A tribute to @Lexiconical
A survey of the blog history of one of the great minds, and writers of Steem. He may be best known for an incredible series, he wrote, about our top-ranking Steem Witnesses. That work in and of itself was monumental and should live long in the history of the Steem Community. We are going to explore, together, some of the topics and themes he has chosen to write about and get to know better:
Who is Lexiconical?
On June 2, 2017 @lexiconical wrote his first blog on Steemit:
"As the overall market cap of the crypto-currency market explodes, so too does interest in the whole sector. With Bitcoin losing its market cap dominance, interest in alt coins is increasing." - First Day on Steemit
Citing a buzz on Youtube, as well as some other social media, Lexiconical arrives on Steem, about a month before me, excited about the possibilities of a social media without the massive amount of censorship seen elsewhere online, and in the world at large.
Shortly afterward, he shares some of his experiences in Futures Trading that serve as a cautionary tale:
"Unfortunately, your human psychology is very apt to look at the movement of prices and quickly calculate how much you could have made. That's why investor psychology tends to be reactive, buy after prices ramps, sell after price drops. The term FOMO is unfortunately very apt in this case. Combine this with the natural ego to think that you have an edge, and the ability of any market to remain highly irrational much longer than you can remain solvent (either directly, or psychologically), and you have a recipe for a casino - 95% walk out losers." - Lessons Learned in Futures Trading
These days, it seems that everyone is dreaming of Lamborghinis and oceanfront property, but we might be better off hodling our investments rather than trying to play the markets.
A number of his early posts are short-form content like you might see on other social media. However, it’s not too hard to find articles, he wrote, which continue to provide value, today.
An example is the article “Steem, Bitcoin & Cryptos vs. Gold - The Battle That Shouldn't Exist” which describes a rivalry between the crypto-currency and precious metals markets, that I didn’t know existed. He shares that while crypto is an investment which is more likely to multiply in value, gold is a proven store of value, and both are part of a balanced portfolio. Here is a tip I found helpful from that article.
"The best rule I've come across when it comes to investing is "Buy as much as you know." Most people aren't investors, so they should not be making asset picks, but rather saving in reliable stores of value. However, if you are an expert in a particular asset or area (like Steem), you may be able to go more hog-wild with a high expected value."
If you are still struggling to understand the crypto market, another helpful article from his early days on steem is "Segwit is a Trojan Horse." The theme of this article is that segwit places your bitcoin transactions under centralized control, which is against the original values which birthed Bitcoin. The result is that Bitcoin Cash, which forked to avoid SegWit, is the real bitcoin. All of this can be quite disorienting to anyone who is new to the market. As cryptocurrency breaches the mainstream, profit-chasing is taking priority over core-values.
Moving Forward
There is a lot of great stuff on @lexiconical's blog. If I have any hope to stop short of TLDR, I can't go over it all. I'll admit, I'm enjoying myself quite a bit looking over his blog history. There are lots of great articles about Steem, Cryptocurrency, and beyond. It helps me to process the history of the space, at large, while I've been here too. I found Steem first, and have been gradually learning about cryptocurrency, because of Steem. Much has occurred that I didn't quite understand while it was happening.
Jumping ahead, we find ourselves about halfway through Lexiconicals journey in Steem, so far, and getting into some of the juicy stuff. Incidentally, this is also around the time that I started following his work.
How to Win Followers and Influence People on Steemit
Next up is a series loosely based on "How to Win Friends and Influence People" by Dale Carnegie, but for Steemians. There are a lot of great tips in this series, and if you are a new user, trying to figure out the best ways to get ahead in Steem, you'll want to check them out.
- Part 1 - What NOT to do
- Part 2 - What to do when you're just Getting Started
- Part 3 - Quality Comment Creation for Maximimum Follower Gain
I believe that the biggest takeaway from that series is to spend a lot of time commenting on people's posts. Comments, Comments, Comments. The longer I'm here, the more evidence I see that Comments are a major key to succeeding on Steemit. Another great point he made is about limiting your resteems. If you don't have a big audience, yet, then your resteems aren't doing much good. They can also make it harder to find your content.
Meet the Witnesses
Now we've come to an incredible work which I am quite grateful for. 5 Months ago, @lexiconical undertook an effort of titanic proportions, to write a report on each of the top 50 witnesses. Many of them are not the most active bloggers. It can be difficult for the ordinary Steemian to know who they are, and what they've done to get there. These reports are an excellent introduction for each of these witnesses. I'll link to them all, here, for an easy reference. I am listing them in order, as they were at the time, although the witness rankings change quite frequently, so not all our current Top 50 Witnesses are represented here.
You can check steemian.info/witnesses for a current list of witnesses, with more information on it than the other sites I know of for that purpose. It's been great to read these over while preparing this article. You may want to read them all, or simply look at the current witness rankings and check here at the witnesses most interesting to you. Names which have been crossed out have disabled witness servers that you should not vote for.
In my preparation of this list, I've been reading over these reports again. In 6 months on Steem, I've seen that witness list change quite a bit. As this community grows, newer, more engaged witnesses are rising through the ranks, and many who used to be at the top, seem to have gone on to other pursuits.
Witnesses are what make Steem work, so it's crucial to choose your witness votes wisely. Even though it takes Whale votes to get all the way to the top positions, there are witnesses currently in the top 50 who've gotten there without a whale vote. All of our votes add up, and as your account grows, here, your vote gets stronger!
You can read more about witnesses here, in a review @lexiconical wrote after publishing the first 30 of his "Meet the Witnesses" Series.
To be continued....
Now you have a glimpse into some of the technical reasons I love @lexiconical so much. He's much more than just a beautiful mind, however. His blogs are often decorated with South Park memes and other pop culture references. Which make it entertaining, as well as thought provoking, and educational.
Resources
- First Day On Steemit - Useful Discoveries For Other Former Outsiders
- Lessons Learned From Futures Trading The 2000's and 2010's - Bias Towards Holding Your Steem
- Steem, Bitcoin & Cryptos vs. Gold - The Battle That Shouldn't Exist
- Segwit is a Trojan Horse. Bitcoin Scaling debate explained.
- How to Win Followers - Part 1 - What NOT to do
- How to Win Followers - Part 2 - What to do when you're just Getting Started
- How to Win Followers - Part 3 - Quality Comment Creation for Maximimum Follower Gain
- steemian.info/witnesses
- What are witnesses? why vote for them?
Thanks so much for the honor! Now I have somewhere to link people to when they ask me what I write about and I don't know.
My early experiments with humor didn't do so well, eh? I thought "African Wild Dogs" was pretty decent but it went over like a lead balloon the first time.
well, I didn't look at every single post you wrote, I suppose I was selfish and focused on the stuff that was valuable to me :)
of course now I must go to see this African Wild Dogs post... Still time to edit it in :)
I was going to ask you if there was anything significant to you that I should include..
[edit] and yes, the grain silos vs wild african dogs post didn't quite grab me, but now after a few reads I am finding myself entertained.
I was hooked the first time I read a lexiconical post. He wrote about relevant topics. He commented and responded to comments. He upvoted good comments.
I even followed him into the flagging wars and respected his frustration and willingness to call it the way it is. Because of all this, I delegated my witness votes to him.
Great post and thank you for pointing out topics and discussion that was before I followed him.
I cannot unsee buggedout misreading a Colbert quote. :p
now I wanna see!
Now I see that it's actually an entire thread within the post, on whichever app I first saw the comment it was just there standing alone without a response making it a bit funnier.
https://steemit.com/minnowsupportproject/@lexiconical/quality-comment-creation-for-maximum-follower-gain-how-to-win-followers-and-influence-people-on-steemit-part-3
It's a bit down the comments but it's still there, hehe.
yeah, steemit was acting crazy in those times... I'm glad you pointed it out to me, because I got to enjoy some of the other comments I missed while I was there :)
:D
We can always learn something by reading @lexiconical's posts. The guy has a wise mind indeed.
Now you shared some old posts from before I arrived in here that I didn't knew. Will be checking those out now ;)
Thanks!
I've always seen his works on crypto, at sometimes he dedicates his time to answering questions to newbies which made him wrote those blogs on how to get started here.
And the witness updated and all I've not really seen them, but well I learnt a two or three threw thing from him when I got started.
Well since your paying tribute to him, I use thus opportunity to laud him, and all his accomplishments too.
Thank you for the kind words! I do try to answer every question put to me.
Thank you for knowing us about @lexiconical's blog i was unaware about his blog before. I will definitly visit his blog and will read all those articles about cryptocurrency,steem and beyond.
Keep publishing post of this quality my friend @inquiringtimes!!
Greetings :)
i will done up vote
Excellent your post alwys see your post ..And follow you dear.
Fascinated by Demiurge inspired art.
Interesting work you're doing.
It is actually a very good idea, the one you had to introduce all the witnesses...
Very "InquiringTimes-like" :)
Cheers
actually, those are all links to blogs lexiconical wrote :)
You got a 3.36% upvote from @postpromoter courtesy of @inquiringtimes!
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Wow @Lexiconica is an important Steemians with real quality content.
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Thank you for this. I only discovered lexiconical within the last few days, but have been really enjoying reading him. Having this history is now reinforcing a growing suspicion that something deserves extra attention there. Thanks for shining that community spotlight where it is deserved.
btw, I just found you because @ilyastarar suggested I follow you. I'm looking forward to reading more.