What Does Hive Mean To Me?

Transcript from Video:

To talk about what Hive means to me, I must first talk about what Steem meant to me. I found Steem because of my interest in cryptocurrency, and I found cryptocurrency because of my interest in decentralization. Decentralization was always a cornerstone, and a large motivator, for where I put my energy into for various reasons.
The reason that decentralization is so important to me is because it requires a commitement and a desire to help others first, in decentralization. When someone wants to centralize something, they're centralizing their power,

[1:00] they are protecting their power, those with power will do little to nothing to give up that power. So, in the form of decentralization, it really takes an effort for someone to give to something greater than themselves, to help build something that is truely decentralized.

When I see efforts to centralize things, especially things that are decentralized, or meant to be, or said to be, a lot of times what you are seeing is someone power that wants to protect that power, consolidate that power, increase that power, and that is a behavior that I don't find very positive, I don't find it to be a very positive attribute for a person. And you run into people in your lives that truely give more than they take from this world and they want to help out other people.

[2:00] For us to form a decentralized platform, it really does take a lot of people willing to give more to the community than what they want from the community. And you can see this in the early days of Steem, as Steemitinc did less, you would see the community do more. But it always felt like we were under their (Steemit Inc) thumb and for the people who saw this coming, they have been beating their chest for a long time about "what is decentralization" and "what exactly are we going to do about it, because this isn't it." So when you saw people start talking about forking out Steemit Inc stake, over a year ago, you got a lot of pushback, people were scared. But we were put into a postion where we had to now.

[3:00] So what hive is to me (back to the question) is a system of decentralization where we can truely give to this community and provide for this community and a lot of very talented programmers and developers are adding to this platform every single day. They've been doing it on steem, they have a track record of giving to the community. And anybody that knows anything, the money that the witnesses back in being a witness, the rewards that people get from creating things and posts, a lot of them keep them in the economy [clarification: Many people that care about the community were keeping their rewards in the economy through staking] . When I first started with steem, it was "steem to the moon steem to the moon I will never power down Ill never power down." I hope we have a healthier perception of Hive,

[4:00] that some people it is okay for them to cash out if it is motivating them to put great content on the platform than we shouldn't discourage that. But, thats off subject, what Hive is to me is opportunity. It is a brand-new baby with unlimited potential, and thats the most exiting thing. What I would like to see what hive evolves into is something greater than we coud ever imagine right now. It sounds pie-in-the-sky but when people are given an opportunity to truely contribute to something, you see the best in people. I know in places where I have worked at in the corporate world, you may put into the business but you will never get that loyalty back. You may be loyal to the business but you will never get anything from that, that loyalty will never be paid off.

[5:00] So when a person who has been in my situation, having been a company man multiple places, to try and give and give and never feel appreciated for that, to be put in a position where you can feel that your contribution can be appreciated really brings out the best in all of us. And I think that is the basis for decentralization, for Hive, everyone can feel like they can really contribute. And it's not just something cliche to say or just something to put out there, it is true. In true decentralization people are able to contribute and feel appreciated.

So what I feel about having a large funded DAO for future Hive development. Certainly having money set aside, tokens set aside, or development is very exciting.

[6:00] It is almost like spending other people's money but we still have to listen to everybody, and communicate, and if you have a point you want to make you have to develop that point and really get to the brass tacks of it. I am very excited for the potential, because of that money being earmarked for development and having the community have say where that goes is super exciting. So it is a lot of positive talk, and there is not that stigma of over 20% of the stake being in the hands of one person. We are not fully decentralized but we are more decentralized and I hope we can continue that journey of getting more and more decentralized and providing more and more value to users. All of my friends in the streaming community that

[7:00] were involved with Steem before, are not involved in Steem now, there's only a couple, a few, and they are very talented people and I hope with this excitement of hive we can recreate that excitement over a year ago for steem, not just when Bitcoin was up but when the platform was being used, and people were communitcating, and life-long frienships were developed. I still believe in that community, regardless of the blockchain. And I think this ... it's like our home a little bigger, we got a little bit more yard, we got a little more in the warchest, and it just seems like a better place to be. What hive means to me, ultimately, is a path towards further decentralization, an infrastructure of decentraliztion.

[8:00] Those who want centraliztion want to protect their power and those who want decentralization want to give people opportunities to be part of it, not exclude it. Although we did start with an exclusion, we are removing a bad actor from our community. We are saying "you cannot buy this community, you cannot tell the community what to do, you do not have that power no matter how much money you have." And I hope we can continue that, that feeling, and excitement. And that is what I am most excited about, and that is what hive means to me, ultimately decentralization and opportunity.

Thanks for watching, Hive on friends!

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