Where I blog now

 Anyone who followed this blog will not have seen an update for a long time. I moved to a blockchain platform that is now known as Hive. I get a lot of engagement there as well as earning from it. Let me know if you want to join up as I can create accounts.

Steem Powered

So, Tsu is dead. Last week the site shut down leaving hundreds of users wondering what they should do now. A lot of them won't get the money they had accumulated as it's not up to the payout threshold. They have added the ability to download your posts and photos. The posts are in xml and json format, so it will depend on whether you can do anything with those. I may file them away somewhere for future reference, but it's better if old posts can stay on-line. Tsu posts were not included in Google results, so they are of little value now.

There's discussion on the Tsu Forum about other sites that pay. I'm not really interested in those that just have pictures and/or short posts. I did that on Tsu, but I really prefer longer-form blogging. I'd heard about Steemit a while back. It's based around blockchain technology and has its own cryptocurrencies. I'm still trying to understand how these work, but you earn some based on how many votes your posts get. It's not based on views as the site does not carry advertising apart from on the search page. You can run mining software on your PC, but they discourage running it on multiple machines by requiring that each has your private key (used as a password). If anyone else gets that they could take your money. They also discourage speculation by limiting how quickly you can take money out.

When you look at the homepage you will see posts that show a value of thousands of dollars. That's certainly impressive. It seems to depend on getting votes by 'whales' who hold a lot of currency as their votes have more influence. Comments also have a value, so it's worth making good comments. I'd hope nobody is voting up 'nice' comments.

I am getting comments from bots. Steemit iswas fairly open for developers. The code for the site is open source and people can access the blockchain of posts to produce their own stats.This post lists a few plus a Chrome extension that gives you notifications. The site itself is lacking some of the features you would expect. There are notifications. You can follow people, but can't go straight to their feeds. Perhaps they are relying on others to add to it. This may be an opportunity for me to find some programming projects to work on.

Unlike Tsu you can pay into your account using Bitcoin. I had a small amount from various faucets and it was simple to buy some 'Steem'. I think that has increased my reputation there. They want people to hold currency. You get $7 worth when you join, but you can't take it straight out. I haven't invested much yet and am happy to wait a while to see where it goes. The Steem price has fluctuated a lot as you would expect. I understand that some people have already taken out large amounts, but you would  have to do it via a Bitcoin exchange to get cash.

If you join up then you can find me here. I'm using my standard name of steevc. Posts do appear on Google and I've already had one about prog rock shared on Facebook. Note that I do not earn anything if you join. There is no referral scheme that I know of.

Update in 2021: The Steemit platform became corrupted by a hostile takeover, so links have been updated to point to the Hive platform that is still decentralised. You can find me there.

End of the experiment

If you've been reading this blog then you know that I have been an enthusiastic user of the Tsu social media service. I was initially attracted by their model of paying users based on views and for recruiting, but soon discovered an active community of people interested in making the most of what the internet can do. Since October 2014 I made well over $300 and withdrew $200. The rest went to charities using Tsu and on a few purchases, including an original painting. I know others made many thousands by recruiting lots of people and/or building a large following.

I was using it earlier today, but when I got home from work the app was not working and the homepage showed the message below.

It looks like they ran out of investor funding. They had a fairly large team operating from offices in New York. That couldn't be cheap. The HypeStat site reckoned they were making a few hundred dollars per day and if they were really only taking their 10% share that was not going to go far. They struggled to build an active userbase. Just over 5 million signed up, but I estimate that only about 1% were really using it and a lot of those were really just spamming the site to try and earn something.

I'm a little sad about this as I had invested a lot of time in helping to build something. I made a lot of friends. I will be able to stay in touch with some of them as we hooked up on other services.

I have to think about what I will do now. I enjoy blogging and may do that more on this blog and elsewhere. I am still a fan of Google+ and you can find me here. I don't really use my Twitter account and Facebook is mainly reserved for close friends and family. You can generally find me on other sites as steevc,

I have looked at some other social sites that pay, but none has come close to paying what Tsu has. Anything less is not really worth my time when I have other things I want to do. So I may step back for a while and enjoy life.

Update (2021): Google+ is dead too now. Find me on Hive

Pay day

Seven months ago I posted about my first payment of $100 from Tsu. This week I'm happy to report that I've been paid again! With the current weak pound it's worth a little more than last time. Those in the USA get a cheque in a black envelope and some cool stickers, but it has to be via Paypal for us in the UK.

I've actually earned a lot more than $100 in that period, but I gave a lot to charity via various campaigns. One of those was a month of sponsoring the runs of member in my Fun Runners channel for Charity Water. That just reached 500 followers. I've also been supporting Papillon Foundation in South Africa and Edlington Community Organisation in the UK. It would be great to see more charities on there from around the world. It's so easy to donate on Tsu, even if it's just a few cents, and there are no transaction fees. It's money you would not have otherwise, so why not help others?

Tsu continues to gain users, but has struggled to keep them engaged. I keep an eye on their stats via a couple of sites. Their Alexa ranking has been falling since the start of this year, but has just started to rise again. There's a lot of growth in places like Pakistan where a local celebrity has been recruiting a lot of new people. The new users need to be guided to using Tsu in the ways it was intended. There are still a lot of people just posting images they found on-line. They will not get paid if they are breaching copyright.

My own network is slowly growing. I have people in there from all over the world. A few are active and I try to encourage them to keep going. If they can build their own following and network then they will see their earnings rise.

I've spent some of my earnings on music by some musicians I've been following. +Matt Stevens is not yet on Tsu, but I've known him for years. I discovered +Deni Gauthier and +Cherry White on Tsu. It's cool to engage with artists you enjoy.

I bought another one from guitarist +Elliott Randall (ex-Steely Dan) who is also on Tsu.

Tsu is still fun for me, so I'll be sticking around there. I think it has massive potential for artists, musicians and charities. They can bring in their supporters to build the service. At around five million users they are small compared to the likes of Facebook and Twitter, but if they keep growing they could become a major financial force. Many of us are producing cool content that earns those sites revenue from advertising. I think we deserve to get a share.

Tsu > Google+ ?

I've been on Google+ pretty much since it started about 4 years ago. I think it's a great platform and I don't find it to be a ghost town as some people suggest it is. I think it depends on the sort of people you hope to find here. There are enough geeky and musical people to keep me happy. I think it has the best user interface of the social sites I've used. I'm on Facebook too, but that's to stay in touch with people who will not use anything else. I don't get much news from there.

I also joined Tsu when it started 18 months ago. That is also struggling to be a mainstream social site, but then it was aimed at creative people who wanted to own their content and profit from it. It also suffers from negative propaganda about it being some kind of scam. There are people there trying to get something for nothing, but I just ignore them. I'm no celebrity, but I've managed to gain 3x the followers I have on G+ in a shorter time. I post several times a day with my thoughts and links to cool stuff. That is making me around a dollar per day.

A lot of my Tsu earnings go to charities, but I've had one payout of $100 so far and should have a couple more this year. Some people are making that much in a week, which is a nice little income. It requires effort and quality content to achieve that. Those who know how to build an active social following will do very well on Tsu. If they are earning something from their Youtube channel then they can double-up by linking the videos on Tsu.

It's not just about the money as it's barely buying me a beer per week. I wouldn't stick around if there were not so many cool people. The money is a bonus and I enjoy the feedback I get from happy charities.

The Children and Network numbers are for people who have joined via my Tsu link. I get paid a portion of what they make for the site. If you are thinking of joining then please consider using my link.

Clicking for charity

From the outset the Tsu social network has made charity a feature. Charity organisations can register their credentials and will then have a 'Make a Donation' button on their profile. Any user can click that to donate some of whatever funds they have accumulated through using the site. You get paid based on views and by recruiting, so it's no extra effort really.

There are currently 67 charities listed (link on this post). These cover a wide range of causes. I'd like to see some from the UK, so if you know of any then please tell them. I know that some have raised many thousands of dollars so far.

I've probably given away about half of what I have made so far on Tsu. There are lots of campaigns run by users to boost donations. I did one in February where I sponsored people in my running group. Other people matched my donations. And this is all with money that we would not have otherwise.

Tsu has undergone a big change in recent months. They released a major re-design of the site and changed how some aspects work.Previously you could post on your own profile or to a group. Now there are global 'topics' where posts must go so that people can find what suits their interests. 'Channels' can be created within these topics by users for more specific areas. People are still adjusting to this, but I think it has some real benefits.

If you haven't visited in a while then check it out. They have an extensive FAQ that should answer most questions. If you are not a member then please use this link. I get a small bonus from recruiting people and you can do the same. They really want to attract more people who create original content. Artists, musicians and others can benefit directly from their work and they don't need to pay to make it visible there.

Wow, an app

If you've been reading this blog then you will know that I like Tsu. It's a good social site that has a good mix of people. Of course it also pays you and I've made over $100 there that I was able to redeem recently. There have been a few other sites with similar models that I have tried over the last year, but none of them was as fun to use and so I didn't use them enough to earn a significant amount.

Now there'a chat app which also pays users from advertising revenue. It's called WowApp and it seems to offer a similar set of features to Skype. Like Tsu it offers the option to transfer money to charities. You see ads in the app (Window, Apple, iOS and Android, no Linux) and web site, but they are not terribly obtrusive.

I'm trying it for now with a few people and have made about a cent. I've only recruited one person whereas others have hundreds and they are making a lot more.

I'll still have to use Skype, Facebook, Google and WhatsApp to stay in touch with friends, but this is another option.

If you want to try it then please use my referral link at https://www.wowapp.com/w/steevc/Steve-Clark