Thanks for HIVEFEST5: Looking forward to the new year!

Here at Deegram, we're still working tirelessly to provide everyone a social media platform built on blockchain targeted towards Norwegians and other users on HIVE/that we meet on our way in life and business. 

No matter who we've met, we've always been greeted with respect and admiration of our work. This weekend, we were lucky enough to once again meet the wonderful people of this blockchain, as we did last year and two years before that (we had a break while finishing our master thesis about blockchain adoption in organizations, which even got published by an international conference, we're awaiting the link and we'll share it with you guys as soon as we have it), to learn more about the further developments of the HIVE blockchain as well as what the current status and roadmap for the projects are. 

Such gatherings are of high importance to an already fragile ecosystem, because that is what a blockchain may become if it remains unattended to both on a technical and a governance level. We have already experienced once on a different blockchain that sometimes changes in governance needs to be made. 

Luckily, here at HIVE, we at Deegram feel safe to express ourselves freely and discuss our ideas for our platform and our future without the fear of competition, because in the end, we're all a family. So thank you, especially to @roeland, for hosting yet another wonderful family gathering. This year it was virtual in AltSpaceVR and we talked through our headsets while eating our dinners at home. 

Maybe next year we'll all meet in one room and just use Hololenses to show each other our saved up art. Or maybe we'll party again in Mexico or somewhere hot once covid-19 disappears as the vaccines roll out. Who knows. 

All we at Deegram know, is that we believe in the true power of decentralized networks, especially for use within social media and/or content creation. 

So as far as we're concerned, we're buckling up for 2021 to be the best year yet, with several news to report: 

• From the first of March, 2021, @robinron will increase his % in the company from 40 to 100%. This is due to the fact that most of the core architectural work and back-end now is finished and we are preparing for a great international launch in 2021. (Currently we're in closed beta while adding a few more features before we go back online on the mobile app, but the beta platform is still live for users and potential investors to see)

• We've hired a new intern! We can't wait to let you all meet him. He's a great guy, has a bachelor in marketing from BI in Norway, and we're excited to have him on-board to assist in marketing Deegram. 

• We also have a new potential CMO in the pipeline, can't wait to tell you guys more about her, we just need to finish negotiations first and then we'll go public. 

• Our core dev team remains intact but with somewhat reduced activity as the progresses in the Deegram platform has been somewhat delayed in 2020 due to covid-19 and lost contracts for us as a consultancy company when the festivals were unable to have their events (and we were in negotiations with one of the up and coming festivals in the south of Norway to provide digital services and marketing for them), but this was made up for by landing new contracts in Q4 which resulted in a slight profit for the company in 2020 (phew! we managed payroll in December as well, due to four new contracts in November)

• We've launched a crowdfunding campaign on Spleis.no (a Norwegian platform with a Norwegian bank owner, we used them to raise funds once before to make the alpha for Deegram, and now we're trying again to raise money for marketing and further development! If any of you are Norwegian (I think? maybe you can sign up for the 50$ ones where half of the funds go directly towards creating HIVE users and the other half goes towards further development and adding of additional features to the platform) you can check it out at www.spleis.no/deegram

Three more things: 

First: A community for Deegram is also coming up to simplify our users experience of discovering more content

Second: We're planning to put up our own node and API to assist in strengthening the blockchain. We have some excess hardware at the moment we're configuring, as well as looking at the possibility of running a full node and running for witness. 

Third: We're also considering doing an STO for Deegram to peg the value to NOK, so we can collaborate with the many new exchanges here in Norway. We've been in discussion with some of the major Norwegian exchanges since back in 2018 STEEM days and their reply was that it relies on market need (of course) and now that we're finally rolling out the platform live to never be taken down again (woo!), our users need a simplified way of extracting their freshly earned HIVE tokens. (Yes, we're also implementing a simple buy/sell function where users can exchange within the app, but this requires us more legal paperwork so we're doing that in 2021. The most important thing for our users now is that they report correctly to the Norwegian Tax Administration next year to alert them that they have made cryptocurrencies using a social platform). 

Thanks to everyone that has supported us so far! Especially big shoutouts to @roelandp , @blocktrades, @howo and @fredrikaa for not only always supporting the Deegram-team by rooting for us, but for providing direct assistance by either putting us on stage, giving us crazy big votes or good technological intel or just being our friends and co-workers. 

We're looking forward to 2021, with smiles on our faces knowing that neither blockchain or Deegram are going anywhere soon! 

Especially not now that we've established that all of the IPR regarding naming and branding is finally settled after we won the naming dispute against Instagram LLC. 

It's great to be back on the blockchain again(and even a new one from 2020!), and this time, not even Zuckerberg will stop us! (Or any other competing actor, we like to play nice and share user-bases, not fighting amongst each other within the SoMe sector)

By the way: If you guys on the blockchain help us out by either tipping us/transferring us/upvoting us/reblogging us/buying our merch on our crowdfunding campaign or any other action that financially benefits either our deegramofficial wallet or our business account to the point that our total liquid value is 20 000 Euros (200 000 NOK), Innovation Norway (Norways organ for distributing funds to innovative projects) will release our next 40 000 Euros (400 000 NOK) that we were granted. 

We would be eternally grateful as it would mean runway for the company for at least 6 months, maybe even 12 if I do my job correctly. 

Let me/us know if you have any questions regarding either the campaign or the future of Deegram! We're excited to share. 

Best of regards
Robin Amir Rondestvedt Moudnib
Soon to be three-year CEO of Decentralize IT AS, the company that brings you Deegram (and sometimes merch, thank-you notes, websites and whatever else it takes to fund project development for another year)
Contact me anytime at either @robinron or [email protected] if you want the direct hotline
Looking forward to next HIVEFEST already! And by the way, I hope we can hug again when we meet next year, because I miss that from Bangkok. 

Posted using Deegram @deegramofficial https://www.deegram.com/