Hello all!
Welcome to this weeks Curation and Engagement leagues, kindly sponsored by 
Thank you both very much for the extra STEEM boost, which allows me to reward the best curators and engagers of the past 7 days.
To enter the leagues drop a comment below (Lifetime membership - unless you ask to be removed)
The leagues (tables) are reset each week and so any time is a good time to join!
On your marks, get set, curate!
Introduction
My general views on curation rewards (to score highly in League 1) are:
Vote before the big hitters, but not too early!
Voting in the first minute will earn you a curation reward of almost 0.000
Voting between 1 and 29 minutes will earn an increasing % of the curation rewards split, this value peaking at 30 minutes and remaining the same from this point onwards
It is commonly suggested that 15-25 minutes is the 'best' time to vote (especially on known 'power author' posts because they are likely to have more auto-votes coming in at these times - and you want to be ahead of these votes)
Voting on good dtube content and utopian-io approved contributions (prior to the vote by
/
) can earn some very good curation rewards
Voting on
posts is likely to gain good curation rewards as founder
, and
support these posts after giving time for other accounts to vote - you will be in front of a couple of large votes here!
As you can see, a combination of many variables such as Steem Power, voting strength, voting weight, time of vote, (and more) all play a part in the amount of rewards received.
My general opinion on maximizing engagement (to score highly in League 2) is:
Spread your vote and write lots of engaging comments!
Use your vote on comments to make yourself seen and provoke a reply
The data for league 1
The raw data has been collected from SteemSQL - 
The formula used for 'quality of financial curation skill' is:
Curation Rewards DIVIDED BY Steem Power MULTIPLIED BY 1000
This will return the amount of Curation rewards gained per 1000 Steem Power held
The rules (which will cause auto-filtering of your account if not met so just enter anyway and see what happens!) to appear in this league:
No programmed voting! Following a trail is OK, using a script to vote for you is not (but well done if you have done that!)
Must have voted at least once on a piece of content in the past 7 days
Must not have leased or delegated Steem Power in the last 14 days
Must not have Started a Power Down (withdrawal of Steem Power) in the last 15 days
The 2nd and 3rd points above are not bad things, but are required to reduce distortion of the figures.
And, as curation rewards for the past week are actually taken from votes made up to 14 days ago, we need a 15 day window as mentioned above.
Don't let this put you off entering though - you will be automatically be excluded/appear depending on the criteria above.
League 1 - Curating to maximize returns (Top 100)
The end column is what I think is a genuine indicator of how well you are financially working the curation game with the tools, including vested Steem Power, that you have at your disposal.
This Week's winners!
Congratulations to 
And well done to 
All of the above will be getting some STEEM :)
League 2 - Engagement and Excellence - Write on!
This the newer league which is not based around rewards and relates to engagement.
Everyone currently on my master list has a chance here - delegation dealings or not.
I've used some metrics (which is the fancy way of saying that made up some numbers) relating to:
- Posts (P)
- Comments - number of (C)
- Comments - replies to replies - depth > 2 (C R) (new this week)
- Comments - length in characters (C L)
- Witness votes (W) (for those proxying witness votes, your total is always 30)
- Upvotes to others (V)
- Upvotes to different authors (U V)
- Self-votes - a small minus score for this one sorry! (S V)
Firstly, if you are placed in the table above then you are doing great and are among the top 25%!
Congratulations to 
Very well done also to 
Excellent engagement levels and top 10 places for 
Do you want to be a part of the leagues? Let me know below!
Prizes sent!
League 1
League 2
Lucky number 25 in League 2
Delegation Prizes
The most consistent performers, and especially those in need of a boost on the way to the holy grail of 500 SP, could also receive a small delegation. This week:
50 SP added (150 SP total) -
50 SP added (100 SP total) -
50 SP -
Well done guys, continue oiling that Blockchain :D
Finally
If you have spotted any glaring errors in my post, please let me know so I can fix them
If you would like to be added or removed from my personal curation league, let me know
If you have any other comments or suggestions, please enter them into the box below
As always, thank you very much for your support!
Asher 
If you feel that the Curation Leagues are a worthwhile addition to the Steem Blockchain, please consider a vote for our witness - 