Steemit a place where you get paid to post! a Place where you even get paid to look at/rate content...

Those where the first words and instantly I was convinced it’s something I need to have a look at!

So I started up my laptop and joined steemit, Then I realized it’s not like Facebook twitter or Instagram you actually have to wait to get onto the platform, about a month or so later I checked my mails and saw a link to steemit and everything started.

Feeling Lost & Intimidated

I remember that I felt so lost not knowing what to do... do I up-vote resteem what should I search for?
There was only intimidating "tech talk" posts filing up my screen,
Boring Crypto posts everywhere! Something I know even less about! Sure I have heard of bitcoin etc. and I must admit there was a few random photos of food posts of people introducing themselves.
Nothing really anything that caught my eye the only thing that caught my eye was the amount the people where making with these "boring" Crypto posts!

I thought to myself if they make this much with a few intelligent observations and boring graphs about what is going on in the crypto currency world I could surely make something off more interesting posts.

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Off to a quick Start?!

I quickly read through the basics of getting started and started up-voting like a mad man!
Every single post that seemed to be doing well got my vote because you know I get paid for voting? for good stuff and the more the post makes the more I make right? So even though I have no clue what these guys are going on about I up-voted the more a post was making the more I would make... that was my understanding...

So I re-steemed some stuff thinking maybe that also gets me more MONEY sure I watched some tutorials about what to post what to do etc. but I things to happen now! I have been on other platforms and saw that if you up-vote others they are likely to do the same... or so I thought the big guys "or Whales" would surely see my little contribution and up-vote me as soon as I have up-voted their crypto tech talk stuff that I didn't understand.

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Competition Time!

After seeing the whales are not that easy to impress... I started seeing more and more people tagging photography competitions... didn't quite get it but after some research I realized that I should just include certain tags then vhola I enter competitions!
Yay! I am doing something productive & bringing quality to Steemit I thought to myself.
I going to start making cash then I can quit my boring job and just do what I love! taking photographs and win competitions and become one of the Big dog Photographers.

Not So Simple

Hahaha Was I wrong!
I was super excited that on my First entry I won the photography contest - @photocontests by @juliank -
I thought WOW I am doing SUPER well I didn't come second or third I actually WON!

Above is a screen grab of my first winnings going into my wallet.

REALIZING The TRUTH

After opening the post I realized I was one of like 40 Winners and the prize I got was like 0.227 and 45 XP.
I am still not actually sure how all the points etc work when I "win" the competitions?
don't get me wrong the competitions are Awesome! and I like taking part because it seems to have a good impact on how many followers I get, I Know I just need to investigate more, there is just sooooo much going on, on steemit, you always feel like you need to catch up, find the next big thing.

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My first 22

I have learned a lot in my first 22 days but I also saw how much there is to still learn!
I am just scratching the surface... I have seen the good the bad and the ugly, I don't even fully understand what some of these posts are really trying to say, not sure which side to take, My friend @steph4nus told me not to get involved in the politics of steemit so I am not attacking or down talking anyone... At least not until I really know what is going on.

I am however going to make some "newbie" observations...

It seems like some people are always pointing out what others are doing on Steemit be it good ore bad...
Like @berniesanders in a recent post where he was pointing out how @haejin is raping a reward pool?
I didn't know reward pools can be raped... and still don't know if @haejin is good or bad... he also posted a post asking when @ned is going to grow a pair? he calls himself The good whale so from a newbie perspective it does seem like he is fighting for the platform and all its users, Then again I do not really know much about @ned so I am not taking sides... I am still confused after reading some of the replies... I can't see how @haejin is raping anything and don't know yet what @ned can do about "bad people" its most probably due to my lack of understanding.

These type of posts are a bit above me for now, but I still feel that I can maybe learn something good... you know like find a gold nugget of truth that will catapult me into success on steemit!

Poor Newbies

The above mentioned type of posts will confuse new users like me... we might have a snap at some big ass whale before even knowing the basics and end up with a -40 Rep, at this stage steemit is almost like a pool without a shallow side... newbies fall right into the deep end between all the big fishies!

Maybe its good because it will keep the uninformed out of the way especially the ones that do not know much about all this crypto stuff and all the politics.

Possible solution

I Think Steemit will expand much faster the correct type of posts are shown to "newbies" maybe bring in a startup quiz that categorizes the user and then shows them the type of content that is most relevant obviously with the option to still expand on what they want to see like as soon as I know more about crypto I will actually fin the posts useful but for now its not realy helping alot even if it is trending right now probably due to the amount of crypto enthusiasts on steemit at the moment

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The Dark Side

I have read some interesting posts about the dark side of Steemit the one that stood out a lot was by
@distress2success... maybe it’s just the pretty pictures that got me... He mentioned some very important things in [This Post]
(https://steemit.com/steem/@distress2success/the-dark-side-of-steemit-users-with-negative-reputation)
Like - The 10 Unwritten Sins of Steemit - I only stumbled across this post about 10 days in and luckily did not cross any of those lines.

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Is Name Dropping Bad?

Thing that I have also seen people do on steemit is name dropping like I just did above with Bernnie etc... the first time I saw it was in a post where used a quote by @papa-pepper - Steemit like you mean it - good advice yea I totally agree but is it a good thing to mention others in posts do you get good or bad attention that way?

Sure I have also thought about doing similar things, to get the attention of some of the big guys like @jesta @good-karma @someguy123 @timcliff @gtg – These are just a few of them they are mostly witnesses got them from the part where you can vote for witnesses… I actually don’t even know what exactly they do I just voted for the coolest names hahaha
Anyway so back to the point I can include the names of more evolved users in my posts or I can go and ass kiss on their posts and tell them how they are the best and how I want them to one day contribute towards the creation of my children etc. But I am sure there are already to many users trying to take that route and that’s not really who I am I will prefer that I actually get up-voted by a whale once I actually post a really good post, but then again that’s if it does actually get noticed between all this bitcoin & sushi posts.

So Maybe if it is a good post, you drop the name of a whale and Khaboom they see your good content and upvote you?

I love Sushi and I know bitcoin is big an all - but how do we as newbies know that we will be seen?
Some put hours into a post and only maybe make 0.50 SBD

I think Steemit should work together to inform new users better maybe release a short video of the do's and don'ts
I am still not sure what is okay and what not...

I can still write like 7 pages just on my first 22 days there are still the bots the people selling up-votes and much more to be covered...

I just mentioned my biggest concerns at this stage and the point is to get feedback from others that know more than me.

I have seen a lot of posts on how to become rich etc. but not one that just informs me how to just do the basics or how to not get flagged… I think we need more how to videos for the poor Newbies like me.

If anyone knows of good sources to better understand the basics better please leave a reply below so I can educate myself and put my long winded opinions on posts in a more educated manner .