<center>![newage.jpg](https://ipfs.busy.org/ipfs/QmbfSVh3hM2dss4PDpLk2B893BvzdZM46CFi5Zgg8XM6vb)</center>
<center>[Image Source](https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjJpbKhnKbkAhVEyaQKHRWiDwcQjhx6BAgBEAI&url=https%3A%2F%2Ffindanswers4life.org%2F2018%2F03%2F26%2Fnew-age%2F&psig=AOvVaw0yiqtcXpVBcuk9ngCd5GDr&ust=1567104192287116)</center>


Hello everyone! What a night that was...

Everything was rolling pretty well, until that bug decided to make things a little spicy....At that very moment when the tweet from the official #steem account appeared on my Twitter feed, I was like: **"Oh God plz don't..."**

You see, everyone's memories from the previous HF weren't exactly good. Quite the opposite I would say. It was the absolute nightmare...

But thankfully DV's and witnesses did everything in their power to prevent further delays... 

>...and the bug was treated the very same way a cockroach does when it's seen in the corner of the living room... 

So here we are!! HF21 is in full effect and unless I've missed something really important, there are no reports of threats that need to be _eliminated._

 ###### Economics have changed and so did our overall attitude.

I couldn't be more happy and optimistic about the future of the platform hence the future of steem too. All you need to do is visit the trending page and you will understand the reasons why. Most of the big stakeholders, seem to make really good use of their 2.5 free 100% downvotes.

All these rewards return back in the reward pool. You might think that your downvote will make no difference so why bother,right? Besides...you only hold a few hundred or a few thousand SP...

**WRONG!!!!**

If everyone does their part steem will be distributed to those that deserve it more, who work more, who are devoted and not looking for ways to milk the system or to find shortcuts.

I hadn't hit the _Trending_ button for months now. I was sick of seeing the same names on the same spots spending hundreds of steem for visibility - often on loss - but today was the day. I DID use my free downvotes for obvious reasons. Bid bot abuse.....

<center>![2019-08-28 21_45_27-SteemWorld ~ @mindtrap.png](https://ipfs.busy.org/ipfs/QmZW1L7WNbL4mfjKeFx3qXaCCoBV1v4YS2oLkycZzdC3p1)</center>

<center>![2019-08-28 21_45_45-SteemWorld ~ @mindtrap.png](https://ipfs.busy.org/ipfs/QmRZ3Agkkvu3quNpXXejSy4Ctp84q5hWwoj3QoJu96vYim)</center>



What makes me sad though is that I came across a couple of posts whose authors could have been even featured by a curation team, but preferred to write only a couple of lines, upload a few photographs and instead of trying a bit harder, to spend hundreds of $$$ for promotion. Well...the rest is history...you can go and check them out yourselves.

### Expectations:

- Did you know that by upvoting any post you will earn double curation rewards compared to HF20? Did you? Nice....That's one of my expectations. To finally see authors who are persistent and maintain a standard quality to finally be better rewarded.

- Big stake holders / average users to not forget to visit Trending page and take out the garbage.

- Free flag wars to start some time soon. (I have a hunch though that they won't last long)

- Attractive Trending and Hot page. We need it more than anything if we want mass adoption.

 
### Reality...

- We are at the very beginning of a "New Age". We need to start treating steem with more respect. There is no room for old habits in the #newsteem. 

- Finally, further investing in steem and being a stake holder makes much more sense.

>>I feel like this is all a bit backwards. We're basically all trying to figure out what the best way is to give out all the STEEM that's being created rather than trying to figure out why people should want STEEM in the first place.

This is a part of a comment @yabapmatt dropped a few days ago...and he's just speaking my mind. Looking forward for that HF...someday.


Cheers!