What Is Steem?
Steem is a cryptocurrency used to power the platform Steemit - an incentivized blockchain social media platform.
Users create and curate content on Steemit just like other social news platforms (e.g. Reddit, Hacker News) and get rewarded in Steem for their work.
Steem
Steem is the fundamental unit of account on the Steem blockchain.
All other units (Steem dollars and Steem power) derive their value from the value of Steem.
There is no need to hold on to Steem in its cryptocurrency form, it should be used either to buy Steem power, Steem dollars or be converted to Bitcoins.
Steem increases in supply 100% each year. Steem was first published as a whitepaper in March 2016.
The currency and platform were in Beta until July 4th 2016.
Steem Dollars
Steem dollars are the units used to reward users for posting and curating content.
Each Steem dollar represents the amount of Steem equivalent to 1 USD.
Steem dollars (or SMD) were created so that users won’t be affected by the fluctuating exchange rate of Steem.
SMD are actually a promise, that when you come to cash out you will receive the USD equivalent in Steem of what you’ve earned.
Steem dollars earn an interest rate of 10% annually.
Steem Power
Steem power (or SP) is a token symbolizing how much power you have inside the Steemit platform.
When you have a lot of SP your votes count more in the system. In fact you can’t vote if you don’t have any SP.
Increasing your SP is known as “powering up” and decreasing it is known as “powering down”.
The way to power down is basically to cash your SP into Steem.
This can be done over a preiod of 104 weeks (2 years) in order to insure that users don’t just cash out quickly and collapse the whole Steemit economy.
Steemit Platform
Unlike other cryptocurrencies Steem has a built in inflation of 100% annualy and no coin limit.
The platform itself (Steemit) has grown considerably since the Coin launched on July 4th 2016 and currently has over 70,000 users however it seems that the number of active users is much lower.
You can earn Steem dollars and Steem power on Steemit by posting and curating articles.
Steem Curation and Moderation
In addition, you can make money with Steem. Anyone can read content posted on Steem without an account, and users can be entirely anonymous if they choose. Steem governs its users behavior through Community moderation, Steemetiquette if you will.
There are no set guidelines as of yet, like on Reddit, but they are being created organically and are self enforced by the Community through their combined voting power called Steem Power.
These guiding principles in many ways encourage quality original content from fellow Steemians, otherwise the user is simply wasting their time since they will likely not earn any rewards for posting low quality, undesirable content or spam.
Voters on Steem are called "curators" and are encouraged to evaluate content, sources and links to find high quality information, then vote and moderate based on on the information's factuality, relevance and quality, rather than on opinions.
Giving credit where it's due and citing sources is encouraged, since the original poster is being rewarded for the content, original content is preferred when it comes to handing out rewards.
Getting Started With Steem
Steem, another advanced money made to boost the utilization of Steemit, another examination in web-based social networking, has detonated in the previous couple of days, taking third place after Ethereum, with a present market top of more than $200 million, yet would this be able to really work or is it only a craze?
The stage has pulled in expanding enthusiasm with now more than 2,000 dynamic clients posting and voting. In the previous couple of days, it has started drawing in standard consideration because of its trial in boosting content creation and voting (curation). It has even pulled in a following with a few clients, for example, pfunk, saying that they discover the stage "genuinely gainful, fun, complex, [and] testing":
I joined seven days prior under aquentson to better comprehend the examination and experience it direct. Despite the fact that I attempted to check whether I could embrace some curating, I didn't generally discover anything convincing, along these lines logged out.
The client encounter leaves much to want with the accommodation procedure requiring significantly a greater number of snaps than reddit and clients unfit to connect a feature specifically, yet these UX issues might be genuinely simple to settle. Boosting quality discourses in social cooperations through cash is a much more troublesome issue.
From a specialized viewpoint, the voting calculation is completely open. To amusement, it requires around two minutes for any individual who can code. In spite of the fact that Steem's whitepaper, which is dispossessed of any specialized clarification, says there are various measures to battle vote gaming, every single such measure are open, illuminating coders of precisely how to influence the bot to look simply like another steemer.
Reddit utilizes unfathomably complex measures to battle vote gaming while at the same time having a concealed calculation and still regularly fizzles. The increases can be significant notwithstanding when no immediate cash is included, while the cost practically nonexistent. Consequently, many are exceptionally energetic to locate the correct tenets of the shrouded calculation by experimentation to create true blue client bots.
With an open calculation, streemers are quite recently paying bots, yet even with a shrouded calculation, as cash is specifically included, it is difficult to perceive how this issue can be fathomed or even limited.
In the event that we assume that the decades-long difficult issue of vote gaming is tackled in a specialized level, steem makes a much more difficult issue – getting the adjust appropriate in boosting inherent conduct, for example, sharing, talking, getting engaged with open exchanges, and so on.
The principle explanation behind utilizing steem instead of, say, reddit, is a result of direct installment, yet when cash is included individuals have a tendency to wind up noticeably more narrow minded, all the more entirely normal and are more quick to slight morals or ethics.
My first post on the stage was one of the greatest news stories of the year. I posted it on the site promptly after the article was distributed, yet scarcely increased any votes. Rather, it was replicated inside hours and the duplicated post increased significantly more consideration, despite the fact that submitted considerably later.
The stage is improbable, along these lines, to wind up plainly a place where individuals coolly submit or remark with the financial angle as only a reward, be that as it may, principally, a stage to profit.
For common clients, sharing something fascinating is probably going to be an exhausting or irritating background as nobody needs to see their accommodation at 1 penny, which feels annoying, or stolen by others and see the stolen accommodation pick up $200 while theirs scarcely gets much consideration. A great part of the substance, along these lines, might be left to bots or "experts," with the final product prone to be tasteless.
Inborn conduct can be roused by money related motivating forces, however it is a sensitive adjust and a long way from an insignificant issue. Absolutely not as simple as straight up offering cash to publications and voters which boosts unaltruistic conduct and transforms an unwinding social affair into work.
There are a few spaces where cash basically ought not have an immediate part. On the off chance that a client is paid to peruse, the perusing background changes. In the event that a client is paid to share, the sharing knowledge changes. On the off chance that a client is paid to remark, the remarking background is never again the same.
What already was an enormous social affair like hanging out with companions, steem transforms into work with the attention not on unwinding or sitting back, but rather experiencing exhausting substance to locate the one that will increase most votes and along these lines most cash with the lion's share scarcely getting pennies while bot administrators or expert "marketeers" get millions.
Steem Resources
Latest Steem News
Announcing the Steem Developer Portal!
The goal of this portal is to help make steem as easy to use, and developer friendly, as possible. It is our collective resource & hub for developers in the steem ecosystem as they embark on creating the next wave of steem-based tools, sites and applications.
The Steem Developer Portal is a community effort and developers are welcome to submit additions and updates on Github. The Portal is now live at: developers.steem.io
Developer Guides - As a new developer to steem we want your experience to be fluid and we want to make it as easy as possible to get started. The Developer Portal includes API documentation and working code examples of functional items to implement within your project.
Tutorials - The tutorials walk developers through the steps of building a working blockchain application from scratch. There is both a text version with sample code, as well as a video that demonstrates the process in action. After completing the tutorials, developers should have the confidence to dive into more complex applications.
API References - The full list of JavaScript APIs are categorized and listed, so that developers can explore what commands are available to use. These will eventually be expanded to include a detailed description of what each of the API commands do, as an explanation of the input parameters.
Open Source - The source code for the Dev Portal is open source, and pull requests to update the portal are accepted and encouraged. Developers who would like to make additional improvements to the Dev Portal may submit pull requests to the GitHub repository: https://github.com/steemit/devportal. We would love to grow the Dev Portal into the “one-stop-shop” for all steem development, having all of the information that a steem developer could possibly need at their fingertips in one convenient place.
Growing Our Ecosystem - The innovation that has come from our community has been amazing. Every new application that the community builds to use the blockchain and token in new creative ways adds value to the steem ecosystem. We are very excited to see what you all develop next!
Steemit.com Updates: Design and Security
We've been busy synthesizing community feedback and designing ways to improve Steemit.com. Over the next few weeks, we'll be rolling out a series of changes to the User Experience (UX) and User Interface (UI).
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