all.

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The Struggle Is REAL

We've all seen the flag wars, spam wars, and whale wars play out over the last 6 months - all things that seemed to have been ignited by changed that rolled out after HF19. Good people who speak out to help make Steemit a better place for us, or suggest projects that bridge gaps between other systems like Bitshars and EOSIO all get added to the "hit list" and are ruthlessly flagged and bullied to "teach them a lesson" for exposing the shady side of things here or daring to suggest an alternative.

Hopefully in time future hard forks and community efforts can help bring a balance to Steemit to allow us all to help more people and communities together. At the moment I am thankful for the higher STEEM value so I can spread my votes to more people and help more during our weekly events over on Whaleshares, but who knows how long that will last.

There is an imbalance in the force here that needs to be corrected.

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Looking Forward

I am cautiously optimistic about the future of Steemit, but I know there are so many projects and platforms currently under development that 2018 will be a great year for cryptocurrency-backed social media and blogging platforms. My hope is that we can bridge the gap between them to allow successful cross-posting to multiple platforms to earn rewards from any/all where our content is relevant.

I am now a moderator of multiple discords, an admin on our related telegrams, a live events coordinator and co-host, as well as a projects/contest coordinator across the Whaleshares, EOSTalk and BeyondBitcoin communities. I am forever grateful for @OfficialFuzzy for trusting in me, for his generosity, the opportunities he has given me, and for all the thankless deeds he does without fail. I take my responsibilities seriously because I know how important what we do is to many others.

I am also thankful to have met so many great people from all across the world and look forward to the many new people I will meet in the coming year.

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Connect With Us

I encourage anyone who has not done so already to connect with us in the network of BeyondBitcoin communities and join in the discussions. We have a tremendous wealth of information available from a large group of very smart people working to bring these projects to life.

EOSTalk Discord
EOS.IO related community and topic discussions.
https://discord.gg/WaN27D2

Whaleshares Discord
Steemit community discussions, contests and events.
https://discord.gg/E9Rm9yT

Bitshares Discord
Bishares development community and discussions.
https://discord.gg/z2MSfWg

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Projects I Continue to Support

@BuildAWhale - Curation Digest (Quality Content Curation by Humans)
@FamilyProtection - True Family/Child Protection Support Group
@SteemitWorldmap - Pin Your Post to a Collective World Map
@LookingForNiche - Connect with Like-Minded People on Steemit
@blocktivity - The ONLY Blockchain Statistics that Matter
@SmokeNetwork - First Cannabis Blockcahin Community _{Being built on EOSIO}
@Peerity-io - Activity/Community Network
@Voiceshares - Giving Voice to The Suppressed
@Hairshares - Cancer Survivors Support Group

...among others who may not have an official Steemit page or are working 'behind the scenes'.

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Witness Voting is IMPORTANT for ALL OF US!

@TheMarkyMark is one of the fastest growing witnesses on Steemit as he EARNs the respect and support of community leaders, developers, and members for his unrelenting efforts to improve the platform [including a new FULL Node] for us all.

Scroll the bottom of the Witness Page and check the box for 'themarkymark' or type it in the text box.

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HAPPY NEW YEAR!

May 2018 bring you happiness and success!

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Let me know what you think, please leave your comments below.

As always, please upvote this post and follow me if you like my work and want to see more.

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Thank You to EVERYONE who has Supported Me in 2017!