I put my money where my blog is with Steem (#SteemBloPoMo Day 11)

I originally had the idea for this post at the beginning of the year, when I took the plunge and invested some money for the very first time. But it wasn’t until this week, when looking for a topic for my #SteemBloPoMo Day 11 post, when it popped back into my brain. Especially since the Steem blockchain was what I invested in.

Then I thought about all the things I should say, and all the links I should share, and the graphics to make my point, and the gifs to make it funny, and… I spent the majority of today “thinking” about writing it, instead of actually typing.

Now I’ve decided that the short and sweet route is probably best. Especially since pretty much everything I’d say about how much I love Steem would just be a rehash of my post, Come to the Steemit Side…We Have Crypto that I did almost a year ago.

First, a clarification of Steem/Steemit

I know all of this sounds confusing to people not familiar with cryptocurrency and blockchain technology, so I wanted to try to simplify things. This might not be the most technically accurate, but let’s use Facebook as an example.

Facebook is the social media interface that allows you to interact with your friend’s cat photos via leaving “likes.” Steemit is the social media interface that allows you to interact with your friend’s cat photos via “upvotes” on the Steem blockchain. Except with the blockchain, those “upvotes/likes” are actually worth real money.

As I said last year…

Imagine that Facebook, WordPress, Reddit, Snapchat, World of Warcraft, and the Stock Market got together one night, had a little too much to drink and did things they regretted in the morning. Then, nine months later, a baby appeared. That kid would be Steemit.

Simple, right? Honestly, it really is, once you’ve become familiar with it (which the somewhat steep learning curve is probably the biggest downside of it all, but that’s a story for another day). And I wanted to make that clarification because you can actually invest in Steem without blogging – it’s a cryptocurrency like Bitcoin. But the large majority of the Steem I’m holding came about JUST from blogging on Steemit!

Now, show me the money!

So, a little context – I’ve been officially blogging (I started doing it for a local newspaper’s website so that makes it official-like, right?) since 2005. During the past fourteen years, I’ve generated essentially zilch for monies. I did get a $25 gift certificate to a local restaurant once, and I was able to write a couple “for pay” posts for the now basically defunct BlogHer website, plus I have a couple of WICKED AWESOMESAUCE people who regularly buy me coffee, but my main source of any kind of blogging revenue is AdSense.

Since installing AdSense in February 2014, I’ve reached the $100 payment threshold twice. Once in August 2017 ($114.27) and again in December 2018 ($101.13). So to break it down, that means I’ve earned $3.47 per month. Of course, since my hosting costs $9.95 each month, I’m technically losing $6.48.

And honestly – the only reason I’m even reaching that threshold is because I have someone who randomly goes through my posts and clicks on the ads. It may even be a couple of people, and I’m guessing it’s someone who likes my Tarot Tuesday posts, because that’s when I tend to get those “Estimated earnings today so far = $1.04” announcements on my dashboard. Anyway, I digress… and I said this was gonna be short, right?

When I got that $101 deposited into my account in December, and after a bunch of overthinking, I went ahead and bought some Steem. Technically it wasn’t my first time buying it – early on in my Steem adventures, I cashed out 10 SBD and got just over $70 in my bank account, just to prove to myself and others that it’s “real” money. So, when I first stated thinking about investing in Steem in December I decided to start by reinvesting that amount.

Which means since joining the Steem blockchain in September 2017, my account has slowly grown, and is currently worth $915.28. Deduct the Adsense investment, and dividing by months means I’m earning $50.88 per month.

Yeah, that was wicked lot of words for a simple breakdown. Maybe just one little chart…

Yes, I know I don’t pay the $10 to AdSense directly, but in order to have it installed on my blog, it needs to be self-hosted, so I’d say having to pay my hosting company to get AdSense counts as an AdSense expense.

Does this mean hubby can retire soon so I can be his sugar momma? Well, probably not at least for a month or two… LOL!

In all seriousness though, I’ve never been confident enough in something to invest such a large (to me) chunk of change in anything like this before. The fact that I’m contemplating more Steem purchases in the very near future, while the price is still relatively low. should speak volumes about how excited I am about this platform.

And yes – this was the short version. 😂

Thanks for stopping by!

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sometimes utilizing my handy dandy tripod.

All words and images are mine (unless otherwise indicated),
and can sometimes also be found on my various social media sites.
Speaking of witch which…

I have one billion many homes on the interwebz.
Here are a few…

• Smoke Blog ~ Traci York
• Steemit Blog ~ Traci York
• WordPress Blog ~ Traci York
• Facebook ~ Traci Cavanaugh York
• Facebook Page ~ Traci York, Writer
• Instagram ~ traciyork_aka_internetg33k
• Pinterest ~ Traci York, Writer
• Twitter ~ @TraciYorkWriter
• My Weku Blog ~ Traci York
• YouTube ~ InternetGeek
• Ello ~ @traciyork

On the Steemit blogging site,
I am a proud member
of these awesomesauce communities

 
 

 
 

 
 
_{Links: PowerHouseCreatives; steemsugars; steemusa;
anonyvoter/steemians directory; helpie}