This article was written with new steemians in mind. The purpose is to educate others based on the misconceptions that I had when I first started on this platform.
I've seen others post about their achievements as they moved up the ranks and I wondered if it was something I should also do. I decided that posting about gaining 100 followers didn't really mean much unless those 100 followers were actively participating by commenting and voting on my articles so I didn't post anything about my milestones with followers. In fact, I haven't posted anything about any of my milestones until now.
I started out like everyone else at rank 25 and it was quite easy to move up a few ranks at first. Gradually, each rank took longer and longer to achieve. I figured rank 50 might be a good rank to celebrate, but that snuck up on me while I was too busy to write about it, so I missed that opportunity. I figured I should write something at rank 55 and that's what I'm doing now, but not to celebrate, but rather to clarify some of the misconceptions I had early on.
When I was a noob at rank 25 to 30, my votes were dust and didn't even register. At that time, I had no concept of what a whale was, other than that they had a lot of power here. Without anything to compare against, everyone was a whale or dolphin to me. I figured that by the time someone reached rank 50, they must surely be at least a dolphin! Boy was I wrong!!!
So here I am at rank 55 with a whopping 400 Steem Power, still don't have a vote slider and I'm not even a MINNOW yet! I'm still considered Plankton (I prefer the name Plankton) or a Redfish. My votes give close to 4 cents at full power.
I had been delegated 1,000 Steem for a week a short while ago and during that time my votes gave 13 cents each when at full power. From that I was able to conclude that for each 100 Steem at around $1/steem value, your vote is worth 1 cent (with 300+ Steem, I was giving 3 cents and with 1,300+ I was giving 13 cents). I am now just over 400 Steem, but my SP has not been at 100% full since, so I can't confirm if I'm able to give 4 cents now or not. In any case, that will vary with the price of Steem and I know I'm within fractions of actually being there.
Now I know that people with rank 55 are not necessarily even a minnow. Why "not necessarily"? Because RANK actually has nothing to do with your voting power. Rank is simply an indicator of how well a person is being received on this platform. Up-votes will increase your rank and flags will reduce your rank. The greater the vote-power of the person voting, the more it will affect your rank.
Your status in relation to vote-power is based upon how much Steem you have transferred to Steem Power. As I mentioned earlier, for each 100 Steem, you can expect 1 cent at current steem value. In order to drop a $1 vote, you would need 10,000 Steem. It is your vote-power (actually, 'vests', but close enough) that determines if you are a Plankton, Minnow, Dolphin, or whale.
I've read that people earn their vote sliders at close to 500 SP and assume that would also be the time one graduates into becoming an actual Minnow. Unless I get real lucky, that will still be a few months away for me, meaning it will have taken close to a year of daily activity just to become a Minnow. I have not purchased any Steem and I have not bought any votes, so my growth has been accomplished strictly by participation. I have entered and won a few contests and that has helped my growth tremendously.
I'm presenting this information for others to be able to make some assumptions about their own progress. If you have some influential friends, your growth will likely be quicker. If you don't participate much, your growth will be slower. At least this gives some kind of gauge by which you can compare against.
My next mission is to discover how long it takes to become a dolphin!
Good luck in your endeavours and keep on steeming!
I sincerely thank you for your interest!
In case you missed it, you can buy chain-link jewellery here using Steem!
