Giving your absolute everything doesn't guarantee you get anything …. This is what our good doctor says. I don't think for a single second that I don't have anything to learn from you, because I do. I wanted to start with that because that is also my fundamental philosophy which dictates my actions in hive. I want to talk about something important today, which may be unpleasant to some of you. But just because it is, we can't sweep it under the carpet and hide it. We need to discuss it, and we will talk about it.
I want to talk about what is quality and how do a hive user get support. Yes, I will keep it blunt. How do you get vote? That is the topic of discussion today. What I am writing here is neither the guideline of BDC nor bdvoter, as they are written in gory details in respective places, and interested users can look at it. What I am writing is the philosophy of an honest DPOS blogging platform. The reason I thought this discussion is warranted is that people keep asking in BDC voice meetings, in D.M.s, in chats….. The questions in this system continue to be 2-fold:
The answer, to the first question, is simple. Quality is subjective. What I consider quality, you may not consider it. That is fine. You can't force me to say this is quality, I can't force you to say that this is quality. If I consider something quality, I will vote it as per my STAKE, and you will do likewise. If my stake is higher than yours, the impact of my vote will be higher than yours. That is the fundamental of DPOS system.
Answer to the second question is also simple. You can't do anything specific to get a vote. A vote is subjective, as well. Curation projects often have some basic guidelines, following them doesn't guarantee any vote, but the possibility of getting vote may increase somewhat. For individuals, it is even more subjective. An individual can decide what he/she wants to vote at his/her will if it is not abusive. If it is abusive, we have a mechanism in place, such as a downvote, which can be used to re-adjust the reward. Reward pool is fixed, and nobody owns it until the 7th day of the post. Votes are not yours until payout.
This is so simple, but people still don't get it. When explained this way, community members ask the follow-up question: Why are THEY getting the vote and not me? Wrong question. It is like asking why Bill Gates or Elon Musk is rich, and I am not. If you can answer that question, please feel free, but I am not interested in that answer, because answering that question has no impact on my life or action.
What I recommend when you have these questions, please think about two things. Curation project and individuals are here to vote you. There is a monetary benefit for them to vote for you. There is more idle vote out there than content. But that doesn't mean you can write/blog whatever and get a vote. There is also another expectation of entitlement; that being an 'older' user guarantees certain privileges. It does not. The only thing it does to me that it ensures that you know the loopholes of hive, so if you like to abuse, you can perhaps do it better than the new user.
Similarly, you can also know how to engage better with the community because you are an 'older' user. It is a double-edged sword. The sense of entitlement just because of a longer presence is not a virtue we should strive for.
The other thing to talk about is downvote. Downvote is not a punishment, in most cases, it is simply a disagreement on the reward. If I don't agree with the reward I see on your post, I may choose to downvote it. It is not personal, and it may not have anything to do with the quality of your post. You can have a very good quality post, but if some individual does not agree with the reward of that post, they can downvote the post to adjust the reward.
Posting something like clockwork and expecting some auto-vote and collect the reward and sell the hive, is considered abuse of the reward pool. As a member of the community, you must ask yourself the question of what you are willing to do for the community. Community is supporting you and will support you, but it must be a two-way process. You can either support the community with funds, or you can support the community with time and personal energy. Both are equally welcome.
This is a serious issue, and if the abuse of the reward pool is not stopped or contained, there is a growing voice of discussion to stop the reward from the Hive token altogether. I hope we don't get there soon. But that voice is growing louder by the minute.
-Editor
These are some very, very important words to learn. It is crucial to fathom the gory depths these few words hold. You are not entitled to anything, and once you come to terms with this and part ways with your sense of entitlement, you will see it'll get a little easier to get sleep at night :)
Sometimes you just have to do things for the greater good, sometimes for the thrill of the journey....the destination will eventually reach you someday. And even if it doesn't, it's okay. Remember? You are not guaranteed the destination :)
Let me tell you a story, the story of the Phoenix.
About a couple of months back, I started playing the Football Managerial game called 
As it is with every other blockchain game, besides skill you need some, as dada says, " brute force" aka monetary investment to go to the top.
Looking at some of the managers spending thousands of dollars (literally), I knew very well I was never going to match them with brute force, and that didn't matter. I was enjoying the game and swiftly cruised through leagues 2 and 1 at first shot. And I was submerged into the burning flames of the "League of Champions!" (LoC)
I was quickly shown my place in the LoC after just a few matches against the "big boys"....on an ashtray in the deepest pit of the hell that the Loc is!
From the very beginning, winning the LoC was never an option for me. Simply because I never thought it was possible for me....the tiny bird hidden under the ashes didn't dare to dream, didn't dare to rise. Just surviving the brutal matches of LoC seemed achievement enough! And Survive I did. A top 3 finish, just behind the mighty Bluewin 1860 and FC Monaco di Bavaria amidst the top, top teams in the entire game did give me the confidence...not to win the league, no. Just that maybe, just maybe we belong enough to not get relegated out of the LoC.
The second season we stayed close enough to be respectable, a fifth-place finish. But the third season I took myself by surprise as we ran down, arguably the strongest team on paper (still is in my opinion) FC Monaco di Bavaria, right down till the penultimate game of the season, just to lose out on the championship by a mere 3 points. I wasn't upset at all. In fact, I was quite happy to finish above the mights of Bluewin 1860 and Archon S.C.
And therein lies the problem. The tiny bird stayed hidden beneath, never believing it was meant to rise from the ashes.
And that showed clearly in the horrible performance next season. Halfway through the season, we were fighting to avoid relegation. Questions were being raised, Will the Phoenix ever rise? And that's when something changed. With an extraordinary comeback towards the end of the season, we carried on the good form to the next season. And this happened to be the most important season ever.
We started strong, very strong. By midseason, we had already beaten the mightiest teams and clutched on to the top spot. Along came someone a lot of us here know as "The Guardian Angel" to provide the push we needed.
_ Aim for the top spot,_ said the angel. And Aim we did. That was the season we gave it our all. We threw everything we had the title and yet, fell agonizingly short as a run of bad luck hit in the final few games. The points tally do not do justice to the effort. Scoring 71 goals in LoC deserved more. It felt it was now or never, but yet, it just wasn't meant to be.
And this time around, unlike the first time we had a shot at the championship, I was extremely disappointed. It seemed like a golden opportunity let go and then rang the words of Jurgen Klopp in my head,
Giving your absolute everything does not guarantee you get anything.
And that seemed to have made all the difference. There was no longer a sense of entitlement that we should have had something to show for our efforts....and this can be extrapolated to every aspect of life, on and off the blockchain. Off the chain, everyone has their personal extent to which this will apply, for sure. On the chain, there are those rare breeds of "Guardian Angels" trying to protect and better the chain, and they don't get anything to show for it. Giving your absolute everything does not guarantee you get anything. Wise words indeed.
And that ignited the spark within the ashes. The baby bird now knew the potential it has to rise from the ashes. A near-perfect season, after many "almost there" s, 𝓟𝓱𝓸𝓮𝓷𝓲𝔁 𝓘𝓷𝓬𝓪𝓷𝓽𝓪𝓽𝓮𝓶 finally clinched the title.
A few weeks ago, we went through a writing contest based on this topic, and it was quite a successful event of BDC. This is a unique example that a small word can have immense underlying meanings. However, although today's manuscript is not about travel, it has an indirect connection with travel.
Believers of different religions believe that they will attain heaven for good deeds in the hereafter life. For example, Muslims believe that those who have faith in the core part of Islam will attain heaven one day. And it is proved by the Holy Book that the person who has the least facilities in heaven will have seven times more space than the present earth as his abode. There are more impressive gifts as well that might not be related topics today, probably will clarity another day.
A group of people cling to the hope of getting these seven worlds hereafter life and show little interest in exploring this world at present. Another category of people think that what is allotted to them in the next life is in the Intact state, so it is better to explore the world as much as possible in this life. I still belong to the second category and try to explore new places whenever I get a chance. However, the most important part of travel is to manage time, money and need to have a decisive will.
In my current context, there is no depletion of money and will, the only inadequacy is enough time. Travelling as a student was such an addiction that it seemed as if I could see the whole world. Although there was endless time, I had not enough financial ability to travel. The whole world is far from being explored, the whole of Bangladesh has not been discovered yet. I wanted to see the pyramids of Egypt, the mighty statue tyrant Pharaoh, but I didn't discern anything. So the following lines of the poem by Sunil Gangopadhyay are very special to me, which speaks to the minds of many.
বাবা এখন অন্ধ, আমাদের দেখা হয়নি কিছুই ।
সেই রয়্যাল গুলি, সেই লাঠি লজেন্স, সেই রাস উৎসব ।
আমায় কেউ ফিরিয়ে দেবেনা ।
Today where the time is the main obstacle in travelling, I am trying hard to manage it. I will try to explore my favourite places as many as possible inside and outside the country, and I will be proud to do it with my kids. They will see new places, confront new people and enrich themselves with knowledge.
I have read in many books that travelling makes people's minds larger. If the vastness of the mountains, seas and deserts gives people a part of it, that's enough for the vastness of the mind. The bigger the human mind, the greater he will be, because, in today's world, we need great and talented people more.
Roy Andersson's Approach to Nihilism
In his "Being Human" trilogy, Anderssons addresses the absurdity of daily life and how hard it is to live as a human being. But this possesses a challenge. However sad, broken and alien we may feel, we have gotten really great at faking happiness and making social appearances. I think it's hard to express the reality of our natural state in a regular narrative drama.
To imitate a detached, aloof atmosphere, he had to discard theatricals. His cinematic style is like melting ice cream. There's not much going on the screen, but if you're not concentrating, you will lose the meaning and details.
The frames are clean and minimalistic. Presence of furniture is scant. This is important because you'd be surprised how quickly the human mind picks up the absence of things they expect to be somewhere.
Almost all the shots are static, only characters move to further the films. There's not much to focus on, the audience is passively forced to focus on the characters instead.
I wasn't really interested in the symbolism and hope. There's a truly endless airport, and people are going on about their lives dragging big luggage constantly— perhaps this implies an attempt to take a holiday from life and humanity. The scene with a sky full of planes and human sacrifice is perhaps there to indicate unlived realities and mass delusion. There is also the duality of dreams and awakening. Some characters break the fourth wall and speak to the audience. Perhaps those are soliloquy. I am unsure in some of these cases.
But his fondness for the real human beings are not murky, they are not only imagined, idealist people. His characters are angry, tired, bitter and suffering in despair. Exactly how people are in real lives.
I think these three films are the perfect mirror of humanity ever presented on celluloid.
ছোট্ট শিশু দৃশ্য অঙ্কন করতে খুব ভালবাসে। ছোট ছোট উপাদান গুলো খাতায় ফুটিয়ে তুলতে ধীরে ধীরে তাদের নেওয়া হয় প্রকৃতির দিকে। খেয়াল করলেই দেখা যাবে আমাদের জীবনে প্রাকৃতিক দৃশ্যের সংখা প্রচুর। গ্রাম বাংলার প্রাকৃতিক সৌন্দর্যের চেয়ে অধিক সুন্দর কিছু শিশুমনের ফুটিয়ে তোলা সম্ভব বলে মনে হয় না। প্রাকৃতিক সৌন্দর্যের লীলাভূমি খ্যাত এই দেশ।
আমাকে এখনো কোন দৃশ্য আঁকতে বলা হলে আমি একটি গ্রাম্যা দৃশ্য একে ফেলবো। বলতে গেলে আমার কল্পনায় প্রতহ্মে এটাই আসবে। কিশুটা এরকম হবে যে, একটি নদী রয়েছে তীরে যার অনেকগুলো ছোট ছোট ডিঙি নৌকো বাধা। অপ্র প্রান্তে হয়ত থাকবে সারি বাধা সবুজ ফসলের মাঠ। সাথে অত্যন্ত মায়াবি নীল আকাশ। আবার হয়তো কিছু কুড়ে ঘরও নাহয় একে ফেলা সম্ভব। সত্যি বলতে, কল্পনার রাজ্যে প্রকৃতির মুগ্ধতায় হাজারো প্রতিচ্ছবি অনায়াসেই এঁকে ফেলা যায়।
অঙ্কন কিংবা অলস সময় অতিবাহিত করা, উভয় ক্ষেত্রেই হয়ত প্রকৃতির সন্নিকটে যাওয়া কারোই অপছন্দ নয়। কিছুটা সময় নদীর তীরে বসে স্থিরমনে নদীর ছুটে চলা পর্যবেক্ষণ করে জীবনের মিল খুজে পাওয়া যায়। নদীর মতো প্রবাহিত হতে হবে জীবনের সময়ের স্রোতের সাথে। চেয়ে চেয়ে দেখি জেলেদের ছুটে চলা,তাদের ব্যস্ত সময়ের জীবিকার যুদ্ধ। প্রতিটি জাল ফেলার সাথে যেন কিছু প্রত্যাশার নিক্ষেপ যা তার জাল টানার সাথে নিয়ে আসে পূর্নতা কিংবা অপূর্ণতা। এখানে থেমে যাওয়া মানা, একের পর এক নিক্ষেপ করে যেতে হবে প্রত্যাশা পূরণের আকাঙ্খায়।
ছোট্ট মনে ছবিটি শুধুই একটি নদী ও মাঠ-ঘাট সম্বলিত দৃশ্য যা তার অঙ্কনের খাতায় রং-তুলি দিয়ে একটি ছবি অঙ্কনের সহায়ক। তবে বাস্তবে এখানে বসে ছবিটি অনুভব করা সম্ভব, সম্ভব হবে প্রকৃতিকে উপলব্ধি করা।তার সাথে মিশে যাওয়া, তার সৌন্দর্যে মুগ্ধ হয়ে যাওয়া।
Fishing at NIGHT....
Shamsu was a person who likes to go fishing at night! Yeah, it is a peculiar passion, but in villages, this sort of passion is seen in numbers. Whilst, shamsu was very famous for this habit of his. He used to travel distances, to acquire this experience of night fishing. He was asked plenty of times why he likes to go fishing at night? He smiles whenever he answers this question. The peace of night helps him to focus, while fishing, was his answer!
Today was no different. Shamsu was preparing to go fishing for the very evening. He was preparing his fish rods (made with bamboo), harpoons and few other elements along with some fish to use them for fishing. For some reason, he was feeling a lot more excited than other days. Probably because he heard from the local bazaar that the other day someone was able to hunt down some big fishes at night in a near river. Which is why he was probably expecting to hunt down something like that.
After having the dinner and taking some rest, shamsu with all the needed stuff went out in search of fishing at around 11 pm. He reached the place where he wanted to, at around midnight. Shamsu prefers the chill wind of this time as he lit a cigarette and started smoking as he was preparing his fishing rod. Once the place was set, he put a small fish in the hook and threw his first hook into the water. To his surprise, it did not take much longer to see something stuck on his hook. As it was pulling harder, he used his skill of luring that fish into his trap. His face was probably glowing as he thought, this must be his lucky day! He played with the fish for a long time and finally managed to put an end to this race. The fish probably gave up with shamsu's skill and was finally lured in the trap. Shamsu was very happy to see the size of the fish. As this would be his one of the best catch so far. The fish was probably 3 feet long and was very heavy for him to take it under control.
Under normal circumstances, shamsu would have returned back home with such a fish, but today he was very much keen to see how lucky he was and he said to himself to fish for some more time and who knows he might end up with another surprise. Little did he know a huge surprise was waiting for him, indeed!
He put the fishing rod in play and went out with his harpoon to fish some more fish. Shamsu is an expert in this technique, and he also is aware of where to hunt at this time of the night. He tried and tried but seems like he was not going anywhere with this. But luckily he found a big fish which could have been much bigger than the one he caught earlier today. He was carrying a small torch to see what was actually going on. He was following that fish and was trying to hunt the down fish with several tries. But somehow he was missing with his tries. This has never happened before! And for some reason, the fish was also being too keen on hunting down. Under normal circumstance, any fish would swim into deep water, but this specific fish was moving within the river bank so that Shamsu would try to hunt it. He was getting angry and probably forgot to rationalize what was actually happening. He was trying hard and hard to get the fish, but all his tries were going into vain.
Shamsus insight came back when he heard the Azan of Fajr. As soon as his conscious came back, he realized he was near a shashan of another village. As he looked around, he started to feel the wind was getting heavier. And he was hearing some sort of scream which was coming far away from the other side of the river. He was feeling an immense pain on his shoulder, probably because of several tries to try to catch the fish. He was surprised to feel the depth of the situation. He heard stories in the past about this particular place where people disappeared and never came back. This place was also taken as a place for granted. Nobody usually comes near a place unless it is absolutely necessary. That is why this place is situated at the end of the village.
Shamsu was still in shock and was realizing what has happened. How did he got consumed by this situation? How deep he was going to be if his conscious was not returned? Who knows where he would have ended up? So many questions were lurking on his mind. As soon as he figured out this was not a normal situation which he was caught into, he immediately left his harpoon and started to hurry back to where he started from. It was not less than a few hours walk to where he went to. He still was not believing what happened. How did he walk so much place within that time? This all seemed to him like a few moments. With all this confusion, when he was able to get back from where he started, he saw his fishing rod was gone. The fish which he caught was also missing. But he could see the strain of blood was leaving a track from where he kept it. He followed the trail and found a small portion of fish lying there and the blood strain was also going further, and he followed that trail, but after some time he stopped. As he saw, the whole fish was practically opened. And all it was missing was the intestines and other internal parts of it. And not to mention there was a very bad smell which was coming out of that area.
Shamsu immediately without even thinking, started to walk and slowly paced his walking and stopped when he reached his home. He was so tired he felt like his body would lie down at this instance. He was screaming by his wife's name, and finally, he got unconscious. When he woke up, he found himself on his bed. Slowly everything was cleared to him, and he also shared what happened with him the other night. His wife and kids were already crying, and after listening to this incident, they were making the situation even worse. And after everything cooled down, Shamsu's wife took a promise from him that he would never go fishing at night from that day on. He obliged by that and never tried to fishing at night from that day onward. To this day, Shamsu does not have any idea what actually happened and how things would have been if something went wrong!
This here is our piece de resistance. To promote engagement and a little self-branding, we have come up with an initiative that we simply called Featured. And we are very excited about this portion of the magazine.
Every week, one talented author will have the opportunity to contribute a piece for the magazine while showcasing one of their best posts. The willing writers will have a chance to add a few words about any topic they choose and be a 25% beneficiary of the magazine.
The first step is, you have to decide whether you want to get featured or not. Once you've made up your mind, you have to apply by submitting one of your articles from last week. We have a wiggle room for quality content if they are older than seven days. Choose the piece you deem to be your best work for the week, as this will play a significant role in you getting featured or not.
There will be a two-day period to submit your application. It must be submitted by dropping a link to your post in the #Featured-Magazine channel on the BDCommunity Discord Server. One author will be chosen randomly from all the submissions. The featured author for the week will be announced during the weekly voice meeting. They will then have two days for writing a piece and submit.
The author who gets featured in the weekly magazine will be set as a 25% beneficiary, meaning 25% of the magazine's liquid payout will go to the featured author.
Do not forget to join our next weekly hangout at Friday 10 pm GMT +6
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