Check Your Voting Power Before Hitting Up-Vote Button

Knowledge is power. Being a productive Steemian will require that you spend your due diligence learning as much as possible about how its mechanisms work.

One such mechanism is the upvote. There are many fellow Steemians who have created posts to help make clear its purpose, its value, and its fluctuation weight.

I thought that the upvote was determined by the value of STEEM. However, research proved this to be a myth.

There are times when I click the up vote button; and, there is absolutely zero change in value.

I have posts that show that I may have several upvotes and still zero pennies in my tip jar.

Now, if the person is already 0.00, that up-vote, while encouraging, offers little power in regards to bettering my reputation.

Reputation, you may ask? The reputation is the number in parentheses next to your Steemit name. This number has a lot to do with the number of up-votes, with monetary value you receive.

For nine consecutive days my reputation number didn’t change. Every day, logging in, logging out, the number was the same.

In this time, I began noting that the value of STEEM began to decrease, and continued to fluctuate, mostly in the decline value for these nine days.

It was then that I decided to see what makes the reputation number increase in value. The answer was both surprising and enlightening: The Up-Vote!

So, to all the newbies, myself included, I guess we’d all do well to learn how to analyze our voting power.

There are many videos out there on the subject; however, I found the following information to be the most helpful:

While there’s far more to it, than you will view in this brief video from @sethlinson, it should help you get a better understanding of the multi-faceted value of the up-vote.

Also, here’s a link for a post by @vallesleoruther who discusses in more detail, calculating your voting power using an app designed by @penguinpablo:

https://steemit.com/steemit/@vallesleoruther/voting-power-calculator

May I suggest, that at the start of each day, that we check our voting power.

I haven’t had much of late; and, voting without power can and may negatively impact an author’s payout reward; so, be sure, to check before you up vote. Yes, it may feel good; but, it also may be harmful to the author’s bottom line.

I went back and forth on whether I should leave the up-voting to people with the power, aka, dolphins and whales, after reading a post recommending that I should.

I decided to ignore this sage advice, and defiantly up voted work I liked after reading from another expert, that I should up vote whenever I please.

The latter turned out to be a ‘feel-good’ reply; but, yielded negative results on more than one occasion, where the value dropped by a penny or so.

Can we all say together: NOT GOOD ;+)!

So, if you’re noting that your reputation number isn’t budging, it’s about the number of up votes you’re getting; and the weight of their value.

I’m presuming that as the value of STEEM increases, the increase and value of the up votes shall, too.

In closing, regarding the upvote; be sure to learn your voting power so that your support doesn’t work against the curation pot.

I hope this has offered a little more insight to how Steemit ‘works’.

As always, show your love by an upvote, resteem, comment.

Peace.