I've had a bit of time to process the presentations I watched, as well as the additional conversations had with various parties at SteemFest in relation to their products. I still want to write a 'thank you' tag-tastic post (perhaps without any tags) with some of my favorite moments from last week. The 'boring' stuff first though...

Much better than anything I took a picture of in Krakow source

---

Same goals, same blockchain, same moon

Before I mention some of the applications, I think it's worth stating that there is much overlap in the projects underway, but that doesn't bother me in the slightest. Having so many different teams working on finding new ways to present and manipulate the Steem blockchain is only a good thing for the investors, curators, content creators, and anyone else invested here.

The point was made at one of the talks that conferences like SteemFest are rare. At some IT events, and events of many kinds, there could well be a collection of different teams with a project under development seeking to gain ideas to improve their product, but the last thing on their mind would be to to share with the competition. This is the opposite of how I and others see SteemFest. If the 'competition' have the ability to catapult the Steem blockchain into mainstream, then that has to be a good thing for everyone.

---

Steemit inc and the opening speech

Ned seemed a bit distant to me. Maybe he was feeling a bit peckish, and thinking about dried fruit, or maybe he was wondering what his destiny was. Either way, and it was somewhat expected, there was not a huge amount to take from the opening 15 minutes. I can only hope and assume he's sitting on something big, and of course SMT is on the way.

At SteemFest 2, there were a lot more of the Steemit inc team present, and the conferences last year (be-it location, audibility, etc) seemed to allow for much deeper question and answer sessions. One can only assume that this year, the development team are working to much tighter deadlines, and could well have been called out for taking a 5 day break. I respect that, and can imagine that they would have spent the majority of time fielding SMT questions.

Yeah we are working on it, but were delayed cause of free beers and salt mine trips

Unlikely to hold any weight if things are delayed.

The Content Director and a Business Development staff member for Steemit inc were present all week, and the latter was part of a group of dirty stop-outs late night(morning) adventurers taking photos by the river - They did their best to get around the attendees, and deserve credit for that.

---

It was impossible to listen live to each conference at SteemFest as many presentations were taking place at once. However, it is possible to find the presentations of the talks and catch up there. This is my own personal app. round up, based on what I heard last week.

@steemmonsters - are making money out of nothing and are currently not reliant of delegation and curation rewards to prosper. Something close to this is what we need much more of here on Steem! The team are looking into new game offerings already, and the real-time strategy mention sounds really cool. I grew up on these games and I am looking forward to seeing what's in store.

@dstors - Another business model that could have little reliance on delegations/curation as a way to grow the business as time goes by. haejin is keen on the project and has delegated 20000 SP to the project 'for starters' to support development costs.

@appics - Were pretty much ready to go at SteemFest 2, and have waited patiently for SMT this past year. Uma was not backwards in coming forward about the lack of communication from Steemit inc with regards to SMT delays. @appics are still here though and waiting, which I think is pretty commendable. It's been tough for them to wait I guess, but SMT need to work, and I'd rather them be late, than on time and not right.

@steeve - @hr1 and his team! I really like what steeve.app are trying to do with their interface to the Steem blockchain. I spoke with @hr1 for a little while last week, and hearing that steeve.app is looking to hide bot votes/trail votes/other auto votes, and add weight to resteems to create 'Trending' views sounds good to me. I asked if my auto-vote would be be ignored - 'yes, if that's OK by you'.

As an aside, manual votes cast much later than the optimal time for good curation rewards due to the content actually being read could be rewarded with MCT, or 'Manual Curation Token'. Sounds cool, no idea how to take this forward, but I like it.

@oracle-d - @starkerz was part of my bowling team at the festival and I spoken to him on the coach on the way. He seemed super excited by who in the business world he was due to meet in the coming weeks and I'm going to allow him this excuse for not being on top form at the bowling

The idea behind @oracle-d is to attract businesses or clients to invest into Steem Power, which can then be used to reward the people that promote their business or service. This sounds a solid initiative to bring in more investment, holding of SP, and a rise in demand. Go on Matt, bring home the bacon!

@esteem - I have to mention @esteem because of their presentation on some new features, especially the searching of content held on Steem. The functionality of the search, and the speed at which it ran impressed me a lot, and during the presentation, roelandp asked if they could find his 2 year old 'make-up' post. Which they did. If my phone wasn't so old and slow, I would be using the app on IOS a lot more.

@utopian-io - Are re-developing their site and it could be ready around March/April next year. I was approached by a couple of people at the even who seemed worried that they might be leaving Steem. Offering payment for work in other cryptocurrency via tips isn't new, and I think this inclusion of other crypto has the potential to strengthen @utopian-io going forward. It was really good to meet 'the boss', his partner, and some of the key staff.

---

A bit of a rapid-fire round up, and I'm sure there are many full posts on individual apps on the chain right now to get stuck into.

I'm confident that with SMT, the number of new apps will grow rapidly, and it could be that none of the above take us mainstream / fill many pockets / whatever you want from Steem. Maybe something else will arrive at the perfect time, having cherry-picked all the best features and learned from the 'mistakes' of the past. Someone's destiny.....

Right, that's my round-up on the talks/tech. The next/last Steemfest post will be about the people I met, those who made me laugh, and those who stole my towel so i was left with a really tiny one to dry myself for a few days :P

Have a nice day all!

Asher