Steemit in Rolling Stone Magazine: Looking for Success Stories

in #steemit8 years ago

My editor at Rolling Stone asked for ideas for their annual Hot List issue:

I shared my experiences on Steemit with him, and suggested that it would be great for the model, the disruption, and of course the community itself.

And I was met with a resounding...yes.

It's a widely read issue, so I'm looking for a few great success stories to include in the item.

Stories like:

@heiditravels touring the world, chronicling her adventures on Steemit, and using the rewards to finance her travel.

@infovore living on $1 a day in West Africa, then making over $41,000 on Steemit over the summer.

@anwenbaumeister doing something impressive in her life via Steemit that she hasn't posted about so maybe I shouldn't out her here.

If you have a great success story (or any story), let me know below. Would love to hear it: for the article, for background, or even just to inspire others in this thread.

Looking forward to sharing my thoughts and experiences on Steemit with the readers there, and to the challenge of explaining this model succinctly and comprehensibly to the general public.

Sort:  

@neilstrauss this is awesome. However, may i suggest something different? Do not interview Steemit celebs. If I was to read about Steemit in Rolling Stones, I want to know thoughts of normal steemit users. Let me explain: pick 4 or 5 steemit users (they don't have to be famous or people that earned a lot of money), ask questions and let them express their opinions about Steemit.I don't want to read about a person's POW who earned a lot here, I want to read normal user's opinions! The ones that are consistently writing here and have not made a lot of money! But they still want to stay here and write in Steemit.

I agree with @thebluepanda! I've been working on an article describing my experiences on this platform from the perspective of someone who gave up all other social media for 60 days, came to steemit with 0 followers, and suffers from metromania. Coming here has been the best decision I could have ever made. I'm writing more than ever (which has helped with depression), engaging the community through poetry challenges (currently on the 8th installment), and have organically grown a following from 0 to 300. I'm no Steemit big earner, but I'm a die-hard community member who posts daily and loves what this platform is and can still become. This platform has had such an impact on me that it has become a factor in how I am shaping future goals/milestones.

You may choose to go with the bigger names, and that makes sense. But @thebluepanda's suggestion is awesome and could give unique depth and perspective to the final piece, especially given that the uninitiated perspective is that you blog here and get TONS of money.

o.O MrWang would be perfect.. actually my real name, Wallace Carranza would be perfect for this...
Let me start off by offering my IMDB LINK for verification purposes but I'm sure this community is pretty familiar with me already.

This is one awesome opportunity that maybe we can really help each other AND this community out by including someone like me in the article, here's why..

I'm kind of making some big noise in the entertainment and television industry as a professional actor... right now, my career is blowing up, big time.

this video post first..
Goodbye American Beauty


a little background about me and a source of influence...

then follow it up with this video montage of my success as a professional actor after all this happened in
Divorce Your Insanity


A music video montage looking back on how far and high I've climbed in success over this past year to finally being cast as a regular on, Queen of the South a hit cable network show on USA Network.

I feel that my story is not only relevant to success and what your looking for but also I'm more then willing to share my success story and help influence others to give us a look and join the steemit revolution. Right now I'm looking to strike while the fire is hot, in regards to my current rise to "fame", if you want to call it that... it's not really my reasoning for being in this business but it comes with it of course.. so I might as well take advantage and if you agree... I'm ready and willing to make this happen.

Either way, I'm resteeming this and excited to hear this news.. I hope I hear back from you on this but if I don't... good luck on this project and I can't wait to read about it.

I like the idea of @MrWang being featured! A thoroughly entertaining chap to follow!

Must Feature Story !

Hey Neil. This is astounding news. Rolling Stones would be a great PR move for Steemit, and hopefully bring some users.

Here's my story, I started writing on Steemit back in July, right around the time that payouts started occurring. After a couple of months, my Steem Dollar earnings helped me pay off a ~$7,500 IRS debt obligation. It was also a therapeutic experience to write about some of my experiences and talk to others. I find the vibe here to be really motivating and educational, if you're following the right cats. However, the exceptional circumstance of this story, is that such a large payout in a short amount of time was due to the high price of Steem at the time, so I was able to accomplish that in just handful of articles, a feat that is not possible today. By a stroke of luck, timing, passion, reputation, and drive, Steemit.com made a big difference in my life, and helped me get my financial situation back into a sane place.

I haven't made the time to write as much lately, in fact I took a conscious break after I hit my goal so I could refocus on other projects. And prevent the dreaded burn-out. But I am still lurking, curating, commenting, and following the developments of the platform.

Keep up the good work Neil, that book club idea is really cool and I wish I had the time to participate. Looking forward to hearing about a Steemit article in Rolling Stones.

That's incredible. And you, and some of the other posters here, are right. Your story, and some of the others, are part of that high Steem price then. That said, it's the model and the respect of users' time/value/posting here that's important, as opposed to the dollar amounts.

And thanks, just got off what I believe was the sixth Steemit Book Club call!

I agree with you on that point, "it's the model and the respect of users' time/value..." and that is also why I stick around. I love the concept of contributors getting compensated directly, relatively proportional to the value they bring. That's a huge improvement over the convoluted centralized business models that benefit corporate entities that run a social media network. That being said, I think an advertising model that has been mentioned to be in the works (I can't remember the source) could help to close the loop for the Steemit economy by increasing the demand for STEEM. This place gets really active in a bull market and really pessimistic in a bear, who would have thought? Anyways, another rise in the market cap of STEEM would really help with retention because there would be users that realize the wax and wane of the market is inevitable, and maybe they should just ride the next tide instead of losing hope. So, maybe advertising is the key to reversing that trend.

Such an amazing opportunity! Featuring a Steemit story in Rolling Stones would bring attention to our community and benefit every member. It would be an honor to share my story, but I think this would have more of an impact if a couple different members were featured! Please check out my blog post! It was one of the highest paid posts- earning over 30k! Many have reached out to me and said that this post is what inspired them to join Steemit.

Link to post: https://steemit.com/beauty/@guerrint/the-first-steemit-makeup-turtorial-bringing-youtubers-to-steemit

Hope to hear from you soon!
<3 Guerrint (gar·in·tee) /ˌɡerənˈtē/

Thanks @guerrint, I remember seeing your post, will re-check it out now and get in touch to discuss.

Interesting to find out how to pronounce your name, I was pronouncing it more like (gwer-rint)

:-)

Cg

I figured out early on how the real currency here is relationships:

The Currency of Steemit Isn't Steem Power, STEEM, or SBD

I'd love to see that idea featured.

I've since been really active, gaining followers, and providing content people enjoy like a weekly report of currency going to and from exchanges. You can see my blog for more. Thanks for working to make this happen to support our community!

I think @charlieshrem's "A Geek in Prison" series is the single best success story that both resonates with mainstream readers and highlights the power of Steem. Steem incentivizes content creators to share real content and Charlie's tales from prison are as real as it gets.

I completely agree and his backstory and history in cryptocurrencies would add a lot of interest to the story.

Maybe a visit to SteemFest is required?

There are a lot of fantastic stories out there for sure, I dont know if mine is much for mentioning in comparison but to me its been incredible. As a single mom for the past 15 year whose always struggled financially because my passion lies with bejng an artist, I have always worn myself thin trying juggled numerous jobs at once, and make time for my art. Then there was my ridiculous dream to hike the Appalachian Trail...6 months on my own 2,200 miles 14 states. I posted my first blog about the supplies id take..a lot of which i couldnt afford and had no idea how to make it happen. I was floored when my blog hit $10,000 then floored again when i was hacked and lost it all. Thinking OMG this is going to happen and jumping around my living room like a 6 year old to,crying about it was too good to be true and that I never would get such a big break, so figured. Well, the community of Steemit came together and I was able to recover 7,000 and not only aquire my supplies (I leave this March), but also leave the multi job world...Im talkin real full nights of sleep!!!" It gave me the opportunity and time to apply myself to my art, to the point where last week super star Chris Young bought one of my pieces! Part of my Appalachian dream is to publish a book which would be a combination sketch jornal of all the faces their stories and my own experences and all in between. It will be one of the few books based on a full through hike, unlike the wild and a walk in the woods....Which are great reads but they only hike chuncks of the PCT and AT. I look forward to this time to write and record my insain life as well as draw and record those of people i meet and all i experience.

I am an elementary school teacher who banked more in July by Steemit than by my teaching job. That was interesting.

open-freelancing paradigm that people aren't just stuck with certain job scopes and firms. I've been partly formulating that with the other great people in Project Curie. I believe open participation / contribution is paving the way, breaking out of corporate conventions etc.Hi there @neilstrauss, I've been through plenty of ups and downs in the startup world trying to create porous, agile, and flat organizations that are based on voluntary actions. And Steemit has been great facilitating that move for such a

I've experimented with plenty of concepts to figure out uses cases for Steemit, and have been doing pretty well so far!

I've expressed my journey, and thoughts on the work-paradigm that we're carving out with the other good folks in a milestone post here: Past, Present, Future - A Personal Roadmap

Still an ongoing attempt to cross Steemit with my music event company: Steemit and The Dance Music Scene

Also ran a crowdsourced logo contest, probably the biggest in cryptospace so far: Logo Contest for Project Curie - Calling All Designers!

My best performing post so far (philosophy): The End of Criminalization: On Free Will, Accountability, and Compassion

I think having a stake motivates one to contribute in many different ways. Instead of having 99% of my potential suppressed in normal jobs, I get to open up myself here, and it's been doing great for me.

And it's great to see you here! Remember reading your books awhile back! :)

Oh yes, @kevinwong would be a great feature and quite fitting I think with the Mag!!!

Another Must Feature Story !

In my opinion, Kevin is one of the most brilliant minds that's persisted on the platform, and I'd advocate including him in on the piece - could also fit in with Rolling Stone's music angle, given he's a DJ/promoter in KL...

This is wonderful! I think @ericvancewalton is the person to speak to about his success on Steemit. He introduced me to this amazing platform and it has given me hope. Hope that I can change the future for myself and my children.

Beautiful, will check Eric's posts out now.

I would really appreciate the opportunity to tell my story @neilstrauss. Thanks for the nomination, @angierose! This platform has helped me both personally and professionally. Here's a link to a post about how Steemit has saved my wife and I financially - https://steemit.com/story/@ericvancewalton/wall-street-failed-me-cryptocurrency-set-me-free.

My "success" has been mostly intellectual. It's really interesting to see what kind of impact Steem will have to the world. To be part of this from early on is "once in a lifetime" opportunity.

Steem is yet another step in the evolution of blockchains. Unlike many other blockchains, Steem is actually doing something useful. Most blockchains are just a playfields for developers, but Steem has been able to attract real users – many of whom have never earlier used any other blockchains.

The Steem blockchain is really powerful. You can think of it as a creature that is existing in several computers around the world. Because it's existence is so widely distributed, it's really hard to kill it.

It has superpowers: it can remember everything perfectly. It has a built-in reward system that is paying humans to record stuff into it's memory.

Steemit.com is just a first application where Steem rewards humans to write blog posts. If you start to think, there are lots of different stuff that a reward system with a perfect memory could do.

A good sci-fi writer could get a nice novel out of this. A creature that nobody can kill starts to pay humans to do stuff. First it's very innocent, like blog posts. But then it starts to evolve... there will be more diverse stuff that it's rewarding humans to do. Someday it's so popular that people start to use the native tokens it has issued to replace their fiat-currencies.

Hey Neil, I believe that I am the most succesfull teenager on Steemit (15) I would love to share my story with you and be featured on Rolling Stone... If you interviewed me; it would really empower the youth to come onto Steemit!

Nice work, will email you tomorrow, then make sure to edit your comment to remove your email address.

Really anyone on here who is providing content that is adding value to other peoples live would be a good candidate too. I can't give you a name but I'm sure there is someone having a profound impact through steemit.

I'm just a guy providing education on how to buy a house and/or invest in real estate without getting hosed by a shadey agent, broker, etc. There's gotta be someone out there impacting people on a wider scale.

I would call The Steemit Talk Podcast a success story that is still unfolding. We started by recording our first episode on the Voice Memo app of an iPhone, and through only the earnings of Steem from episode to episode, we've expanded to a full-on radio station type of talk show that has met weekly since the end of July.

From this:

To this:

The following Steemit post breaks down our progress from the beginning:
https://steemit.com/steemit/@winstonwolfe/a-giant-steemy-thank-you-on-behalf-of-steemit-talk-podcast

excellent post my congratulations, thank you very much for the office visit my @neilstrauss friend, I'm not the person to answer your question, I do not consider myself worthy of it, is more ud I ivitado to visit my blog whenever you want, seia a real honror to me that ud visit my blog, thanks for sharing this brilliant post.

Hey Neil. I'm working on a series to help introduce people to cryptocurrency and Steemit. Here's the link.

If you don't think you need it I'm happy to remove it :).

Well if you really are going to do this. You gotta hang out in steemspeak and talk to some of the guys that are working on development of some of the tools for steemit and traders. Join us.

http://discord.steemspeak.com

This is great news, and will be extremely good for steemit. The exposure alone from an article like this will be huge. I only have one upvote to give you, but i'm giving it as hard as I've ever given one.

"It's getting hot in here" should be the official Steem catch phrase. It's got that touch of intrigue. "Why with two E's? hot in where? Siri, google steem. No! S-T-E-E-M."

Keep it real and the publicity will be great!

Found your book club for one. Also found a group called #steemprentice that I work with that is a mentor initiative founded by @sykochica that helps bring together a variety of steemit users along with newer ones who all help each other learn more about steemit for improved experience and value.

here.This has led to me being invited to #beyondbitcoinhangouts where users can vote for me and my projects

Finding a way to combine my passions of crypto, games, investing, and sharing. I am now playing poker for upvotes and sharing my winnings with my upvoters.

Find the whole steemit experience to be great and free which is one of my goals. Having lived freely most of last year mostly in nature. Then getting Meningitis. This platform has helped me find new ways to do things which I have been trying to do for the past few years and finally finding more of my way.

Followed: You're incredibly enterprising, great ideas here and really shows some of what's possible on the platform. Thanks for the feedback on your experience.

He should go on steemspeak's discord chat at a certain time. There are lots of successful steemit members there who would give him some good dialogue.

Talk to @fyrstikken, @picokernel, @instructor2121, @ raymonjohnstone, @inertia (the friendly dragon), @contentjunkie and all of us. Heck a 15 to 30 minute slot with a pre-announcement would assure the best are on the channel at that time. Let me know if you need any info in order to get it set up.

Good call. Hadn't checked out steemspeak, listening now. And if needed, will take you up on the excellent idea of getting a great group together on the channel.

Hi Neil,

Steemit enabled me to pay off about $10,000 worth of debt, at a time when I quit my job and had about a month's worth of money to support me and my family.

I wrote about it way back when it was called: The Puppy And The Preacher - How I Paid My Rent With Steem. I'd be happy to do an interview.

Thanks

Cg

I'm a little disappointed at how quickly everyone jumps up to recommend a male writer while disregarding one of the most important and influential people on Steemit: @stellabelle. She's a multi-talented woman with a fascinating personal history who lives life on her own terms. She belongs in the pages of Rolling Stone because she's a freaking rock star!

I feel like this place is the only thing that will save the world from the horrible algorithm run social media plaforms like Facebook, which is ruining the world by spreading false information as fact & people go to that for news! But slowly everyone is switching & I'm no story but I'm in love with steemit & everything about it. I tell everyone to register & one reason is with their future with money & earning it if they usually go to main stream sites for revenue i suggest this & they get excited! So I'm pushing everyone to use steemit instead & most people are switching due to the hope of monetary gain to start but I think but the best things will always rise to the top on here! Its nice to actually see who I'm following on my fee . What a thought! :3 I think @njweedman is going to be a success on here, even though I just got him to join! He's huge in the activism community in NJ & I just hope everyone else in the cannabis community follows suit & joins as well, why not?! Its almost like an instant talent audition on here, you'll kinda know if you're good at whatever youre doing or not heh I just love it, sorry for the ranting!

Great points, and will check out @njweedman. Raises a number of questions too, to discuss in another post. In the meantime, here's hoping Prop 64 in California goes through!

Awesome! & yes rooting for Cali! NjWeedman had a cannabis temple there too actually :P

What a very cool opportunity to get Steemit into the mainstream.
I'm not doing anything extraordinary, just a regular person excited about an opportunity and building a solid foundation with positivity. :)

I worry about it becoming mainstream too quickly filled with idiots just trying to make money but the best stuff should float to the top either way I hope, I find a lot of junky looking posts, I just wish everyone would post like each post mattered to them like I do or I don't post anything, but thats just me lol

I hear you @vapecat - I scroll through the New tab every day looking for quality material and...well... I keep scrolling through a lot of junk. Then again, "junk" is pretty subjective isn't it? Heck, I put effort into my posts and to some, it may in fact be junk. LOL But here's my take on it - only the adventurous are going to sign on. I've been very active for 3 months and doing my best to bring friends and family onto the platform...and like lemmings, they continue to waste their time, energy and talent on Facebook and Pinterest (and others). Well - it's their loss as far as I'm concerned. I'm just going to keep doing what I love and maybe one day it will pay off. :)

I noticed that. When people come on and don't get "rewarded" right away, they disappear. So one challenge for the platform is (and maybe there's a good post somewhere on this): Getting people to come to Steemit for Steemit and the community itself, so that whatever Steem they may or may not make is just a bonus.

90 days on steemit. I've got a good bit about expectations.@neilstrauss, you may actually enjoy the blog post about my

Agreed, it's exciting, and also to see so many people here like @vapecat below spreading the word-of-mouth. "A solid foundation of positivity" is exactly the heart and core that Steemit needs, and so much other social media lacks. Thanks for contributing to that.

This is simply fantastic!

You've got an interesting challenge because the early Steemit experiences are not the current Steemit experiences. And this blogging/social media platform is just an experimental testbed for perfecting and discovering opportunity based on the underlying blockchain technology. Blogging success here is incidental to the bigger picture. I'm looking forward to your article!

Great points about early experiences vs now, and about the bigger picture. Hope to address those in the story, depending on my final word count.

It's a complicated subject. It will be interesting to read how you approach it all. Good luck!

Heya I have been on steem for the last 3 months and I am developing a strategy game for steem that uses the social network as the map, check it out at #steemstars if you are interested.

Take a look at @iamdavidl post - https://steemit.com/music/@iamdavidl/music-video-over-again. A great musician on Steemit with a top notch music video.

On my way to check his video out, thanks @pairmike.

how about a story of a washed up middle aged Americana artist steeming his emotional ups and downs of going back in the studio after a decade of drunkenness hahah.. maybe that's too depressing. this is great, good luck

Speaking of artists, we haven't heard from @klye in awhile. Wonder how he's doing.

@anotherjoe has a great series on his work in Haiti, with proceeds earned here used to help in that work.


Also I don't know if your'e aware of this or not, but steemit has its own game, set to to launch here shortly. I would love to see a quick blurb about it.
You should look at @imaxess a hospital that accepts steem. https://steemit.com/steemit/@williambanks/havin-the-game-that-allows-you-to-spend-steem-dollars-in-the-real-world-huge-update

Thanks for all you do @neilstrauss

That's awesome, will be a great opportunity for steemit. Thanks for supporting the platform.

My success story is being inspired for the first time to create content, write article and poetry. I've never wrote in the past like I have here on steemit. The social interaction I have had from the community has been so supportive that its just inspired me to write even more. No other social media platform has reinvigorated my desire to create like steemit. Since joining I have made a 360' turn from user to content creator. Now I am always excited to better myself so that which I create has higher quality, so that everyone that enjoys my work can gain even more with each new blog I create.

Pretty new to steemit and I have heard the user experience has changed since the past but all I can see is that it is a great supportive community that has turned me into a content creator.

Hmmm... I don't know if it's enough, but publishing my erotic novel on Steemit might just help me become a published author. It sure helped me find the time and renewed passion to keep writing the book. And planning the next one. :)

This article promted what I would consider a very interesting success story: https://steemit.com/story/@goldmatters/jose-canseco-and-me-and-my-quest-for-a-follow-back-on-twitter

Would never have been able to make contact with this celebrity and communicate without this medium. Was upvoted, shared, and tweeted until could no longer be ignored! All because of the Steemit community https://steemit.com/story/@goldmatters/jose-canseco-followed-me

Hey Neil,

First off: I think it's awesome you pitched this concept to your editor! It's also fantastic news that he is on board.

There are no shortage of great success stories here, but I'll add mine to the mix to give you another option. I'm an example of someone who was a complete virgin to the cryptocurrency world, but who has become borderline obsessed with it since being introduced to Steemit.

I'm a former newspaper reporter who now works in the Communications Department at RE/MAX of Western Canada's corporate headquarters. In July, a guy in our tech department, @chrisj, told me about Steemit. Chris had been investing in Bitcoin for years and noticed the dramatic increase in Steemit's value. Knowing I love to write, he encouraged me to create an account.

At first, I posted a couple pieces of writing I had kept in my back pocket over the years. One made $1.33. One made $0. At that point, I took a step back and decided to observe what others were doing on the platform. At that point in time, @heiditravels was consistently on the trending page, and seemed to be well-liked by the community.

I reached out to Heidi via a Snapchat video and requested a "20 questions" interview. Although she was sharing a lot with the community, I knew there was more that Steemit readers wanted to know about her. She responded to me that night; I posted the next day. That interview was worth more than $500.

This week I will be posting my 20th "20 questions" interview. My blog has given users a more intimate look at many of the popular users, while also focusing on influencers outside of Steemit. For example, my interview with Roger Ver ended up being the #1 trending story of the day, and eventually led Roger to join Steemit. ( @rogerkver )

In four months, Steemit has become a huge part of my life. I'll be attending SteemFest in Amsterdam (trip completely funded from money earned on this platform), and my plan is to continue with my "20 questions" interview series.

Feel free to use my story, or don't, totally up to you! (But can we grab a beer in Amsterdam? I'm a big fan!)

Cheers,

Wade Paterson

I would like to add that having a community around creation really makes the "photo a day" type projects a thing of the past.

When you are constantly creating, you get into a flow state where failure barriers are easy to break through. And you can continually push your own boundaries to open up new areas to make art.

I have written several poems, songs, and drawn illustrations and this feeling of creative momentum is true regardless of the type of art being made.

I was a stay-at-home dad / freelance illustrator when I started. Before that I was editor-in-chief of Bitcoin Magazine. Now I substitute teach Algebra, which has provided many more ideas for articles.

I commend you, @neilstrauss for your followup! I am also a single Mom trying to make ends meet while still riddled with guilt at being white and American :-O lol the special needs in my house are through the roof! :D CHEERS! XOXOXXOXO

This post has been linked to from another place on Steem.

Learn more about and upvote to support linkback bot v0.5. Flag this comment if you don't want the bot to continue posting linkbacks for your posts.

Built by @ontofractal

Steemit in Rolling Stone? Awesome!

I haven’t been all that active here lately, though had a reasonable amount of success as one of the earlier adopters. There’s probably more epic feature stories out there, though as a basic overview:

seeking to bridge the gap from being a DJ & writer in Bali to entering the world of blockchain technology and facing the stresses of a super slow season and business uncertainties upon moving back to Canada at the end of the year - stumbled into Steemit, earning (and taking out) over $25k in 6 weeks - the equivalent of 100 DJ gigs…

not only eased the financial pressure - but gave a start into cryptocurrency investing, and led me into exploring blockchain developments in the music industry - giving a glimpse of how the music industry stands to benefit with a range of blockchain-based applications, from digital rights management & innovating licensing models to music curation platforms (that could pay listeners for their service of voting, just as on Steemit - though the funds allocated from music sales, split via smart contracts).

could be an interesting combo angle - covering both a Steemit success story AND bridging into an expansive vision for such technology’s potential for the music world - which of course fits well with Rolling Stone’s core focus…

hit me up with a private message on the Steemit.chat (username “sivante”) if interested and wanna discuss more.


You inspired many with your advice .
My very short, simple and personal success story, not meant for the Mag but as a Thank you for being at @steemfest. You made my day 1. Danke Vielmals @neilstrauss

I was born September 1958

1999 ( Prince, one of my all time favourites wrote a song about ) :
I was asked by some of my friends to better check my emails if I move to the other side of the moon, from one island to another, New York to Bali, Indonesia. This was a bit crazy for a single mother to get up and just go. I started a new life with my excited 5 year old girl, her pink Daisy Duck suitcase, my cd collection packed up among the typical NYC " black is beautiful " outfits and of course one original Texas cowboy hat remembering the "Wild in the USA" days.

"Email? hmmm what's that ???!!!" This had propably something to do with those computers I decided to avoid.

2016:
I am on steemit!

I wrote more since July than I did my whole life.....I enjoy practising on this platform!
I do not post a lot because I love to keep some mysteries telling my stories in an ongoing extremely challenging book project.

I hope you article gets lots of attention for Steemit. I've seen a new user say they came here after reading it. I've not seen much mention of this site in mainstream media, so this is very welcome.