Conserving Voting Power : Why Bother?
When I started on STEEM my Voting Power was precious. I guarded it and managed it like my life depended on it because I thought it was important. I didn’t really know anyone so it was actually a bit of a struggle spending just 10+ votes a day and I still didn’t really know what I was looking at…or even looking for. But as I learnt more about the system and started making connections with other users that all changed…
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Now I don’t really care about my Voting Power. If I like a post, I will vote for it. If I like someones comment, I will vote for it. It doesn’t matter if I am making 10 votes a day or 100 votes a day, I just let the system spread my Voting Power around and I trust that it will take care of itself. When people are new though they think that having a low Voting Power is a bad thing. Trust me, it isn’t and I think it is actually a good thing. I’ve done the math and the system is brilliantly designed to manage your Voting Power dynamically so that no matter how you want to use it you can vote as much as you want and you aren’t losing a single cent of value. If you are making 10 votes a day at 100% Voting Power or 100 votes a day at 10% Voting Power the sum of all your vote values is the SAME.
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There is only 1 legitimate reason for maintaining a high Voting Power and that is to maintain a high value for an individual 100% Upvote. This is maybe important if you are self-voting or vote trading, but if you are just trying to reward undervalued content (like we all should be) then it just doesn’t make sense to manage our Voting Power like it is some kind of precious resource. Free yourself from this mental burden of rationing your votes!
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There are other benefits to having a low Voting Power too. You can actually take a few days off and not have to worry that your Voting Power is going to hit 100% and have you committing that cardinal sin – Wasting Voting Power. Whereas if you were trying to keep your Voting Power in the 80%+ range you simply must log on every single day to use enough to keep it from hitting 100%. Talk about taking something that should be fun and turning it into a chore!
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So stop worrying about your Voting Power. Just spread your vote far and wide on content and people you like and let the system do its job in managing your Voting Power for you. Just try it and you might find it is quite liberating and fun!
IMPORTANT EDIT : If you are a minnow please read my follow up post Spread Your Vote – But Don’t Let it Turn to DUST!
https://www.irishexaminer.com
http://www.alamandamaths.com
https://www.amazon.com
https://www.pinterest.com.au
I think I'm going to take a middle ground stance on this. I'm in agreement with you that there's really no reason to be keeping your voting power at our near 100%. If you're wanting to give as high a vote as possible 10-11 100% votes because of either a desire to give the most you can, or because you don't have a lot to give and you want to at least leave $0.01, I get it. But by the end of the day, you should have your VP recharging at least for the time period that you sleep, or until the next time you're getting on Steemit.
The only caveat I would have is that unless those with less than 100 SP are only voting on things that already have $0.02-$0.03 or above left on them, anything lower than that won't make the dust payout threshold. Those of us with higher SP can do a lot more voting before we hit that amount, but the lower SP folks will have to watch what they do for their votes to count.
It's a very good point. Thank you once again for helping knock the rough edges off my ideas! :)
How do I find out what the dust vote threshold is? I am thinking I should clarify that point today.
Well, I'd probably start with Tim Cliff's post, since he's the reason why I even know about the payout dust threshold.
The vote dust threshold (I didn't know but there are two dust thresholds and they're different) is set to go away with HF 20, whenever that happens. That was in the steemitblog's HF 20 Velocity update back in late December.
Thanks mate. Have I told you lately just how much of a champion you are? You've certainly got your finger on the pulse for anything STEEM related!
I think this might be the first time you've called me a champion, but apparently I've got you convinced I know something about this place. Kind of feels like the blind leading the not-that-blind, but okay. :) I am happy to be helpful however I can.
So modest. Ok, so maybe you're not an expert but you've got some kind of "Jack of all
tradesSTEEM" thing going on here.Interesting post. I also was very protective of my voting power in the early days, whereas now I have liberated myself a little and use my voting more as a "like" as intended. However, it is much more profitable if you manage to try to maintain a quite high VP. If you have like 1% in VP that would not give you much influence in the eco-system. It could also be an idea to sell your vote above a certain VP or delegate some of your votes to a bot (Smartsteem or our beloved ssg-community). Then you do not have to bother if you go away for a week or to.
Yes, I personally think having a balance works best. I delegate some to charitable projects, some to projects that support communities I'm involved in and the rest forms my curation budget. My VP usually sits between 10-20% but my upvote is still worth a few cents.
You need to work very hard with the upvote-button to get down to 1% voting power :-)
Very well said. I used to micromanage my vp. Sometimes I'd even pass on upvoting good quality content because my vp had dropped below a level I thought was acceptable. Now, like you I pay little attention to my voting power and concentrate more on rewarding good content.
It is so much easier this way isn't it :)
When you say you concentrate on rewarding good content, what exactly do you mean? Do you mean by resteeming?
Upvoting.
⬆️What he said
I just vote for good quality content - something that shows me that the author has spent time and energy on. The article must deserve a vote!
Sometimes people may spend lots of time and energy, and still they can't manage to deliver quality content.
Amen to that. But still it is better to try and fail, than not to try :)
Thank you for your continued support of SteemSilverGold
I like your style buggedout. I used to worry about my vp but no longer consider it as I vote and comment. I've delegated a good chunk of my SP which keeps my upvote between .10 and .15 most of the time. I have a few authors that I make sure I upvote 100% on a regular basis... And others vary. I check Steemworld every now and then... But vote, vote and vote some more... I'd say just keep voting... Be nice if the whales voted, some do and it's nice to see... But others com'on... Spread the pool.
Arg. I wish I found this post earlier! It really doesn't matter after all! Cheers.
I was always trying to manage my voting power too. I still have a small amount of SP buth actually, yesterday i made the decission to stop watching my voting power all the time and just vote away. It is more relaxing and starting to feel more as a hobby where it was becoming a job earlier. I am glad to read that i am not the only one that felt that way and today, i came online with a smile and i will leave with that same smile on my face because i am just doing what i like and voting as much as i like without making it a duty. I always liked spending time on this platform buth from today, i even enjoy it even more. Thanks for shearing this. Now i know i am not alone feeling the voting pressure sometimes.
"Break on through to the other side!"
Congrats and well done, you've figured it out. It is much more liberating and fun this way isn't it! :)
I love it! Done feeling guilty for a vote stop at 80%. I don't look anymore. I guess the system will warn me when I reach 0% and then I don't have to feel guilty because the system prevents me from voting. Then there is more time for real life, real stories and new articles. This is steemit at it's best :)
I have never stressed about my voting power. In all honesty I haven't really looked a gaming this system at all.
I just do things when I feel like and upvote things I want whenever I want. I have had lots of time away and my voting power has probably stuck at 100% a lot.
Again a good post, I have been enjoying a lot of your content :)
Thanks man, appreciate it. I think you've got the right idea from the start but once your SP builds up a bit more you will need to put it to good use somewhere! :)
Such a damn good post. I have been thinking a lot about this issue myself. And over time I have come to the exact same conclusion :
Don't overthink this.
I do a lot of Comenting/Curating. And whenever I like something I give it full power Upvote. I don't care what others say.
I just do it and don't think abpout it.
My Voting Power is rarely ABOVE 50%.
And I am having the time of my Life Rewarding worthy ( and sometimes Undervalued) content :)
Thanks! Sounds like you've got the right attitude. When the platform has such a steep learning curve, Voting Power really is one less thing to worry about managing.