Another banger from the new kid on the block, you've really found a place that suits you here. I barely know you, but your stuff suits the place and thus I have to draw the conclusion I asserted, that the place likewise suits you.

But a couple of things I'd like to respond to in this post.

First of all, thank you for the compliment! I am always glad to share my intrigue and excitement about this place with newcomers who are also excited by and intrigued by this place. So I am flattered by you noticing and honored to be one of the folks welcoming you here.

Now about your post.

Regarding witnesses. I think you may get it, but it read a bit off so to make sure, the top 20 witnesses and in fact, all of us witnesses are voted by HP holders into our positions on the chart. The top 20 are supported by the most HP held in the hands of their voters who elected them, but they themselves, may or may not be "top stake holders" per se.

They tend to end up that way pretty quickly in the top 20 slots because the compensation for validating blocks at that level is substantial on the monthly producer rewards for doing the job, but they are not personally holding all the stake that creates their ranking, that is the cumulative HP staked by their supporting voters. You can be a voter as an HP stake holder as can anyone who stakes even just 0.001 hive into HP.

And yes, minnows make a difference here. Granted, alone, a tiny stake doesn't add much to a witness vote, but look at the vote counts on the witnesses. The top ones have 4 digits worth of voters, many of those minnows.

NOW we enter a "race" where two witnesses in close gross voter stake total positions next to each other may in fact shift BECAUSE of a minor voter choosing one or the other, 100 HP could shift one witness over another if the numbers are close. And a school of minnows landing their votes can make an even bigger gap happen.

It's really as simple at ten 100mv voters is the same as only one 1000mv voter, so ten little dudes plus one more tiny one added there would beat the single bigger dude in cumulative "vote weight" total.

Every voice counts, some more than others, but bigger total voices is the only metric that matters. Mentioning "mv" - don't let that stress you , mv is short for megavests, just think of it as HP for now, the math is an advanced class to some degree and not relevant to the point here directly, its just a more algorithmically and programmatically useful mathematical thing than HP / staked hive power.

There are posts about it you can find to get into the weeds of the vests,megavests, hp, staking details around the blogs from over the years, this doesn't change much or often, so pretty much any post, regardless of its age will get you the general gist of it.

The point was, yeah, so the top 20 are indeed directly aligned to the "top stakeholders making the decisions", BUT also rather, its the top 20 who are chosen by the most cumulative stake voted into them as a witness selection. It could be true that the #1 witness, has one million 1mv voters, and the second one has 2 fifty-million mv voters. Same total mv, but one represents 1 million unique users choices and the other represents only 2 people's choice, but those two are rich rich like that and so can elevate a witness to the same height as a million little guys supporting a crowd favorite. It's a bit whacky but it more or less works.

This system has its pros and cons but in summary, your post as I read it somewhat cites the top 20 as being the top 20 direct holders calling the shots. It's just not quite that simple as noted herein. They may not represent the top dogs at all, though because more top dogs vote than little dogs, they usually pick who they want to be top 20 with sheer mass and inertia. It could be overcome by the "masses" is all I am saying, it isn't usually, but it could be!

There IS indeed a hierarchy but it often has more to do with personal stake, personal rep numbers which are really just a glorified activity counter over time, and more or less a guide to if "people like them or hate them with up or down voting over time) and personality and contributions to the ecosystem or even just to those sub-sects you mentioned.

It's a myriad of things, but somehow ends up in something of an established pecking order among the more visible, high profile users here. It's also meaningless, because there is enough mass here that as soon as you think you are somebody here, you will find out there there is an entire population of thousands tucked in some corner of hive speaking a foreign language you don't know, that never ever heard of you at all.

So in some ways, it's fallacy to think much about "hierarchy" vertically and rather think about more lateral "positioning" - do you want to be known as a solid witness? Be one, do "witness things" well, make enough staked weight happy to vote for you to climb that ladder. Rather be a well liked fiction author, curated by the heavy hitters to earn your living or build your savings and stake via writing? Be one! Rather be a community builder or participant who isn't much of a writer but is good at spreading communal enthusiasm in the groups you hang out in? Do that! Want to share art or photos or your latest knitting creation? Do that!

You get the idea. Be your OWN thing, and try to be really good at it and that will lead us to my last point.

Don't worry about the money! Like, other than knowing how not to accidentally lose it all, and what it means to stake, save, transfer, trade, blah blah, the mechanics of it, don't focus on if you should "balance" your craft vs your business here. Generally speaking here, of course. Just do your craft. Be good at it. If you do, and you also learn and observe some of the local customs with examples of that being the typical stuff you see people discussing here like plagiarizing is bad, self voting is questionable, supporting scammers or being one is bad, basic stuff like that, then really, its just the same as anywhere else....

Make a good product, people will support it if its something they like, and you might get lucky and impress somebody wealthy who slams down a $2 upvote on you. But you might not, and that should not dissuade you from doing things you personally love and throwing them at the wall to see if they stick.

I like running witness nodes, I like making software, obviously I like talking about Hive, teaching about how it works and hanging out with friendly folks making jokes in the communities. Sometimes I post my project news, sometimes I post creative work when the mood strikes and inspiration hits. Sometimes I get attention, sometimes I don't.

Look at the money more like a bonus, than a core goal. For the most part, that's how successful people here fare the best.

But keep experimenting with the toys and gadgets and the money side too, if that interests you, as it seems to. I'm thrilled to see you found PIMP for example, as that is literally the creation of my witness partner on the @PolleNation witness, @Enginewitty and while it's not a pollenation thing, its very much a Witty's thing thing, its still coming from one of my most trusted peers here so its cool you found it and liked it all the same!

BTW, I am not a financial guy so I just turn nearly every sidechain token I get back into Hive asap but not PIMP, being that I trusty Witty to do make it do good things, I stake all of that I get as tips on my various posts from PIMP users and its the only side chain token I keep. I definitely advise learning more about sidechain tokenomics if financial stuff is one of your interests. It's not so much one of mine. I like that blogging pays, so to speak, but its not the main reason I blog and after 7+ years around here, my wallet reflects my apathetic nature about money. I am going to have to get much more serious about it to make sure my project can pay for itself or produce income to pay for itself and that's another reason I am partnered with EngineWitty, he is very good at finance, tokenomics, etc and I am very good at making software and together we are very good at being social and community builders/drivers/participants. It's a good and useful duo that serves us well together.

End of the day, I really wanted to follow up and clarify about the witness stake vs "holding the power" and to talk about "never mind the money, do what you love, the money will probably come if you're good at it" part most of all.

You're doing fine, better than fine as a brand new user, and I encourage you to keep going, learning, doing, experimenting and getting settled in to your groove here. Like I said, I believe it suits you and you suit it, with "it" being the whole hive vibe, the place, the platform, the ecosystem, the whole inexplicable thing that it just is.

Rock on!