Crazy! It's been over 3 months since my steemgigs guide for WhaleShares and the project is still going strong. I know WhaleShares project from the start and some great people like @akrid, @themarkymark, @anritco, @alexpmorris, @nepd, @rawbinhutt, @steempowerpics, @nutela are still in it!

The whole community has over 1600 people now - helpful, kind and just lovable! WhaleShares also had people that were not good for the community or for steemit, but they don't have any known plagiators as mods anymore. :)

Sometimes a new member comes to the discord and ask for help. My guide worked great, but a lot changed since then and the guide definitely needed an update.

If this post will still not be enough for you and you want to know more information about the project, please join the WhaleShares discord and we will help you out.

You can join WhaleShares discord here:
https://discord.gg/zsdWYQX

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The WhaleShares is a project from the steemian called @OfficialFuzzy. OfficialFuzzy is not some random person, he is actually the cofounder of BitShares, another great cryptocurrency based on graphene.

WhaleShares is not just a token that you can "convert" to a whale vote on a post you choose, but also a community of people. These tokens have their own value and 1 WhaleShare token is worth 1% upvote from @officialfuzzy. This upvote can help you massively. No more of being depressed after you spent days on your amazing post and after that nobody saw it.

TL;DR – WhaleShares can increase your post-payout and thus increasing your visibility on steemit. But it is not their only advantage.

Another advantages are:

1. It is also a community.
2. 100% upvote from more whales on the same post there are WhaleShares and BeyondBits).
3. You can get more than what you have paid for.
4. Hot/Trending tab on steemit is possible.
5. Free contests and giveaways.

But that is not it. In my honest opinion, one of the greatest advantages of WhaleShares is that you have to use the DEX, decentralized exchange. I only knew BTC-E before and using the DEX is completely something different and actually much better!

WhaleShares are only possible to get on BitShares/OpenLedger decentralized exchange. Many people are using centralized exchange that are much easier to hack and easier to be shut down by governments, but these people don't know any better! For some people this is also much better "cold storage" than having them on centralized exchange such as poloniex.

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What I exactly need to get some?

The most important thing is to have BitShares or OpenLedger account ready. It does not matter if you register on OpenLedger or BitShares exchange as they are both linked to your one created account. Pretty much if you register on OpenLedger you are also registered on the BitShares decentralized exchange and vice versa.

Pick your side :)
https://bitshares.org/wallet/#/create-account
https://openledger.info/?r=browniedistro

To make it as easy as possible for you the account model is the best. To login you just need an account name and your password. With wallet model your wallet is restricted to current computer and browser. It offers amazing security, but you can lose your coins very fast if you are not very computer skilled.

The creation of the account model is easy as 1 2 3

You have your account ready. How can you get some WhaleShares onto your wallet?

CONTESTS

There are still a lot of contests, where you can earn whaleshares or beyondbits for free, but it's sometimes very hard to find them. There is a new account created, where all the contests are just on one account.

https://steemit.com/@contests

BUYING THEM FROM THE DEX

This is the hardest way how to get WhaleShares and the most expensive one nowadays, but if you just don't want to join the contests and be active in the community, this is the only way. DEX can be very hard to use for the new people, but when they get into it they will understand the strength of DEX and will love it, like I do!

The main currency of the DEX is cryptocurrency called BitShares. The best way how to change your Steem/SBD to BTS is by using blocktrades.

Go to https://blocktrades.us and change the cryptocurrencies so you will send Steem/SBD and receive BitShares. Click get deposit address.

You got your deposit address now. You have to transfer your Steem/SBD to the blocktrades account with the memo written below now.

Go to your steemit wallet.

Tranfer Steem/SBD to proper blocktrades account.

And that was it! Blocktrades sent you BTS and you have them on your Bitshares/OpenLedger account now.

You can go to the WhaleShares market and buy some.
https://bitshares.org/wallet/#/market/WHALESHARE_BTS

I have WhaleShares, what now?

Right now the WhaleShares is mostly about working together and being active in the community so you don't really have to check the voting power and if it's worth to use the tokens or wait before the whales recharge their voting power. If you are active, you will always get some because you deserve them!

However, if you want to check the voting power of the whales there is a great site called steemnow.com.

How to use them?

Go to http://whaleshares.net and follow the steps on the website:

The most important is the step 4 - the memo.

Head over to your account on the Bitshares/OpenLedger exchange, find whaleshares and click transfer.

One very important thing is to pay any fees on the DEX with BTS because it's much cheaper than using your earned WhaleShares or BeyondBits.

To save your tokens you could just deposit (or exchange via blocktrades) one SBD to the DEX and sell it. This way you would always have enough BTS for the transfers and the fees.

On the other hand, if you still have enough BTS to pay at least for the market fee, I suggest you to sell 1 WhaleShare so you would have enough BTS for the transfer.

And that's it! If you made every step correctly you should get a whale vote on your post in a couple of seconds.

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What are BeyondBits?

BeyondBits are another tokens in the WhaleShares project. The features of these tokens are the same as with the WhaleShare tokens. In other words you can use them to call a whale to upvote your post and as with WhaleShares one token is worth 1% upvote. The biggest difference is the whale that will be doing the upvoting. Every token is linked to different whale and BeyondBits tokens are linked to @fuzzyvest.

Why is there another token? Isn't one enough?

Well, no! Another great advantage of the OpenLedger/BitShares DEX is that everybody can have their own user issued asset and put their own value into it. It can be everything - lottery tickets, giveaway tokens, upvote tokens, tokens that pay dividends based on how many you hold, whatever you think of!

You can set the parameters like the name, maximum supply and choose for how much it will be selling on the market. You are the boss of your own tokens so you can even choose how your tokens will be distributed. And there are a lot of ways how you could do that. The best thing is that you will not even want to power down your steemit account because this way your Steem Power is actually marketable now. It is a win-win scenario for both sides.

Where can I get some BeyondBits?

Or you can just click this link and go straight to the market.
https://bitshares.org/wallet/#/market/BEYONDBIT_BTS

You can also exchange your WhaleShare tokens for BeyondBit tokens. https://bitshares.org/wallet/#/market/BEYONDBIT_WHALESHARE

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The project is still very young. With more whales in the project there will be many more tokens and every one of those tokens will have it's own value, popularity and demand. I would say WhaleShare tokens are like the main currency of this big synergy between cryptocurrencies and people.

Feel free to ask about anything on the WhaleShares discord channel or here. I will probably edit the post later if I have something more to add. :)

Also you should check out @officialfuzzy's BitShares and WhaleTank hangouts!

https://steemit.com/bitshares/@officialfuzzy/bitshares-hangout-39-2017-09-23-sat-100pm-utc-opensource-agenda-beyondbit-payouts-powered-by-sp

https://steemit.com/eos-project/@officialfuzzy/open-rsvp-beyondbitcoin-whaletank-hangout-225-2017-09-23-sat-300pm-utc-over-1000-dollarbd-in-awards

Thank you!