Being a newbie is not easy but I found a few things that help

I have only been on Steem for 3 weeks. I have learned a few things that work and others that can get you in trouble. As you can see my reputation is already 40, which was set back by about .5 by a down vote early on. Now my curations seem to be stalled. Not quite sure why yet.

OK here is what I have learned. Giving upvotes is a MUST....... Especially as a Newbie....

1. Upvoting gets you curation of steem, followers and builds community. You can upvote yourself but be careful with that. It pisses of the steemain whale community. The only time I upvote myself is once someone else has upvoted me, I helped someone but they did not upvote me; but I give them a day or 2 before doing that.
   (Your voting power will drop as a newbie after about 10 upvotes. Logout for a little while and your voting power will go back up.)
2. Resteem stories you like, upvote them and comment on the story. If the writer of the story engages you, engage them back. You can easily keep up with your comments and replies in your "blog" menu selection under your avatar. UPVOTE the writers comments if the writer is kind, informative, engaging, as long as they are not being mean UPVOTE!
3. Submit a story. Make sure to give credit for pics and links.
4. Submitting stories, upvoting, resteeming and dialog makes steem.