Money for nothing, results for free!

I often think about the strangeness of trying to persuade people to become part of the Hive community and park their blogging/artistic/video content here.

Then I find myself thinking about the many people who did — in fact — come here, parked their content here (some of which was quite good), and then they quietly disappeared, never to be seen again.

Aside from the proverbial "oh, it's too complicated" excuse, another thing I have heard a few times is that it's just too much work, too much effort.

Well, what did you expect?

I can guarantee you that mega YouTube influencer Mr. Beast didn't get to where he is now by sitting on his butt and complaining that it's "too much work!" That's not how you get 170 million subscribers.

There's a hole in your thinking...

But Thus Goes the Whole WORLD?

This actually isn't the post about the state of Hive nor about the ongoing challenge of getting new people to join here. It's supposed to about the state of the world in general. And perhaps it's supposed to be about me realizing that some of us might have to face that we hold a point of view and perspective that's getting to be out of date, in some way. I don't know.

The "out-of-date" bit refers to the fact that I come from a belief system and a school of thought that getting some kind of success - be it minimal or extreme - ultimately requires a lot of effort. And if you don't put effort into stuff, you shouldn't expect any significant results to come out of it.

I think about many 30-somethings and younger we know, and although they are hard-working people by most standards, they lean towards expecting unreasonably high outcomes after unusually short periods of time.

Our dear Daughter-Hooman started her new job about 6 weeks ago, and she's already starting to get upset about the fact that it doesn't feel like she's progressing after 6 weeks. I'm not actually faulting her or commenting on her so much as on the broader mindset that somehow 6 weeks has become "enough time" for serious progress to happen in the perception of everybody where that same progress 20 or 30 years ago might have been perceived as normally 6 months or even a year.

So now, let's carry that mindset back here to Hive and make it relevant to our community by simply asking "well if you're not enjoying any success did you put any effort into it?"

Or is the degree to which we expect to get success simply a reflection of our general accelerated world in which everything is supposed to happen right now? We've grown accustomed to the daily news fitting in a 256-character tweet instead of a 15-minute news story, so does that apply everywhere?"

To use a parable of sorts, 30 years ago we used to buy products from catalogs by mail order. And the time that would pass between us filling out an order form (with a pen), putting it in an envelope, affixing a stamp, mailing it to the company and then waiting for the package with the goodies to show up... might take two weeks. Now we expect same day drone delivery from Amazon!

Now, I'm not claiming that I don't enjoy the fact that I can order products online and get them immediately, quite the contrary! The thing I'm questioning is whether this sense of immediacy reflected on everything from the Internet to social media to getting food, can actually be applied to all things in life?

Like, for example, building a following and a success on Hive.

Or we could even take the time-honored example that it takes 5 years to become an expert at something; can we somehow compress that into becoming an expert at that same something in one year instead of five? And if that's what we expect, are we actually the same level of "expert" in a year that it previously took us five to become?

I would be inclined to challenge that notion! I wouldn't expect to be able to take up pottery, or painting, or neurosurgery, and suddenly achieve the same skill and expertise level in a year that previously took five.

My point being, we can't expect to apply the standards of the instant always-on web to things that have to occur in physical space, regardless of whether it applies to job advancement, learning pottery or succeeding on Hive.

Much as those on the bleeding edge of Technology might like to think differently, we still have to keep what is virtual somewhat separate from what is tangible because they operate at different speeds. An hour is still made up of 60 minutes and that takes just as long as it always did; just like a year still has four seasons and is 365 days long. And there are only so many things you can cram into an hour!

Thanks for coming to visit my blog! Do feel free to leave me a comment! This is social media, after all, and our community could sure use a little more engagement!

=^..^=

Love Cats? Get Involved in Hive's Cat Communties!

If you're a cat lover and often/sometimes post pictures or other content that includes your feline friends, why not become an active part of Hive's growing Cat Communities?

These are some of the more active Cat Communities — why not join them ALL? Many of the allow you to share your cat posts, even if you started at a different community!

HiveCats by @curatorcat is a central "gathering place" for cat content on Hive; promoting the use of the #hivecats tag for feline content!

Cat Snaps by @manorvillemike is a place to post pictures of your cats when you don't have a whole lot to say beyond just sharing your cute photos!

Caturday by @saboin is a community where we get to celebrate posts relating to Saturday — aka "Caturday" — our own special day!

Cat Photos by @andrarchy is a "mixed use" cat content community; posts can be just photos or longer, as long as the subject is CATS!

Cats by @captainklaus (and Sissi!) is another "general" cat content community.

There are a number of other feline communities listed on Hive, but I am not sharing them for now as they have not had any activity (by their Admins OR users) since the Steem/Hive fork. Updates as they become available!

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