SteemIt Isn't About The Money... Not Anymore!

It didn't take me long to find out: SteemIt is so much more than a way to make money...

My Turbulent Start On SteemIt

Just like most of you, I signed up for SteemIt because of the money. No, that’s not entirely true. I had been looking out for promising cryptos and had purchased some Steem. I only heard about the platform later. Either way, money was the motivation to register for an account.

When I first joined, I really didn’t know what to expect. I liked the fact that some people called it a 'blogging platform' rather then a 'social media' platform, simply because I am a bit of a loner. Both online and offline, I don't feel comfortable interacting with people I don't know.

So I started blogging like I was used to: 'internet marketing-style', which means no more than writing posts to promote a product or a service. I considered SteemIt as a perfect opportunity to double my profits: I could earn money through my affiliate marketing, and by getting SteemIt rewards.

Of course it didn't take long before my posts started to get downvotes, taking my reputation score all the way back to 11.

I didn't understand... SteemIt was loaded with affiliate links, and my posts got downvoted? The confusing part was that some were downvoted, and some were not.

Affiliate links appeared to be a delicate topic on SteemIt.
It took me while to understand that writing a post that's all about the promoted product is not the right thing to do. When you post a quality article and use an affiliate link that fits your content, most Steemians will let it go by - as long as you have a disclaimer on your page, stating there is an affiliate link on your page.

Anyway, I'm drifting off...

The Power Of SteemIt As A Community

I've never been a community-minded person. Instead, I always kept my distance when the word 'community' was used, because in my reality, joining a community always involved a lot of expectations and obligations - which I definitely not like.

The Spam-Initiatives

It wasn't until three weeks ago that my opinion about this changed.

People started to make posts addressing the growing problem of low-quality content and spam posts and comments. I had noticed the increase too, and suddenly I found myself having long, interesting conversations with other people in the comments sections of several posts.

More and more people started to post articles or set up initiatives trying to reduce the problem. Without saying it out loud, we all knew that if this problem would keep on growing, it would eventually cause the end of SteemIt.

At that point I realized I actually cared about SteemIt, and it's community...

The Support-initiatives

Many people seemed to agree on the fact that a lot of those lousy comments and no-quality posts were caused by the giant in-stream of new Steemians, who simply didn't know any better. The real problem was lack of education.

Of course there are some communities that have being doing a great job all along, but I noticed that a lot of people took it upon them to educate newcomers and to support them to post good articles and quality content. Whether under the form of a contest, a course or an invitation sent out to newbies to post their article in the comments section to either get some useful feedback or a resteem and upvote - people are trying hard to help newcomers to learn how SteemIt works.

I haven't seen such an engagement in a long time, and I can only have loads of respect for the people that are willing to spend their time on the education of newbies, and in the long run, the future of the SteemIt community.

The Power Of SteemIt As A Connection

These last few weeks, I've been bumping into posts that add real value when it comes to my personal struggles in life. Most of the time I don't know how I discovered the post and why I decided to click the link to actually read the article. I don't believe in coincidence, and I believe those articles were simply meant to be on my path to personal growth - because I had to learn something from what was written.

Posts by people like @honeydue, @bkdbkd and of course @chrismccron are helping me to fight the battles in my life and the monsters in my head. Sometimes the things you need to hear are said by people who are on the other side of the world. Thanks to SteemIt, I am able to connect with people who are fighting the same demons, or have already defeated them and I get the reminders I need to keep growing as a person.

All this to say that for me, SteemIt is not about the money anymore (although I would be lying if i said I didn't like to get paid for what I post). SteemIt is so much more than the 'incentivized blogging platform' it looks like from the outside. It's not only helping to improve my skills, it's also making me a better version of myself every day again.

A big 'Thank You' to every single fellow-Steemian for being part of this valuable community, that has been turning my world upside down ever since I joined.

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