I was hugged by a whale yesterday. Here's how it went.

in steemit •  7 years ago 

I had a pretty great experience yesterday when my page refreshed and I noticed this post...

We lived in an off-grid barn for a year.

went from just over a dollar to just over $46 in one vote! I couldn't believe it. My first thought before looking was someone messed up and is gonna want their money back. I knew it was an upvote but somehow in my head I was still thinking someone accidentally sent me money.

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Then, I open the post and check the votes and see that the upvoter was @blocktrades.
Now I'm even more confused. I'm thinking blocktrades? That's the exchange, why are they hugging me so hard? My wife thought I may have been having a stroke as I suddenly just started saying "on my gosh, holy crap, what just happened" over and over as I couldn't even explain to her what was going on.

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In my struggle to understand I went to three different Discord groups asking questions. Although I couldn't find anyone else it had happened to, plenty of people had seen it before and told me I was hugged or slapped by a whale.

Now, I was still extremely excited, but I start wondering what I did to get a whale like @blocktrades attention? "You had a great post" people said. "Blocktrades noticed and upvoted. Simple as that". "They do that all the time". For me it's also really nice to see this happen when it seems all you see on Steemit is the negative things associated with whales. All that is great, but I'm still wondering, specifically what I did and could do to recreate getting hugged by a whale like blocktrades. The consensus response, no matter how unsatisfying was just keep making good posts. I will indeed do that and even if this was once in a million lucky shot, then that's ok too. It happened once and that's enough to keep me excited and knowing that it can happen anywhere to anyone that just puts genuine effort into posting things they think people will enjoy.

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Dude you're so lucky!!! CONGRATULATIONS!!!!

Yeah man, sure feels like it. Thanks.

I went back and re-read your post and it was a really good post. I'm sorry I cannot give you anything else except the cliche answer of keep posting quality and the payouts will come. I have been hugged by a whale before and it feels good but as we used to say in sports, " act like you've been here before".

HAHA, I do not blame you for getting super excited and your writing reminded me of my wife when she says sweet things to me like, "are you writing another stupid blog?". I joke, but my wife has no clue what all the deal with cryptos and Steemit is about but she may warm up.

Congrats again.

Ha, that's good advice I'll use on the second one. I guess I won't be acting then though.
My wife is an Instagram girl so I don't hear too much from her, she's busy on her own posts 😉
Thanks!

Funny...I made a post last night about roofing and siding my tiny home last night. When I woke this morning I had 4 up votes and 2 comments. I left to do some errands and when I returned I had around 130 up votes and still 2 comments. I had more votes than I had views. Any ideas? Thanks You for the post.

@qberry, could we pitch in here?

@aktinyhome, we noticed the same thing with one of our posts too. There could be several reasons:

a) Your thumbnail photo looked great and the Steemian just upvoted without going into the post. And many of them did the same.

b) You're in a group where you receive an upvote (every 24/48 hours on a new post) from the main administrator and then some of the other members in the group could be lazy and put an autobot to vote the same way as the administrator. This is called 'trailing'. Leaving a trail.

c) Is linked to B, but you're not in a group and someone with influence gave a big upvote and they have a trail on them, so those people voted too. Therefore 130 upvotes with like a couple of views.

Best way to see if there is any 'trailing' is on SteemWorld (steemworld.org/@aktinyhome - in your case). In 'Account Operations', this shows the activity going on in your account in terms of comments, replies, upvotes and payouts etc. For example, you can spot one upvote that might happen at 15:49 and then suddenly 50 upvotes at the same time or a minute later. It's usually that first person is the leader and the rest are the 'trailers'.

It's strange, but sometimes the reality. Time is against us and many of us don't have time to read everything. Therefore, an upvote (which is highly appreciated), but only 2 comments! That's the sad part as we like the engagement on the platform and discussions that can come out of one post.

Hope this helps and maybe @qberry can pitch in his thoughts - sorry for diving in @qberry - hope that's fine that we did.

@travelling-two thanks for your time! I will go checkout SteemWorld.. I definitely learned something here. Thanks again. Following.

No worries! Love to help out where we can. We've been on the platform for 39 days (this info can be found on steemd.com, you can yours there). There are a lot of stats sites, which we love. To see not only your account, but the account of others too (if you want).
We learn something new everyday too about using Steemit and now we are exploring DTube, (like YouTube) DLive (a mixture of Youtube and Facebook Live) and SteepShot (like Instagram) too, so lots more to learn. :D

The verdict is in thanks to you. There was a $67 and change up vote followed by 5 or 6 'trailing'. So...@qberry I was touched by a whale too. woo hoo!

There you go! You're welcome!
Touched by a whale with love. It's amazing how sometimes less than 1% of their voting power equals to $50 or so. Crazy, but grateful! Hope you get touched by a whale in the future! Multiple times :)

Did you check to see if anyone resteemed you. I've had that happen after a resteem. Funny thing was I had twice as many votes as views so they upvoted without even opening the post.

I'm going to check now. I was really confused, the numbers didn't line up. Like you said I want to know if I did something different so I can keep the role going. thanks @qberry!

That’s awesome, @qberry! I’m stoked for you!

Thanks, if it happens again I'll know how to act 😁

Hahha it HAS happened to me. :D In the past. Once or twice. ;) It's pretty exciting!!

More than one? Awesome, lightening can strike twice 🙂

Just keep making quality content and you will be rewarded. Great job.

Thank you much. Will do!

We know the feeling (twice), it's a great feeling! :D

Just keeping doing a great job and you will receive multiple 'hugs' or 'slaps' (if you're into that) ;)

Ha, I'm just glad to hear it's happening twice to some people! Thank you.

Haha! That is AWESOME! Congratulations! I haven't read your "whale-spotted" post yet, but it's my next stop on the Steem train. I had to take a moment and tell you how funny your description is, I'm still laughing. You see, something similar happened to me, and your reaction sums it up beautifully! I am a newbie, today is my 23rd day on Steem. I went to sleep on Tuesday, after having just posted my 5th real article. It was at $0.54 . On Wednesday, I checked Steem first thing in the morning, and it was at $92.14. I thought I was on the wrong page, I kept clicking around, thinking it must be some sort of mistake. LOL After figuring out it was legit, I just sat there stunned. The response was incredible, I'm so humbled and grateful. Just wanted to let you know, I felt the same way. And I'm still laughing, you expressed the reaction so well! Congrats, again! Don't you just love Steem?

That's awesome. Isn't it a great feeling? Here's to it happening again some time. Thanks for sharing yours too.

I love your innocent way of gratitude! I got a $80 upvote two weeks ago by our messiah @Dan himself for a comment. It´s good to get motivated by these rare moments.

Thank you. I agree, it keeps us coming back and energized to create good posts!