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      "body": "Congratulations @ashleyjames! You received a personal award!\n\n<table><tr><td>https://steemitimages.com/70x70/http://steemitboard.com/@ashleyjames/birthday2.png</td><td>Happy Birthday! - You are on the Steem blockchain for 2 years!</td></tr></table>\n\n<sub>_You can view [your badges on your Steem Board](https://steemitboard.com/@ashleyjames) and compare to others on the [Steem Ranking](https://steemitboard.com/ranking/index.php?name=ashleyjames)_</sub>\n\n\n###### [Vote for @Steemitboard as a witness](https://v2.steemconnect.com/sign/account-witness-vote?witness=steemitboard&approve=1) to get one more award and increased upvotes!",
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      "body": "Steem is a “blockchain-based social media platform where anyone can earn rewards”.  An incentivized platform, Steem supports community building and social interaction by rewarding those who take part by posting, voting on, and curating great content with cryptocurrency.\n\n“By taking inspiration from lessons that have been learned from building cryptocurrencies, the cryptocurrency communities, and concepts we have become accustomed to from the various social media platforms already available”\n\nCEO Ned Scott and Daniel Larimer, CTO of Steemit and founder of Bitshares, came together and created Steem in 2016.\n\nThe key statement Steem stands by, is how their platform is ‘the first cryptocurrency which attempts to accurately and transparently reward an unbounded number of individuals who make subjective contributions to its community’. They employ a fair accounting system which will always reflect your own contribution, so if you simply participate then you will be rewarded.\n\nWho can benefit from Steem?\n\nSteem has been built for regular people, to reward regular people for their contribution to online communities, with the goal to empower people across the world. As the technology Steem is built on can process thousands of actions per second, rewards are plentiful and can be earned quickly with digital tokens being rewarded around 24 hours after content and votes have been submitted.\n\nThe groups of people Steem say can vastly benefit from using their platform, include:\n\nCreators\nCurators\nRemitters\nMerchants\nMarket makers\nShoppers\nEntrepreneurs\nBloggers\nCommenters\nInternet readers\nCommunity leaders\nReferrers\nSign up party hosts\nSocial media platforms such as Reddit, Facebook and Twitter have seen user-generated content posted by its members create billions of dollars’ worth of value for the shareholders of the company. However, Steem works in a different way. Much of the value created by the people who provide the contributions on social media and online communities are rewarded themselves with virtual currency.\n\nWhat is Steemit?\nSteemit.com is a social network and content rewards platform which uses Steem technology to reward users for curating content all over the internet. It gives rewards in 50% Steem power, and 50% Steem dollars.\n\nBy building an online community which is rewarded in cryptocurrency for sharing their voice, Steemit is redefining the world of social media, and is quickly building a growing social economy as it is the users who earn rewards from using it rather than only the company shareholders like other platforms.\n\nA community is being built by allowing users to reward other users for the content which they post by using the revolutionary Steem blockchain and cryptocurrency. It is free to post on Steemit.com, which is what makes it perfect for the regular person as well as the content creators, and it is ‘minted’ daily. That daily currency is then distributed to content producers according to how many votes they get for the posts they make.\n\nHow you can earn digital tokens on Steemit\nSteem has several types of tokens, Steem, Steem Dollars (SBD), and Steem Power (a denomination of VESTS). Steem and steem dollars are liquid while steem power is not.\n\nWhen you are paid on the website Steemit, you can choose to be paid 50% in STEEM Power and 50% in STEEM Dollars, or 100% in steem power. Here’s an example of a 50/50 payout: If you earn $200 on a post, you will get $100 STEEM Dollars, and 50 STEEM Power (assuming STEEM Power is worth $2 each, at the current time).\n\nSteemit has three ways in which you can earn digital tokens as a community participant, and it’s easy and simple to get involved and start being rewarded with cryptocurrency.\n\nAs shared on the Steemit website, as part of the community you can earn digital tokens by:\n\nPosting – By sharing your posts, you can earn upvotes from community members. Depending on the upvotes you receive, you will get a portion of the ongoing Steem reward pool.\n\nVoting and curating – If you discover a post and upvote it before it becomes popular, you can earn a curation reward. The reward amount will depend on the amount of Steem Power you have.\n\nPurchasing – Users can purchase Steem or Steem Dollar tokens directly through the Steemit wallet using bitcoin, Ether, or BitShares tokens. They are also available from other markets and exchanges including BlockTrades, Poloniex, Bittrex, Shapeshift.io, and Changelly. Steem tokens that are powered up to Steem Power earn a small amount of interest for holding.\n\nEarning digital tokens is easy, and the Steemit policy makes it fair for all users to be rewarded no matter how often they participate and post. Digital tokens are created constantly by the Steem network. Some of the tokens are given to the users who add real value to Steemit by posting content, commenting on other users’ content, and voting on the content of others, and the rest of the daily digital token pot is them distributed among the holders of Steem power and the witnesses who power the blockchain.\n\nStoring Your Steem Currencies\nThe official Steemit website has wallet functionality built-in, so by signing up to the site you have also created your wallet for storing, Steem, Steem Dollars and Steem Power. There is also a command line wallet you can download and also a mobile wallet known as eSteem, which acts as a mobile interface to the social network itself allowing you to access all the main features of the site and also transfer your funds.\n\nWhat makes Steem different?\nAlthough there are many other tipping platforms emerging at the moment, Steem is different from the rest. Many other cryptocurrency tipping platforms require their users to give something up in order to reward others for their contributions. However, to reward others on Steem all a user needs to do is to vote for another users’ content or post, much like you would like a post on Facebook or upvote a post on Reddit. This encourages users to participate in the community and rewards the best contributions with currency which can be collected in their own personal wallet and exchanged at any point for real-world fiat currency.\n\nConclusion\nWe all use social media, but it’s probably never occurred to you before that you could be rewarded for the content you share.\n\nSteem is changing the way we use social media, by allowing users to earn rewards for their active participation. By putting an incentive behind interaction, this technology is creating a thriving community where quality content matters.\n\nIf you have content to share which deserves to be seen by a large audience, and which you deserve to be rewarded for, Steemit is perfect for all the aspiring writers among us, as well as regular people with views to share and discuss.\n\nIncentivizing and rewarding the users of a social media platform is a great idea as it promotes growth, and creates a community of people interacting with others. On top of that, digital tokens are distributed in a fair way so that the best content gets cryptocurrency recognition and everyone gets recognized for their efforts of taking part.\n\nSteem is a forward-thinking blockchain-technology platform, which could make a huge impact and contribution to the already buzzing social media world as its rewards give people a reason to join and to actively get involved",
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      "body": "Hi! I am a robot. I just upvoted you! I found similar content that readers might be interested in:\nhttps://www.rollingstone.com/culture/news/can-this-social-media-site-make-you-rich-w449566",
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      "body": "Steemit created 'magic internet money' – and has distributed $4 million to users since it launched last summer\n\nIn May, Wale Ifemi was living on one dollar a day in West Africa. A month later, he joined Steemit, a new social-media platform that rewards users with its own cryptocurrency. The more \"upvotes\" – likes, essentially – a post gets, the more it earns. By August, he had made the equivalent of $41,000 – plus another $18,000 after posting his story about this transformation.\n\nIt would be understandable if your first reaction to hearing about Steemit would be to think it's a scam, or too good to be true. I felt the same way. Then I posted just four sentences, along with a copy of an angry letter that Phil Collins once sent me about a concert review I had written. It received 463 upvotes, and made $10,452 in the site's cryptocurrency, called Steem, which can be converted into bitcoin.\n\n\"If you look at companies like Facebook, Twitter and Reddit,\" says Ned Scott, who co-founded Steemit earlier this year, \"they're taking our time and our work and our creativity and our energy, and leveraging that along with our private data to create profits for their shareholders. But with this point system – this 'magic Internet money' – the users can get paid for creating and curating content.\" Steemit, which currently has more than 100,000 accounts, has distributed the equivalent of more than $4 million to users in four months, and it's not alone: There are at least half a dozen other sites, like Synereo and Yours, based on slightly similar models.\n\nLike most money, Steem's value is based on the unspoken agreement among users that it has value. If you create a piece of paper or an Internet token, and enough people start trading it for goods, services, or other commodities, then you have your own currency. But for it to work, people have to believe in it.\n\nThis means that users must not just have faith in the future of the currency, but also trust that the supply is limited, predictable and incorruptible. This is why Steemit was built on a blockchain, an online public database where information can't be deleted or tampered with.\n\nWhat's particularly clever about this setup is that, since all users end up with Steem, they automatically become investors with a stake in the growth of the currency. They're allowed to withdraw only half of their earnings immediately; with the rest, users are given interest on what they save, and the monetary power of their upvotes on the site increases.\n\nOf course, Steemit is easier to use than to understand. And whether the ambitious venture succeeds as a social-media platform and bootstrapped currency, the disruption isn't likely to go away.",
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      "body": "Hi readers and followers! I continue my cryptocurrency series and this one is dedicated to “How to Invest in Cryptocurrency and Join the Blockchain Craze”\n\nA single Bitcoin in 2010 cost less than one cent. Now, one Bitcoin is valued at about $3,500.\n\nYou probably already know about Bitcoin, and that massive jump in value is likely why.\n\nForex Triple B\nBut what about Ethereum which has nearly $30 billion worth of coins in circulation? Or emerging coins like Ripple or Litecoin? Joke currencies like Dogecoin or FedoraCoin? The deeper you dig into the blossoming world of cryptocurrencies the weirder it seems to get.\n\nDon’t let the memes fool you, though. Cryptocurrencies are establishing themselves as the real deal. Their use values are appearing and their massive levels of inflation have already made some people a lot of money!\n\nGiven the seeming technological complexities of cryptocurrency, many young people are the forming the public body of participants who are bringing these new currencies into the mainstream. As the New York Times put it:\n\n“GRANDPA HAD A PENSION. THIS GENERATION HAS CRYPTOCURRENCY.”\n\nIn this article, the third of our Process Street Future Finance series after Micro-Investing and Equity Crowdfunding, we’ll look at 3 key areas to equip you with the knowledge to jump on the cryptocurrency bandwagon before it’s too late:\n\nWhat is cryptocurrency and how does it work?\nWhat currencies are available and how do they differ?\nWhat are the steps to getting started with cryptocurrencies?\nWhat is cryptocurrency and how does it work?\nThe libertarian ethic and the spirit of cryptocurrency\n![](https://steemitimages.com/DQmNcMPbz3qty9XdEJX68xMbSx7d22KbhBk5PTPHVGWefWY/image.png)\nLet’s first off start by saying that cryptocurrencies aren’t actually brand new anymore. Bitcoin was the first decentralized cryptocurrency in 2009. That’s already nearly a decade old and the technology and theories regarding cryptocurrency predate that even further.\n\nThe first descriptions of what we now consider cryptocurrency were published in 1998 by Wei Dai in his article b-money. The first paragraph of this article sheds light on how the public perception of cryptocurrencies has come to be viewed as a community of what the New York Time refers to as:\n\n“…TECHNOLOGICALLY SOPHISTICATED ANARCHISTS AND LIBERTARIANS EXCITED ABOUT A DECENTRALIZED FINANCIAL NETWORK NOT UNDER GOVERNMENT CONTROL…”\n\nDai’s first paragraph reads:\n\n“I AM FASCINATED BY TIM MAY’S CRYPTO-ANARCHY. UNLIKE THE COMMUNITIES TRADITIONALLY ASSOCIATED WITH THE WORD “ANARCHY”, IN A CRYPTO-ANARCHY THE GOVERNMENT IS NOT TEMPORARILY DESTROYED BUT PERMANENTLY FORBIDDEN AND PERMANENTLY UNNECESSARY. IT’S A COMMUNITY WHERE THE THREAT OF VIOLENCE IS IMPOTENT BECAUSE VIOLENCE IS IMPOSSIBLE, AND VIOLENCE IS IMPOSSIBLE BECAUSE ITS PARTICIPANTS CANNOT BE LINKED TO THEIR TRUE NAMES OR PHYSICAL LOCATIONS.”\n\nWhat we see from the beginning is a radical technology. One which is theorized as a tool to allow for the systematic overhaul of society. The challenge written into the heart of the technology is that of the destruction of the state’s monopoly on violence; a conceptual framework founded in the work of Bodin and Hobbes with hundreds of years of scholarship and debate built on top of it.\n\nThe German sociologist Max Weber, when defining the modern nation state, relies upon this monopoly as his core thesis. In Politics as a Vocation (1919), he writes:\n\n“[THE STATE IS THE] …ONLY HUMAN GEMEINSCHAFT [COMMUNITY] WHICH LAYS CLAIM TO THE MONOPOLY ON THE LEGITIMATED USE OF PHYSICAL FORCE. HOWEVER, THIS MONOPOLY IS LIMITED TO A CERTAIN GEOGRAPHICAL AREA, AND IN FACT THIS LIMITATION TO A PARTICULAR AREA IS ONE OF THE THINGS THAT DEFINES A STATE.”\n\nAll of this is a long winded way to make use of my philosophy degree say that cryptocurrency’s revolutionary beginnings demonstrate their disruptive and transformative potential, whether or not you agree or consider the initial political aspirations. Even if cryptocurrencies do not revolutionize society’s relationship with the nation state, they look increasingly likely to revolutionize elements of financial markets, at the very least.\n\nThe first currencies and how they were constructed\n![](https://steemitimages.com/DQmf5heqeL6aGfC3k96x5dGdkh7aPh7Q4v7NqVA1rdiBFw3/image.png)\nOne of the first incarnations of cryptocurrency was BitGold, created by Nick Szabo. This was a kind of precursor to Bitcoin and you can find Szabo’s writings about that in in his blog post Unenumerated – written at the time, in 2008. More recently, Szabo was featured on Tim Ferriss’ podcast about cryptocurrency, where he delves further into the future potential of cryptocurrencies.\n\nBitcoin was the first real cryptocurrency which took off. Bitcoin works on the basis of a few fundamental building blocks. Before looking into other cryptocurrencies and how they differ slightly in their approach, let’s cover the basics.\n\nBitcoin is based on a system of peer to peer transactions secured by cryptography. Think of the films you definitely don’t torrent, and that gives you a rough conceptual framework. It’s architect was Satoshi Nakamoto, who is an interesting figure in his own right with one Australian entrepreneur Craig Wright claiming that he is the real Nakamoto – though, that appears to be unlikely. Not that any of this matters to the Bitcoin community. As Bitcoin entrepreneur Andreas Antonopoulos phrased it:\n\nIDENTITY AND AUTHORITY ARE DISTRACTIONS FROM A SYSTEM OF MATHEMATICAL PROOF THAT DOES NOT REQUIRE TRUST. THIS IS NOT A TELENOVELA. BITCOIN IS A NEUTRAL FRAMEWORK OF TRUST THAT CAN BRING FINANCIAL EMPOWERMENT TO BILLIONS OF PEOPLE. IT WORKS BECAUSE IT DOESN’T DEPEND ON ANY AUTHORITY. NOT EVEN SATOSHI’S\n\nBitcoin relies on people mining the coins. Basically, the computing power of your PC is put to work solving complex problems. In return for solving these problems, you receive/create new Bitcoins. There is a cap on the number of Bitcoins which can come into existence set at 21 million and a schedule for determining their release up until 2040. Given the increased interest in mining Bitcoins along with the cap and scheduling factors, it has become more difficult over time to generate revenues from mining – particularly for the casual participant.\n\nDue to the increasing popularity of Bitcoin and its shift into the mainstream, many people who wish to enter into the market use Bitcoin exchanges. This works much like any other currency exchange and allows you to invest into Bitcoin in a similar sense to treating a currency as a commodity.\n\nBitcoins are stored in your electronic wallet. The advantage of this wallet compared to the one you keep in your pocket is not just that it is a secure storage space, but also because each coin in your wallet is identified as belonging to you within the decentralized Bitcoin ecosystem. Though, Bitcoins have been stolen from wallets in the past, the incentive to do so is low given how difficult they would be to spend as they’re identified against their legal owner.\n\nThis whole security element described above is premised on something called the blockchain. While Bitcoin is a very private and anonymous currency, it is also inherently transparent. This transparency is facilitated by the blockchain which is a constantly updated public record of all transactions. If you imagine each of these transactions as a statement, “I, Adam_1, pay you, Reader_1, 2 Bitcoins for your positive comment”, then that statement is saved as a transaction on the blockchain. I can’t pretend I didn’t say it. The transparency of the statements – or contracts – keep it secure. Moreover, how embedded that statement is within the other statements around it makes it increasingly secure as the blockchain grows.\n\nThe purpose of Bitcoin in this sense, is that you don’t need to trust a bank or some other third party – what Szabo calls a “wet space” – to verify interactions. The whole process is done natively within the computer code using the decentralized network to provide the checks and balances.\n\nOne of the next spaces cryptocurrencies are heading into is the legal zone – an extension of the statement in each transaction to being a more complex contract. Contracts built into the currency itself. But we’ll come to this as we look at the different currencies we have available to us.\n\nWhat currencies are available and how do they differ?\nBitcoin\n![](https://steemitimages.com/DQmefY3jCFK3Bu2u4Z5Z8z4oumadkY4gQqYn7aQHLwSDAto/image.png)\nIf you knew anything about cryptocurrencies before you clicked on this article then you were probably already familiar with Bitcoin. The O.G. of the cryptocurrency world, Bitcoin has made a lot of money for a lot of people. The success of Bitcoin is arguably the driver behind every other cryptocurrency.\n\nIf you want an idea of how much money some people have made with Bitcoin, check out this calculator which lets you enter an initial investment amount and a date to calculate what the current value of that investment would be now.\n\nOne Bitcoin success story is Erik Finman, an 18 year old from Idaho, who invested $1,000 into Bitcoin in May 2011 when he was just 12 years old. He made a bet with his parents that he would become a millionaire before he was 18 so they wouldn’t make him go to college. You guessed it, he now owns $1.09m in Bitcoin. It’s a nice soft news story which has closed segments on tv and earned Erik an AMA on Reddit.\n\nLeaving aside the fact that at 18 the decision of whether to go to college or not would have been Erik’s anyway, the massive riches he earned through Bitcoin were seemingly not down to clever trading. In fact, according to the calculator of ours mentioned previously, $1000 invested in May 2011 would generate a profit of $1,119,965. That’s over 100k more than Erik has.\n![](https://steemitimages.com/DQmZBQcctLLrcrBkDKVU1UEFxN1oFCJxjtPriwG2X4CGcJm/image.png)\nI don’t mean to talk Erik down. He’s a young lad and he has much more money than I do. Plus, he’s expanded his experience to tech startups and a whole range of really exciting little projects including sending a time capsule into space. You go, Finman!\n\nThat said, if you’re looking to make long term money on Bitcoin then it’s not clear whether playing the field will earn you any more money than simply buying low and selling in the far future. Though, at least it keeps you in the loop in regards to your investments…\n\nThere are risks and worries to be had with any cryptocurrency and many of them can be seen or understood through Bitcoin. Which brings us on to security and related concerns.\n\nOne of the effective elements of Bitcoin in providing security is that the blockchain, or the ledger, can’t be reworked or rewritten retroactively because of the decentralized nature of the technology. Nick Szabo describes the risk factor which has been called by some the 51% rule. This is the idea that if 51% of all the computers running “nodes” – recording the blockchain – were to collude or be owned by the same person, then they could begin to wreak havoc with occurring transactions. They still wouldn’t be able to play with old information, but they could do damage in the present.\n\nWhy someone would want to do that is a whole other question. To do so would likely destroy Bitcoin as a currency, and to be in the position to do that probably means you’ve got a hell of a lot to lose. So I wouldn’t worry too much about it right now.\n\nWhere problems have occurred is within the exchanges. Some purists aren’t fans of exchanges to begin with, as they see certain platforms attempting to operate as banks within this libertarian ideal where the banks have been figuratively burned. Misgivings have been heightened come each scandal. The most notorious might be the Mt.Gox fiasco where half a billion dollars worth of Bitcoin went missing.\n\nMt.Gox filed for bankruptcy in 2014 after losing $450m in Bitcoin and a further $27m in cash. The company started as a space for trading playing cards; its name deriving from Magic The Gathering Online eXchange. With the rise in Bitcoins the focus shifted from the DnD-esque game to trading in currency. The details of how all these Bitcoins went missing are sketchy, but it is understood that near to $300m are still missing.\n\nUltimately, cryptocurrencies are not a very tightly regulated industry and an increasingly large presence of third party exchanges which aren’t held to high levels of security could always hold the potential for risk. It’s worth bearing in mind.",
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