Hey Neil. This is astounding news. Rolling Stones would be a great PR move for Steemit, and hopefully bring some users.
Here's my story, I started writing on Steemit back in July, right around the time that payouts started occurring. After a couple of months, my Steem Dollar earnings helped me pay off a ~$7,500 IRS debt obligation. It was also a therapeutic experience to write about some of my experiences and talk to others. I find the vibe here to be really motivating and educational, if you're following the right cats. However, the exceptional circumstance of this story, is that such a large payout in a short amount of time was due to the high price of Steem at the time, so I was able to accomplish that in just handful of articles, a feat that is not possible today. By a stroke of luck, timing, passion, reputation, and drive, Steemit.com made a big difference in my life, and helped me get my financial situation back into a sane place.
I haven't made the time to write as much lately, in fact I took a conscious break after I hit my goal so I could refocus on other projects. And prevent the dreaded burn-out. But I am still lurking, curating, commenting, and following the developments of the platform.
Keep up the good work Neil, that book club idea is really cool and I wish I had the time to participate. Looking forward to hearing about a Steemit article in Rolling Stones.
That's incredible. And you, and some of the other posters here, are right. Your story, and some of the others, are part of that high Steem price then. That said, it's the model and the respect of users' time/value/posting here that's important, as opposed to the dollar amounts.
And thanks, just got off what I believe was the sixth Steemit Book Club call!
I agree with you on that point, "it's the model and the respect of users' time/value..." and that is also why I stick around. I love the concept of contributors getting compensated directly, relatively proportional to the value they bring. That's a huge improvement over the convoluted centralized business models that benefit corporate entities that run a social media network. That being said, I think an advertising model that has been mentioned to be in the works (I can't remember the source) could help to close the loop for the Steemit economy by increasing the demand for STEEM. This place gets really active in a bull market and really pessimistic in a bear, who would have thought? Anyways, another rise in the market cap of STEEM would really help with retention because there would be users that realize the wax and wane of the market is inevitable, and maybe they should just ride the next tide instead of losing hope. So, maybe advertising is the key to reversing that trend.