Having been on Steamit/Hive for more than a few years, I think it is safe to say that things have not progressed the way many of us early users would have hoped. As a brief reminder, please remember that Steamit/Hive started the same year that TikTok did. The vastly different outcomes for the two apps is wildly apparent today. Without even considering rewards, while there are still some of the OG posters still active here, sadly the vast majority have gone silent. Of course there seems to be some minority of authors that post intermittently. Personally I seem to have fallen into this group that post perhaps once or twice a week.

I remember well the early days where there were endless arguments over how many pictures should be in a post, or how many words a post should be to be considered a quality post that was worthy of being rewarded. While I have never posted here strictly for the rewards, it was a fundamental difference that rewards were given on this app as opposed to just posting on Twitter or Facebook. Funny that nowadays the traditional media companies offer more paths to monetization.

I have always believed that people vote with their feet and therefore we have had a long term problem. I certainly do not pretend to know what the answer is. In fact I don't even know if there is a solution to our lack of user base problem. Yet, it seems to me that short form content is an important component of any such answer. I know for me that is the path that I plan to pursue going forwards on Hive.