For the first time in almost two years, I'm using my Steem Hive account. Here's why.
I'm a software developer who fell down the crypto rabbit hole in 2012. I co-organize a blockchain meetup here in Philly, and through that was connected with 
Could DPoS really work? Wasn't Steemit Inc a huge centralizing force in the ecosystem? These doubts made me lose interest in the project, but I've continued to be impressed by what 
Fast forward to today. Frankly, my skepticism of DPoS remains. But I believe Justin Sun did the community a favor by motivating it to get a huge monkey off its back: the Steemit Inc ninja-mined stake. Furthermore, the Hive fork demonstrated the impressive bottom-up resilience of the community.
Do I believe that Hive is as censorship resistant as other PoW networks? Honestly, no, I don't. Do I believe Steem can compete with Bitcoin as digital gold? Again, no. Sorry!
I'm not sure, though, that these are the right questions to ask. After all, I'm not a maximalist— projects exist on a spectrum. I believe in tradeoffs.
Has Hive made a set of tradeoffs that result in a system with a unique set of properties? Yes! Do those unique properties make it a valuable system in the broader decentralized ecosystem? Maybe! I'm not sure. But I think it has a much better chance now than it did before the hardfork. So I'm giving it another chance.
I write a weekly, technology focused blockchain newsletter. In issue number 91, which will go out on Sunday morning, I'm writing about the Hive hardfork. If you're interested, you can subscribe here: