Why Should You Consider Accumulating Steem Power?

in #steem7 years ago (edited)

Dear readers,

Ever since joining this community a year ago, I've been accumulating Steem Power by posting, voting, and commenting about all sorts of things. That said, I've also purchased Steem using Ether during Steem's Great Depression. So I've mostly just held onto Steem Power, investing in Steem's potential long-term value. It's only recently that I powered-down ~15% of my total Steem Power to upgrade my equipment and for investing in other projects in the blockchain space.


Reasons to accumulate Steem Power?

For newbies: there's a distinction between Steem and Steem Power. Steem is a token that you can trade freely, but it can also be transformed into Steem Power. Here's what Steem Power is, as explained in the Steemit wallet interface:-

Influence tokens which give you more control over post payouts and allow you to earn on curation rewards.

That's what Steem Power does, but I suspect many of us have different perspectives and motivations, so I'll explain what Steem Power means to me and why I've kept it for so long.

steem1.png

1) I want to have an amplified influence over the network

The more Steem Power, the more weight my vote has over the network. I would like to shape the network in my own little ways, going for a diversity of content and individuals alike. As highlighted in one of my posts - The New World Blogger, I want to be an active investor on the platform and Steem Power seems to be the best way forward. It also helps that I have the agenda of helping myself and others pursue our interests.

As a content creator

I get to reward engaged followers and build myself a swarm of users that assists me with little things, whatever it may be. I don't want to be just another social account with many followers coming in to like my stuff, so having a good amount of Steem Power is a great simple way for me to reward those that help enrich my online presence around here with their comments and contributions. It totally makes sense for me as a content creator wanting to build my own following to accumulate Steem Power.

As a content consumer

I get to reward exactly that - great content, and great accounts. Voting on them is also a way of giving them more influence over the network in the future, as long as they accumulate Steem Power. There's really no better pleasure than to be truly supporting content creators that I like. It's a paradigm shift that is light years ahead of any social media platforms. I wouldn't be just another random account coming in to increase anyone's number of likes. My vote is actual social currency. It has the ability to financially support and enable independent producers.

As a co-owner of Steem

Just like everybody else with Steem Power, I get to reward new accounts trying out the platform, and influence activities that will improve the platform over time. The only difference is the magnitude of our influence. So in that sense, I've accumulated Steem Power and kept it more than most users just so I could maintain a growing influence at the early stages.

In short, having skin-in-the-game aligns our interest in building out the network, and it's my hope that the community sees this and support long-term players.

steem1.png

2. I want to grow my share of Steem over time

Personally, I have plenty of reasons to believe in Steem's long-term value. You may check out one of my old posts - ASDF: The Simplest Explanation for Steem's Key Characteristics for Long-Term Growth. With more Steem Power, I am able to acquire more curation / voting rewards out of my activities influencing the network. In short, I get more Steem just by spending time on the platform - this is great, almost like a passive income too, and I can be on-the-move doing this!

Check this guide out for curation rewards: https://steemit.com/curation/@liberosist/mind-your-votes-ii-a-guide-to-maximizing-your-curation-rewards

Also, consider this - if Steem's inflation algorithm remains the way it is, we'll have about 660 million Steem in existence by year 2036. Think about that number for a second. If Steem has the ability to land in the hands of everyone on this planet, everybody will on average, own less than 1 Steem! Imagine how valuable that can be. But let's be way more conservative: if there are 1 million users by 2036, then each user will on average own 660 Steem.

steem1.png

3. I want to invest in the platform that I believe could bring us into an economy of abundance

With Steem and any other blockchain platforms running on accountable ledgers with limited production, its peer-to-peer nature in distributed-judgement could supercharge capital distribution and also provide aid to individuals and collectives all around the world that could use it the most. I think Steem's qualities could effectively bring us into a shared economy of abundance through social activities that anybody can perform. Maybe I'm taking this a little too seriously, but I would like to believe that I can do something in helping out with that idea, hence my accumulation of Steem Power.


Conclusion

I think Steem Power is actually highly-underrated in the blockchain space. After actively using it for more than year with others, I can say that it's changing lives. Personally, I hope more of us see the potentials of Steem Power being the extension of our own will in building the platform. This is my opinion why anyone should consider accumulating Steem Power, either by earning them or buying them up (but please, only use disposable income for stuff like this!).

Shameless plug

If you like what I'm doing, please consider supporting my works, delegate SP, or follow my trail on Streemian. I will write more about my plans on building a swarm of power users one of these days. I'm seeing way too many great new accounts coming in and could use more help on this front in retaining users, at least through engagement and reciprocation. Thanks for reading!

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I have only powered down once recently because I have never done it and didn't know how it worked (lol i know). I have been purchasing SP since the beginning, even with Steem Dollars. You know me. I am an eternal Hodler

Steemit is the most undervalued token outhere. Seriously, no other coin has such a developed platform or community yet they are valued so much more.

HODL on!

Hodl the door!

It' so undervalued! other projects with only general ideas and no implementation have a higher market cap. I had the luck to find Steemit scrolling down the top coins charts and like me lots of people will find Steemit in that way. I came here for the money( wanting to invest in Steem) and I'm staying here for the platform and the community!

I am right with you @uanxufree. I came to steem for investment purposes as I saw great potential for it as an investment and have been rewarded wtih an amazing platform of art, news and all kinds of goodness. I have been searching for articles on google, reddit and when I searched in steemit I end up finding the best articles becuase the author wants to create great work to be compensated for it. I frickin love steemit!

Yes, this! I can't believe the CMC top 10 is full of so much crap that does so little. Even ETH has nothing that comes close to Steem. On utility and user base both Steem and Bitshares should be in the top 5... would not be surprised to see that happen this year.

A neat thing is happening in the crypto space: in the last six months long-suffering hodlers of various tokens have started to see some serious returns and they want to diversify into ****quality**** tokens. The days of Peercoin and Dodgecoin being awesome because crypto are gone - now just having a block chain is like having a website.

I'm basically in Bitcoin, Bitshares, Steem, Peerplays and Storj on the basis of utility - what can it do, is that useful, can average Joe use it and is average Joe using it. So yes, Steem is undervalued by a factor of 10 right now and we should see $20+ tokens in the near future - there is a lot of hot Bitcoin value looking to diversify.

"now just having a block chain is like having a website"

That's crazy. It seems like just yesterday when bitcoin was a new experiment and there were only a few altcoins to look at

I agree with you, i didn't find it the same way but as you said i came to buy some coins and now i'm really happy that i've found this nice, absolutely positive community and platform!

HODL!!!! LADIES AND GENTLEMAN!
:D

@kyriacos I can't agree with you more. This is an amazing platform. @kevinwong Thanks for a great article :D

I dunno, can we say for sure? There might be very engaged large communities out there that we may not know of yet. But relatively to the coin in coinmarketcap, i think it's safe to say like you've said it..

nothing is for sure but I can see no other future really

DASH nation comes to mind

I was surprised at how well this platform functions. It's coded brilliantly and the integration is flawless so far.

yeap. we have excellent developers

Strike a pose and, "hodl", it.
U guys, "ROCKET".

I have been here 3 weeks or so.. I did the power down just to see it in action.

Learning through OSMOSIS is similar to learning how to play poker in the military, or learning to play CRAPS at a casino..

Sue we'll teach you,.. ANTI-UP!

RULE  #11.jpg

I Agree With The Last Part
:)

I too see a future of abundance and peace through blockchains and sharing economy. Great post brother @kevinwong

The only question I have at the moment is how the governments of the world will react when they start to realize the potential and impact of steem and steemit .

They are looking into building crap coins that are not open source and do not have true verification I would imagine ... And will try to push that on everyone ... I wish them luck on the endeavour lol
I see it a lot like the Linux window battle ... only this time open source got off the line first .
But opensource will always win out I think even linux has caught up and surpasses anything windows has to offer at this point .... http://www.kubuntu.org/ just installed the latest ...so so sweet....
And if we put steemit and the crypto world on a meshnet the possibilities are endless
https://steemit.com/ham/@thelifeofbrian/just-a-dream the meshnet

Great points and thanks for kubuntu. Here on Steemit we can learn every day something new. Hope it is not too much for my little poor brain.

just burn it to disk or usb and run it live you don't have to install it .
I you just want to see what linux can do and has to offer the Knoppix live disk is quite impressive .
http://www.knopper.net/knoppix/index-en.html

That more than likely will be exactly what they'll do with the added option of being able to increase the amount of coins so they can 'print' their way back to the top like they do with the current fiat system.
For once we have to stand our ground and make sure that the government understands that they are for the people by the people and that is exactly what this new cryptocurrency space is all about.

Countries have fallen for less ... I am watching to see what way the winds will blow ...best to stay alert right now . The pen is mightier than the cripto lol
And best remember who wields the pens.

Well, many people within governments probably will get involved more and more in crypto currencies themselves. Not because they want to bring crypto down, but because they want to profit, too.

"What? Why did you guys forget to send us an invite?"

Yeah, this scares me. They are trying to take notice but most people in places of leadership are not tech savvy at all....so they don't even understand it. You can't outlaw something you don't understand. That fact alone will buy us some time to win over the hearts and minds of the people. The number one job of a politician is to get re-elected so if we can win over the people with blockchain tech, by the time the grey hairs come around, they will be forced to support it. IMHO anyway.

Unless we have a Star Trek replicator I don't see how we can have abundance

Abundance is ever-present. Humanity supresses abundance through greed, power-mongering and other fear motivated maleficence. All real progress begins with faith, takes much effort and unity and ends with benefits. If it weren't for these, there'd be little to distinguish us from the animals and we would be living as they do.

I don't think we are much different than animals. As long as we all want to remain unique individuals abundance will be impossible. Value is created from scarcity. This is why diamonds cost so much more than sand.

I agree on the unique individuals point.

Value born of scracity is like fiat currency and has no tue value. Real value is generated by work and also lies in beneficial assets like arrible land, natural resources and ideas which enhance our environment.

If we were to develop an appropriate united world view which is truly benificent to all life, we could all comforatbly coexist.

It is the creation of scarcity based value which self serving entities purposely foster for personal or selective wealth accumulation which removes access to real value and real wealth which lie in life sustaining and improving factors.

It's not really about abundance or scarcity, it's about distribution. I believe there's enough resources to go round. There's just too wide a gap between the "haves" and the "have-nots". So any system that can help to reduce that gap will be beneficial and is welcome.

Governments are a danger, but they can not stop or eliminate blockchain. Let's Overcome.

I hope so.

If blockchains can prove themselves to be way more effective and able to render big governments useless, I think we'll see change happening in our lifetime. In the end, govs are people too.

That is the key: GOVS ARE PEOPLE. Impossible to describe it better.

That is the key: GOVS ARE PEOPLE. Impossible to describe it better.

Agreed. Why destroy the blockchain when they (people within governments) can have fun in it too and make some handsome profit?

But they are also organizations with rules. And as such, the people who populate them are attracted to the wielding of power over others. Governments are not voluntary and that is the crucial difference.

And all organizations have survival as their first operating principle not serving the stated goals of said organization.

We will see what happens in the not too distant future

Thanks @thejohalfiles, it looks like other technologies besides blockchain seem to be maturing in the right direction as well. Interesting times ..

Thanks for your insights @kevinwong As a newbie, it's good to get the different perspectives and understand different motivations. I myself like blogging and if I make money on the side - well I am not going to knock it back.. I think there's nothing wrong with doing what you like and getting money for it. The whole Steem world can be confusing for newbies, especially if coming in was purely from a content side and little to do with crypto as there is all this other stuff I've now been opened up to and trying to get my head around!

Looking forward to hearing more from you
Upvoted, followed and resteemed

Lol yeah it can be confusing because plenty of information are just hidden, although i develop this habit of "just steemit", as in "just do it" and see what happens. I've been a longtime "writer" on facebook always producing stuff freely. So moving away from facebook to steemit just doing the same and getting rewards from it has been a good thing. Thanks for dropping by :)

I have recently jumped into steem power for the same reasons. I want to have more of an impact here. Thank you for the great info. Following,upvoted and resteemed!

Thanks a lot @s-dbraybrook for dropping by. It could be disheartening if the price is on a downtrend though - I've been through that, but know it's just a cycle. Collecting Steem Power can be fun :)

I've checked your account, by the way. Looks like you may have an interest in @steemstem . If you're interested, there are communities around here that help on certain niches. Feel free to reach out

@kevinwong this is the first post of yours I have seen because I am new and I appreciate you helping motivate each of us to invest in Steem Power for our mutual benefit in building our community here! Nice work getting in on Steem so early and continuing to invest during the down times!

Hey thanks for dropping by @jerrybanfield! Clearly quite lucky to have landed on Steemit early just because my ISP banned Medium and I was looking for an alternative :D

Steem Power!

I personally have been accumulating SP so that I can influence the rewards pool more. I want to ensure that the pool touches more smaller stake holders' hands.

If we aren't helping the newcomers rise, they aren't going to stay and they're who counts for growing Steem as a whole. The more the merrier!

Yeah everybody needs at least that first dopamine hit, but best to do it on those who looked like they spent a great deal of time in their first posts! imo..

Yep, I personally vet who I add to my bot. If they're posting low effort stuff, better luck next time.

If they're actually trying and contributing, then I'm down to help them keep up the good work! That's what we need.

Well said, it's just that we dont have enough "manpower" to keep up with having enough eyes checking out on posts. But with some coordinated effort, i think it may be possible.

Yeh I'd like to see something like this, we could ask for members of the site who would want to help on a rota type system. Everyone would get paid for it by a funding by the whole community to keep certain standards.

Yup. Just gotta keep trying, hoping for the best, and setting good examples. Hopefully then, others will follow suit.

Yeah it's a bit discouraging seeing that the same people are the ones with the top posts time after time. I'll just have to write more engaging content and comments!

It's the beauty of this kind of community, that over time the more you post and the better content you create, the more you're rewarded both profit and the ability to influence the community. Keep posting!

Great piece! Since I joined I have never powered down once. I also bought SP in the Steemit dark ages. I think there is great value in SP. For me it's the only crypto that has an actual use case. Of course there might be more crypto with use cases but this is the only one I actively use on a daily basis.

Good stuff, now everybody wish they bought more during the 15 cent period!

Lol Dark Ages, The Great Depression. Waiting for another name xD

Great post Kevin. I couldn't agree with you more. Steem is very undervalued. I only recently joined but plan to accumulate as much steem power as possible. I wish I would have joined sooner!! Thanks for the post.

Have some! Thanks for dropping by and trying out the platform, hope you'll find your way. I'll be around if you need any explanations or suggestions.

Right there with you Kevin however I have been trying to get to Coinbase to take a deposit for three days now to get ethereum and then on to steem. Their site is constantly playing up or card processing is not working, added to that no human intervention to pick up the issue.
I am just steeming as the price is rising and I cannot find a straightforward path to get the steem.

Ah that sucks! Well, at least you can spend the time trying to mine for Steem by comment / writing posts at the moment :). here's some!

Very much appreciated thanks