Pleasantly surprised to be mentioned in that list. It's kinda crazy to think I discovered you thanks to @camillesteemer's flagging bots.
Steemit helped give me something to work towards, I could set goals and objectives to achieve. It [...] gave me the motivation to push myself.
Exactly ! I feel the same about Steem(it), I used to just do nothing all day, watching YouTube and playing games but never doing anything productive. Now with Steem, I have a real goal which is to review games in the most unbiased way possible but also to help Steem grow by building tools for creators, which is something I didn't expect to do when registering on here.
So you want to build a Steem app ? I can only hope for the best for you ! Currently doing that too, hopefully I don't get discouraged mid-development like I did with my old Steem Jam project, hopefully you don't either !
To answer your question, it feels cliché but I guess that I am thankful for Steem to exist and for its community to be so reactive to people in need of help. I remember in my first month on here, I saw a post crowdfunding to help a user with her cure and the donations were flowing. It seems like every month I see such a post (even more since the creation of Fundition) and it warms my heart. As you said, "the sense of community here is unlike any other site". Anyway, I need to stop writing before I start rambling. Gotta go sleep, going to vacation tomorrow !
Once again, good luck with your Steem app, waiting forward to hearing more about it ! And if you need help with API calls, I will gladly help you. I don't know anything about Python (planning on learning it soon) but I imagine the beem's functions are similar to steem-js and dsteem ones.
Y'know, a surprising amount of good came out of that nasty situation. Silver linings and all that!
It was kinda weird to read that, because it felt like reading my own story. I was exactly the same, if I got one thing done like even just taking a shower it was a productive day. I signed up just to get the free 0.5STEEM, but I soon got hooked and it's helped me completely change things around. There's been times where it's felt like there's a pressure to post every day, and quality has maybe taken a hit as a result, but after a short time away I'm always excited to get back to it.
Yeah I've set myself the challenge of developing some kind of tool or app, although exactly what that will be is still a mystery at this point. I'd started designing a full blown Steemit app, but then discovered SteemPeak and could see that I'd been a bit slow to the mark with that. There's nothing particularly good in terms of Steem wallets that I've come across, maybe that'll be something to look into.
I've done web development/design in some capacity for most of my life at this point, but most of my experience is in front-end/UI with a dash of PHP/.Net. I've set myself a few topics to cover for the next month or two like brushing up on my JavaScript and data visualisation, sorting algorithms and working with APIs and then onto Python as well, which is something I've been meaning to learn for years now. But yeah, if I could pick your brain at some point over the next couple of months that would be amazing. I didn't realise you were developing a couple of things too.
The people here really are something else, I've had my perceptions challenged and changed so many times, but the kindness is just wonderful. I hadn't heard of Fundition, so that's something for me to look further into. The potential here is just phenomenal, and it's so lovely to see people from so many different walks of life coming together in such a way.
Anyway, sorry I've gone on so long, and hope you're having a great vacation! Thanks again, I really appreciate everything you've said and just for being an awesome person. Take care!