Members of the Dash community who were around at the beginning know this feeling. Even ones who joined Dash Nation later may have felt it. A large part of the cryptosphere has never evaluated Dash with a fair lens, due to mistakes made at the launch.

These mistakes led to increased trolling from rival currencies who made the assumption that these mistakes were intentional. Rumours that Dash was a scam were prevalent, but no proof of this was ever submitted. The people responsible would simply follow the adage “Repeat it long enough and it will become true”.

66,000 @KriptoMobile phones sold to retailers as Dash continues to dominate in LATAM. Expanding our partnership to include @Dash_Text and @DiscoverDash apps to bring #Dash to more people and make it easier to spend within the ecosystem https://t.co/slxDOG2qGR #Crypto #Venezuela — Dash (@Dashpay) December 18, 2018 66,000 Kriptomobile Dash-preloaded phones were sold in Latin America.

All of this early-life adversity only served to make Dash stronger. There was never anything wrong with the technology, customer service or work ethos, just a persistent bias from those who believed the parroted narrative of the detractors.

All through this time, Dash Nation persevered. We posted links to our successes in the cryptocurrency subReddit only to get met with downvotes and scam comments. We tweeted about integrations and adoption only to get ridiculed about the assumed intentions of Dash’s founder.

Fast-forward to today. As someone who has spent considerable time in the trenches trying to build the community, I have begun to notice a thawing out of this resistance to Dash’s successes.

I believe a big reason for this was the popping of the crypto bubble. People are no longer making money from pure speculation, and the focus is more on usage and adoption. This is right up Dash’s alley, as we have literally been working on this since the beginning!

Dash’s social media contacts (Dash Nation’s #social-media-squad, and Dash Talk’s #swarm, among others) regularly post newsworthy items in their circles. Recently, where there used to be downvotes there are upvotes, where their used to be snide comments there are now compliments. It’s very refreshing to see, and a vindication of our hard work.

Yonela Maita of @ChurchsChicken in Venezuela gushes about the professionalism and support of @Dash_Venezuela, and predicts that many more entrepreneurs will join Dash Nation in the future:#Dash #DigitalCash #DashNation #Crypto #Bitcoin #BitcoinCash pic.twitter.com/qQGOBml2E6 — Chrrrrristopher Carrrrruthers (@TaoOfSatoshi) December 14, 2018 People who work with Dash Nation more often than not come away impressed by the experience.

We are coming into a new period of added respect for our project, Dash Nation. The dichotomy of how we are treated in the cryptosphere versus how we and the project actually are is slowly fading.

It’s taken a long time to get to this point, but we must remember it didn’t come by accident. The whole community came together to make this happen. Developers coded a smooth and robust network, business developers worked hard to add integrations in this environment of extreme bias, and rabid community members did their best to get the constant good news out there.

Does that mean it’s going to be easy from now on? Absolutely not, and if it was it simply wouldn’t be Dash. This false narrative we deal with every day is still prevalent. There are indications, however, that times may be changing, and we must not rest now. Now is the time to be bold. To have the swagger we deserve.

Now is the time to strike while the iron is hot!