So you are new to Steemit. Join the club! What is this all about and how do I earn the BIG BUCKS on here??
Well first off, it wouldn't do you any harm to read the White Paper. If you can't be bothered doing this then the second best thing you can do is read some articles written by other Steemit members that give you a basic understanding of how it all works.
Here's a something I just worked out. If you go the bottom of the Tags list on the right side of the Steemit content feed page, the last option allows you to "show more topics". Click on this and it takes you to a page where it lists all the tag feeds and tells you how many replies and SBD (Steemit Bonus Dollars?) that have been awarded via voting for each topic.
How is this useful? Well with some very basic analysis, you can determine what tags are earning money on Steemit. Here are the results for the top 20 from not long ago (~60mins):
introduceyourself $289,502 steemit $195,534 travel $71,730 life $58,629 beauty $53,465 crypto-news $46,853 photography $33,931 bitshares $31,161 money $24,487 funny $22,743 blockchain $20,642 philosophy $17,746 introduction $17,217 steemhelp $17,020 bitcoin $16,236 writing $14,417 art $12,602 news $11,812 cryptocurrency $9,814 technology $7,812
Great! So now we know what topics are currently generating users SBD rewards. What else can we learn from this? In addition to what is earning the most via voting, we can also determine which topics are earning the most per article by dividing the the above figures by the number of replies in each tag. Here are the top 20 for this:
backpacking $99.42 programming $92.41 books $77.81 piston $75.57 changedlife $64.14 beauty $56.94 psyhology $53.11 fiction $46.23 steemtubeexperiment $45.85 introduction $38.60 voting $35.28 yoga $31.47 bitshares $29.37 blockchain $29.07 travel $28.52 basicincome $26.95 recipes $25.15 life $23.98 introduceyourself $22.64 crypto-news $22.47
So if you were to write an article on backpacking, an average article could be expected to earn you nearly $100 worth of SBD. It is also worth noting that over $1 million of SBDs have been rewarded to content providers. Not bad hey!
What are SBDs? I'm not entirely certain as they aren't discussed in the White Paper but I am guessing these are Steem Bonus Dollars. The reason I am guessing this term is used, is that the content rewards that are earned via votes on Steemit are paid out as 50% Steem Power and 50% SMD. So basically half of what you earn from vote rewards gets reinvested into the Steemit community (with ~1% able to be withdrawn each week over a 2 year period) and the other half is able to be sold immediately (via converting into bitcoins and then selling these through a bitcoin exchange) or can also be reinvested into Steem Power or just basic STEEM.
A lot of articles I have read recently on Steemit complain about the voting situation i.e. good content is not necessary generating any reward. The voting influence of a Steem Power holder is calculated as the square of their voting power. This is why large Steem Power holders have such a large influence over what is being rewarded. Their voting power is actually even higher than their proportional holding in Steem Power.
This situation will not remain like this forever though. Each week ~1% of each Steem Power holding is converted into SMDs which can be sold or reinvested. Given that Steemit is described at the conclusion of the White Paper as an "experiment", it would be surprising if big holders of Steem Power do not monetize their holdings by selling down over time as the founders and early adopters realize their large gains from Steemit.
Over time voting power will slowly be redistributed by natural dilution through the rewards program and by large Steem Power holdings not reinvesting. This will potentially see voting rewards distributed more efficiently.
As others have identified, what is earing the most SBDs via votes currently are what is adding the most value to the site as determined by large Steem Power holders. Don't get angry or dejected by this. Over time as content builds up, good content is more likely to generate better rewards. Why not take a long term view and start a "How to Guide" or build up a large amount of quality content. Down the track these will be far more valuable than a get quick rich approach and could earn you a consistent income stream.
After all, let's be honest with ourselves. You were already generating and posting content for free on other sites. Isn't it better to be part of a new, fast developing, exciting concept like Steemit with a chance of getting paid for your input? To me it's a no brainer.