Prelude
Oh, this rabbit hole I fell into, I could not imagine before. Taking the step from Splinterlands to blogging started a journey for me that feels like a rocket ride to the moon.
A lot has happened this month for me on Hive. Here is an update of a newbie that started engaging exactly 2 months ago.
What happened so far
In June (funnily enough exactly on the first) I decided to start blogging on Hive. I used PeakD as a front-end since that's where all the Splinterlands updates where posted. I knew nothing about how it all connects to Hive or what was happening in the background.
Since then I started discovering what Hive truly is. How there are different front-ends for blogging and different d-apps to do all kinds of stuff on the blockchain. I was so astonished of what I found that I wrote a post about it.
Let's get into overdrive
That is when fate decided to kick it up a notch. I have no other word than fate for it. Hey, what are the odds of some other community outside of hive running a contest at that very moment with the goal "Find a newbie on Hive and boost them" and some one participating in that contest actually picking my post?
Dreemport
So I learned about Dreemport. A very welcoming and engaging community of curators and I decided to join them. This opened a new world for me. My horizon was broadened during the curation phases: There is so much to discover on Hive, it will most likely never end. And that is a good thing. Every day there is something new to discover, even for the Hive veterans as I would read in a lot of comments I encountered.
Ecency
Also through Dreemport I started to engage more with an alternative to PeakD, namely ecency. For the first 6 weeks on Hive I exclusively used PeakD to post, comment and vote and I got used to it. It is where I took my first steps and I got so used to it that switching to ecency was not that easy. It is different, of course. No sense in building an exact replica.
It took me a while to figure out where and how to find information on the ecency front-end that I knew too well from PeakD. I had to learn how to walk all over again with the bonus of a little deeper understanding of what was happening. The information was there, it is stored on the blockchain as I now knew. Just takes a few more tries to figure out how to retrieve it.
So after a while I decided to use both simultaneously. There is a saying I learned a few years ago in the Linux world:
The right tool for the right job
I will at some point (maybe after a month or so), when I have enough experience with both front-ends write a post about it.
Tokens
I also started to learn more about second layer tokens and how to use those bot commands to show my appreciation for good content. Up until the research to that post I wrote about it, the only tokens I knew where the Splinterlands currencies.
And still I am learning. Every few days I discover a new token with a unique purpose and most of them with a community build around them. Did I do these tokens injustice by not including them in my post?
It was definitely not my intention. On one hand I had to make a cut somewhere as not to write a post as big as a book and on the other hand I didn't (consciously) come across them until that point.
So please do not be offended if I left a token out that you might consider very dear to yourself.
Contests
All the while I am of course still playing Splinterlands and this month they had another Share your battle challenge that intrigued me. There are a lot of contests out there in all the communities. One can not participate in all of them. And even though the array of topics I am generally interested in is very wide, I only engage into a contest if the theme really tickles my fancy. Otherwise I can not put all my energy into the content I am creating and that is the big picture about Hive after all. To produce quality content and not only quantity.
And funnily enough, a few days later another contest triggered me, the 5-Minute-Freewrite Challenge to the word unnecessary. Sometimes (more often than we realize) life is just strange enough to give us these coincidences and so I submitted to that challenge as well.
The contest-month found its final moment for me in the Dreemport challenge to the word Sanctuary. After some thinking I decided it is time to come out of my shell and open up a little bit to the world. This was a huge step for me since I always avoided that on any centralized network but as often mentioned: Hive is different. So why not be different myself? I embrace the encouraging comments I got on that post with a thank you.
Tell a friend
At some point I got asked by a coworker "So, what are you up to these days?" and I answered "Getting familiar with Hive". He drove the conversation along by asking about details. "And what's that?" he asked.
I decided not to get technical, after all it was still very new to me and I might explain stuff wrong. But I was in a funny mood so I replied "The future of social networks and user interaction". Ah, the look on his face told me he was not sure if I was sarcastic so I added "I'll send you a few links".
And out of the blue the idea for another article plopped into my head.
Rising Star
The Dreemport curation process brought my attention to a newbie FAQ about the Game Rising Star. I already knew there are other games on Hive besides Splinterlands and Rising Star was mentioned every now and then in a few comments or banners here and there but I never really took the time to read more about it until now.
So after some reading I decided to log in to it because I was glad to discover you can start playing it without any initial investment. As far as I can tell it is possible to play and rise in it without any investment at all. The ingame currency starbit is earned with every mission and can be traded as a second layer token.
After a few days I invested a few hive into some packs and got fairly good cards I think. It's another wild ride but the plus side of the game is: It doesn't take up much time. So I will keep playing it on the side.
Hive Power
🎉After only 2 months on Hive I broke the 100 HP barrier. 😊
To reach that point I converted the HBD rewards into Hive and powered them up as well. On 1st of July I participated in Power Up Day and powered up 10 additional Hive. Tomorrow I will do that as well.
Glimpse into the future
Considering I only spent 2 months on Hive so far I am very excited to keep going. I get replies from people being on Hive since the split from Steem and even they still discover new things every now and then. So hopefully the journey never ends.
I am looking forward to next months Dreemport challenge in the scholar&scribe community and the new developments in Splinterlands.
All in all it is an exciting time to be on Hive and I cannot wait to see what tomorrow brings.
Header image created with Canva
Logos used from Dreemport, Splinterlands, PeakD and Ecency
Your 2months journey on Hive is an interesting one. I still believe that there are so many gamers participating on Splinterlands weekly Battle and Contest, but they haven't opened their minds to see the vast possibility that exists on Hive.
I hope they do soon and get to experience more.
Great Post bro
Dreemport led me here ❤
Thank you. I hope so, too.
It took me six months to discover Hive outside of Splinterlands. A lot of players (and everyone of my friends) still don't grasp the concept behind Hive.
But with time and patience the word will spread :-)
True
A lot of players don't really understand the connection
I believe very soon they will
Need I say you had one of the sweetest experiences as a newbie here. Perhaps you were tutored through and your ability to grab quickly is magnetic.
You did well for yourself, hoping to see you moon soonest.
Dreemport brought me here.
Thank you :-)
But I have mixed feelings about reaching it. The journey is the fun part and I hope that one never ends ;-)
You all taught me so well, I've read a few of your posts as well, so in a sense you are also my tutor. Thank you for that, too.
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