Greetings Steemians my name is Tom. I go by tcblack almost everywhere on the internet.... Though I have seen a few websites where others who took my name before I got there.
I’ve been playing with technology since my dad came home with a Commodore 64.
When I tore open the package and asked him how to use it, he handed me a manual and walked away. That was the greatest gift he could have given me when it comes to computer knowledge.
I learned to program BASIC (and then forgot it all). I spent so much time geeking out with computers that I formed a startup business in the 80’s and 90’s building and repairing computers named “Component Connections.” Ah those were the days.
Back then - before the Internet was a thing- I ran a Bulletin Board system called “Midnight Run” on a tricked out 16Mhz computer and a 300 baud modem don’t laugh, that was big stuff back then. I connected with a few other BBS every night on a schedule to upload and download mail/newsgroups long before everyone had an email address.
Later, I even taught myself Linux by faithfully following Gerard Beekmans’ instructions on building Linux from Scratch (#12818 to complete and register).
Today I am a Pastor in Central Illinois. And I still get my tech on by working with a company called Logos Bible Software as an MVP in their forums. (Though I’m on a bit of a overlong hiatus).
Way back before BOINC existed I was part of the United Devices (UD) experiment in Distributed Computing with a ton of Work units under my belt. When BOINC sprang into being I remember lobbying for UD and World Community Grid (WCG) to shift over to it. When it finally did... well I had to quit running BOINC because I couldn't afford it.
Cost and cash is what it comes down to. I hate to say it but science costs money. Running BOINC back then raised my electric bill to a point where I had to shut it down in order to feed my family. When it got doable again I had forgotten it.
There was a brief time when I first heard about Gridcoin at the beginning that I tried to get involved, but once again I lacked the time to invest and let it go as a fad. Whoops.
It wasn’t until Gridcoin resurfaced in my memory that I determined I might be able to make boinc pay for itself. Thus the dream of Gridcoin making it “profitable” to run boinc worked for me. Once I started plugging into BOINC and Gridcoin again I started reading about Steem.
So here I am on Steem, ready to do my part to contribute to the community of Gridcoin... for science! (And GRC).
Right now I’m working on several posts and an experiment for Gridcoin.
I can’t wait.
Welcome to Steemit @tcblack. I had an Atari 64k computer back in the 80's, and some of my friends had Commodore 64's. I really loved that computer, so I can relate to you. In my town we had an Atari users group called ACUSOFT. It was a very good group that had it's own software library for sharing with members. Those were great times!
As for the cryptocurrencies, I'm invested in several incuding Steem, and Steem Power, but it looks as though governments around the world including the USA are starting to crack down on them. Crypto's threaten their fiat currencies, and monopoly on money you know. I'm afraid they're going to choke them through banking regulations, much like they did with the online gaming industry. By making it illegal for banks and visa/mastercard etc. to allow funding through these institution. Said differently, they'll block those purchase transactions. This will effectively kill crypto's by choking off their cash flow. I hope I'm wrong. Yes, I really hope not, but it looks that way in light of recent news. Maybe it's time to start writing congress, but I doubt they'll help.
Again, welcome @tcblack! Good luck Reverand, and I hope to get to know you better.
Take are,
James @jamesgun
Thanks James. It's strange, but we never forget our first computer.
Welcome to steemit, always good to have another Gridcoin and BOINC fan here
Hi Tom, and welcome. The Gridcoin community grows by the day!
welcome...thanks for sharing.
i wish your good success..
welcome to the steemit community :)
Thank you.
Welcome to steemit @tcblack
This post may help you :)
https://steemit.com/introduceyourself/@asadullah/sharing-my-two-month-steemit-journey-and-introducing-grand-alliance
Thank you.
Welcome to Steemit! Thanks for supporting Gridcoin!
For some reason Steemit is returning the error:
no callback registered to handle error Voter has used the maximum number of vote changes on this comment.after I tried to upvote your post a number of times so I upvoted this random comment of yours instead.Get it together Steemit!
Yeah, it does that if you change your vote too often. Another quirky thing it does, is that removing an upvote or flag does not return the voting power to your pool.
Wow...
I wish that was clearer. Good to know. Thanks @dutch!
Hah! Thanks for your diligence. I'm sure I'll learn about more of Steem's quirks.