The @ecotrain is group of around 17 people on Steemit. Just like in a real train, we have a driver ( @eco-alex ) a conductor ( @icmultitudes ) , and around 14 passengers. We also have 4 VIP's and even one V.VIP! Before I get into explaining what those roles are and mean, I would like to share with you what the ecoTriain is all about and why we are doing this.
The idea of the ecoTrain birthed with the founding principle of Service To Mankind and the world around us. The full name of this ecoTrain is "ecoTrain Seva"
"Selfless service or Seva in Sanskrit (Punjabi: ਸੇਵਾ) is a service which is performed without any expectation of result or award for performing it. Such services can be performed to benefit other human beings or society."
This name is used to highlight the idea of working without any expectation of reward since it's easy to forget when we are getting upvotes and money from Steemit. Our primary goal is to give service to the world and the people in the form our our posts and up votes. What financial rewards we get are just a bonus! We may make money, but that is not the main goal!
The ecoTrain are a small and supportive community. One of the best things about the ecoTrain train is that we are really engaged with each other. We are all genuinely interested and engaged with each others posts. Therefore, we always have a positive foundation of support and interest in what we post. This is especially true for new writers who are writing great posts, but not being noticed.
ecoTrain Driver
The driver does many things! The driver does whatever is needed to keep the train going, keep the content varied and very interesting, and look after the passengers and VIPs. The driver has some help from the Conductor to keep an eye on things and give help where needed. We support our passengers in whatever way is necessary, both technically and as a community, and let them get on with writing! We don't want our passengers having to spend too much time trying to figure everything out. We let our VIP's know about things like timing with upvoting, so they can get their curation rewards for supporting our passengers with their time and Upvotes. The driver helps with technical stuff, like monitoring Steem Power in case anyone is upvoting too much. We basically are there for each other and we do our best to hold a great and safe space for each other!
Conductor
Our conductor helps to manage the train along with the driver. The conductor is a gentle guiding hand to see things are running smoothly and there is a happy and productive Steem Train moving along! The conductor may post but is generally supporting, upvoting etc and checking on the passengers are doing ok etc.
Passenger
A passenger is someone who is primarily a writer or creator of great new content. Passengers are the engine and heart of the train and offer us their wisdom, insight, and varied ideas around many topics. A passenger is asked to tag their posts 'ecotrain' as one main category tags, so we can find all our posts easily. We also ask for an ecoTrain logo image and link to our weekly highlights post in their posts. This gives everyone a chance to be notices and get a bit more engagement. We ask a maximum of 5 posts a week tagged 'ecotrain'. If a passenger wants to write more than that, they can choose the one they want to feature on the ecoTrain and tag them. By doing this we limit the total number of posts to a number that our entire train produces, so that we can all really read and engage with them. Passengers do not need to have any Steem Power or investments.
VIP
Our VIP's are people who have bought into Steem Power or already have Steem Power and may or may not also write. Most of our VIP's read and comment and upvote and resteem, and sometimes write. It is their Steem Power that helps to give our passengers a better chance of reaching out, and becoming more visible on Steemit. As we grow and get more Steem Power Delegation and VIP's we can have more effect and really help push some of the better writers to where they deserve to be. We are not only highlighting good authors, but also good causes and topics that are generally good things for people to know about. We have removed the challenge of finding good new content by creating it ourselves, and we leave it to our VIP's to just sit back and enjoy the read! We know how hard it can be to find great new original content, so we have made it easy for our VIP's!
VVIP
We got our first V.VIP just two weeks ago. Jerry Banfield was kind enough to delegate @eco-alex 1,000 Steam Power to aid in promoting the posts of great and mostly undiscovered people on Steemit. A V.VIP is someone who has delegated more than around 1,000 Steem Power or is committing at least some of their time to looking at the ecoTrain posts and upvoting the ones they like the most.
Community
Much of our chatting is done online in a private Slack group. It is there that we co-ordinate things, and offer our help and advice and general chat too. Slack is a big part of the community feeling. There aren't too many people on the ecoTrain so its not too busy and we all get to know each other pretty well that way.In order to expand the ecoTrain concept I would add more trains rather than have one huge train. These trains can interact and support each other, but the core community of each train would remain small. I think a maximum of around 15-20 people is about right for one train. As more trains come we choose new drivers and even eventually can have a train station and a new role of Station Master. The ecoTrain SEVA can help to support and move new trains on their way.The ecoTrain is about many things, and the word eco needs explaining. The ecoTrain motto and our definition of eco is:
Things that help to make the world a better place".
That can mean many things, and so the ecoTrain are interested in anything on that theme. Therefore we have a great diversity of posts from our 14 passengers. We cover things like Spirituality, ecoBuilding, Healthy Vegan Eating & Recipes, cosmic knowledge, philosophy, psychology, esoteric writing, story writing, and more! If you would like to see some posts from the ecoTrain you can check our weekly highlights links below. There are quite a few Great read in each post! This highlights post is another way that I try to bring more support and engagement for our passengers.
I hope this helps to give you a better sense of who we are and what we are about. If you have been searching for great posts to read then we hope you will follow @ecotrain and continue to check in with us and read our weekly highlights and trending posts! To make it even easier and so you don't miss them in a busy feed you can click here to subscribe to email notifications when we post our next trending post.
If you would like to be a part of the ecoTrain as a passenger or VIP, or want to support us and delegate Steem Power please email me on: steemit.eco.train@gmail.com