How to begin on STEEMIT - manual for my friends and their friends…

kedjom-keku (58)in #steemit • 7 years ago (edited)

Since I joined this unique social network I have shared almost all my stuff on Facebook with appeal to my friends and followers to bring them here on STEEMIT board. Many of them have already created accounts and start observing. And questioning. ME! So I decided to organize a seminar “How to start on STEEMIT” in Spee art gallery cultural center in Bamenda, Northwest Region Cameroon. I asked one of my students to prepare a manual for real beginners who don’t know much about blockchain, BTC, STEEM(IT).

Our goal is to spread the STEEMIT world with environmental and development topics as well as your personal experience which could just help us to raise funding for conservation and sustainable development.

So here it is! Read well, in case of any question do not hesitate to ask me.

Did you just create an account, open STEEMit and now you’re wondering what it is all about? Here is good news – I’ll help you with your first STEEMit experience so you could easy find your way here and get started with earning money on your content.
Being an IT layman myself I it was hard for me to understand the concept of getting income just by creating content for a social media website without spending any money at first. I bet that for you it may also sound suspicious. I decided however to get involved, but of course, first, I did my research. I was wandering from one website to another, watching YouTube videos, which could help me to get some insight about digital currencies, asking my geek friends and, finally, I found myself here – among the STEEMit community and decided to try. And guess what? It worked. But let’s start from the beginning.

Bitcoin – turn in modern economy

Though it may seem not directly related to STEEMit activities, I think this is the root of opportunities provided by new social media channels. It came with the creation of this cryptocurrency in 2009 when traditional ‘paper money’ economy took another direction. The creator of bitcoin, known only by the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto, based it on the peer-to-peer system which means that all the transactions are taking place directly between users, without any central repository, administrator or institutions, therefore it is considered first decentralized digital currency.

Why is it safe?

Bitcoin is using blockchain technology. It is a public ledger that records every transaction that has been taking place between the users. It is impossible to erase or hide the data from blockchain. It simply means, that while using bitcoin you gain access to other users’ ledgers and you will find out immediately when someone will try to cheat, not only you, but other peers as well. Another advantage? Blockchain, being cyberattack resistant thanks to cryptography, or, to be more precise, thanks to the fact that it is based on encrypted cryptographic structure, does not need any intermediary institution to verify data from transaction, which makes using it significantly cheaper than traditional systems.

While roaming between YouTube resources concerning bitcoin and blockchain matters I came across some useful videos that can help you to understand the whole process of creating and exchanging bitcoins better.

That would be all about the bitcoin and blockchain technology itself. Now, what about the STEEMit?

STEEMit is a portal that uses its own blockchain technology based network with transferable tokens. Just as in the case of bitcoin, the network is decentralized and transparent, there are just some small differences. Besides tokens STEEM contains text content and metadata that users can connect to and interact with. In contrary to other blockchains, users use names readable by humans, which enables direct transaction from one user to another which makes it understandable for laymen like you and me. To make sure that all the transactions are real, STEEM uses a method called ‘delegated proof of stake’. The name stands for a very simple process. Block-created accounts (so called witnesses) are being chosen by users and blockchain transaction are being scheduled for them every three seconds to be processed. They are paid by a small part of the reward created in each block. Another difference is that STEEM does not require any transaction fees or pay block producers. Instead, accounts are using bandwidth which refills fast enough not to cause any financial consequences for its users.

Now, let me summarize in a more human language. STEEMit is an alternative for Facebook or Twitter, with the difference that it pays its users for interesting content. Its aim is to create a community, where everyone can benefit from cooperation. It was invented in a way that mobilizes users to write interesting content since this is the way to make money on it. There is a competition factor between users, but I find it a healthy and reasonable process that motivates community members to find entertaining and original topics, which will help them generate income.

Speaking about an income, how the STEEM currencies actually work?

After creating your account, you can go to your wallet section, where you will find all the money earned and saved through your activities. You can see three different categories over there: ‘STEEM, ‘STEEM dollars’ and ‘STEEM power’. All three of them stand for the value of your wallet and have direct influence on your voting power and possible income. Sounds twisted, I know, therefore let me give you some small insight.

STEEM:

Speaking most generally ‘STEEM’ is simply a network’s base token. It operates on the basis of one STEEM, one vote system. Within this system, those users, who contributed the most for the network, according to their account balance, have the biggest influence over how contributions are rated. Therefore, it serves as a financial incentive for creating content and contributing even more. In contrary to other websites, where users are being paid through, on STEEMit you do not have to decide if you want to spend your money to add economic value to somebody’s activity. It’s enough if you vote up or down on one’s content and the system, based on the votes, will generate rewards for users.

You can both buy and exchange STEEM for other currencies in cryptocurrency exchanges and markets. Its value determines the value of rewards earned on STEEMit. The easiest way to buy it is by using your STEEM dollars.
check this out: https://www.cryptocompare.com/coins/guides/how-to-earn-steem/

STEEM dollars:

The other category, STEEM dollars, is another currency used by the network. It serves protecting content writers from STEEM changes and inflation. Their value represents STEEM needed to make it equal more or less 1$. Therefore, they are pegged to dollar, but the STEEM system along with the volatility of cryptocurrencies makes this goal difficult to maintain. So-called witnesses, individuals who are voted by the STEEM users, are responsible for manipulating the value of it to return it to the peg.

In contrary, to STEEM, you can not use STEEM dollars outside of the platform. First you must exchange them for STEEM and then STEEM to bitcoin or another cryptocurrency and in the end for any traditional currency you need.

STEEM power:

It is basically another token, which represents the power your votes have. While posting your content you can choose whether you will earn only a STEEM power on it or 50% of STEEM power and 50% of STEEM dollars. While upvoting you can choose how much power your votes have. If you’re using 100% of your voting power, you will lose 2% of your STEEM power along with each vote. The system is recovering your STEEM power by 20% every day maximum. You can also exchange your STEEM for STEEM power to make your account more powerful, this process is called ‘powering up’. It is impossible to withdraw it directly, but you can exchange for STEEM in weekly payments worth 1/104th (in 2 years) of the account’s total STEEM power each.

https://99bitcoins.com/making-money-with-steemit-steem-dollars-and-steem-power-explained/

Another video and article, which I found very helpful for myself, which explains the concept of the STEEMit wallet content and its interdependencies.

Having that explained, how do you actually add all those values to your wallet?

Simple as it sounds, just upload something nice! The idea of the network is to make money on the content that will be interesting for the audience. Therefore, before you start creating your article, you should make a small research, look around the community and analyse what is there entertaining for you, which can be also good to read for other users and start posting. Each post on STEEMit follows under particular categories and you can choose up to five of them while writing your own content. The first article however should be a short introduction, through which the rest of the community will be able to get to know you a little bit. It is always quite popular to read introduction post and for that reason you should not post anything else for at least two days, otherwise the post will drop quite fast under the new content which will not be so likely to earn money for you. Technically it is up to 7 days while one article is working for your STEEM, but after the introduction post, when you will be already fully active STEEMit user, it’s good to post new content at least once every two days, to keep others follow your activity.

How to start in few steps:

Get registered!
The process will take you up to few minutes, STEEMit will ask for your e-mail address and phone number to confirm your identity. After 1 or 2 days, you will receive a message with your password via email. The password will be long and complicated, but it is not recommended to change it, so the best way is to copy and save it in some safe place.
Observe!
Take your time before you write your introduction post. Read posts and comments from other users. You will notice that the community of STEEMit is rather nice to each other, critique comes with reasonable explanation in contrary to other social media portals.
Introduce yourself!
You will have one, maximum two chances for writing your introduction post. Make it extraordinary and insightful to attract other users, especially those from whom you hold mutual interests. Do not share anything for a few days, because it could make your post drop and this is how you lose money you could earn on it.
Start following!
Make a list of users who share content which is interesting for you. You can comment on their content, but refrain from advertising your own profile in the comments – others don’t really like it and I bet neither do you. If your comments are valuable you will also get some money from them as soon as someone will like or respond to them.
Comment!
The best way how to let other Steemians know about your present is commenting their posts. I would advise you to not use words as follow(ed), upvoted, resteemed. I was actually using them at the beginning because many people were doing it so I thought it is good way how to get more followers and revenue. Very soon I realized only a few people react on my comments. If you start producing your own posts you will soon get annoyed by those words as well. Generally do not do things which you do not like from the others. If you finally decide to start commenting others posts choose those which are really interesting for you. And comment reasonable according to the content of the post. If it is really a close theme as you are writing about nobody will probably think you are a spammer if you send him link of your post which is closely related to his/her own.
Share!
Sharing is important, because it can get you new followers as well.
Vote!
If you like some post – upvote it! I am sure that some people upvoted by you will go back to your profile to check out the content you share.
Flag!
Flag on the top right side of the post is like downvoting. You can use it when you find somebody’s content offensive or politically incorrect. This is the best way for keeping some users from earning money on words or pictures they should not use.

Quick sum up

STEEMit is a new social network, which shares its value with the users. It creates an opportunity for bloggers, vloggers and anyone interested in sharing some content online to earn some money on their posts. The system does not require you to invest anything besides time to get started earning on it and helping others to get income on their online activity. In other words – we give money by voting and we do not lose anything it the same time. How is it possible? Well there is a big mathematics, game theories and work of genius programmer and economic activist - Daniela Larimer behind it. As a metaphor – STEEMit is like a company, with content as its product and logged users as its employees, who generate income by publishing and voting up and down different articles.