Hive (formerly known as Steemit) is a wonderful piece of technology, but, to the regular user, it may have quite a steep learning curve. On the surface, it looks like a simple, normal social media site, but under the hood there are a lot of revolutionary, and sometimes complicated, processes.
I decided to put together a post in which I'll try to answer to the most basic questions, providing then links or guidance to other posts in which I go into details on a specific topic. If you're new here, I recommend to bookmark this post as the "root" of all the explanatory posts linked form here. Also, feel free to share it with other people, if you think it's useful.
Without further ado, let's start!
1. Where Does The Money Come From?
Simply put, from inflation. Hive is a website built on top of a blockchain, which produces tokens, just like Bitcoin and Ethereum do.
I know, when you hear this, at least a dozen of other questions are arising, so you'd probably want to know:
- how is the money distributed?
- in what currency am I paid?
- what is the reward pool?
All these questions, and a few more, are answered in this article:
Hive Newbie FAQs: Where Does The Money Come From?
2. What Is A Witness And Why Should I Care?
A witness is a person operating a witness node, which validates Hive blocks. It has a similar function with a miner in a Proof of Work blockchain, only in Hive, you don't need that amount of hashing power. In simpler words, witnesses are the ones supporting this blockchain, without them, there will be no content, no voting, no tokens.
As always, I can sense the next questions:
- how do you vote for a witness?
- there are different types of witness: top 19 and runner up? Why?
- can I delegate somebody else to vote for witnesses on my behalf?
The answer to all of these and a lot more details about how the block generation works on Hive, here:
Hive Newbie FAQ - Witnesses: What Are They And Why Should You Care
3. Can I Get Hacked On Hive?
Hey, this is (still) the internet, of course you can get hacked. Only here you get hacked in a different way. The most important difference is that your account is not stored in a central database, somewhere, that somebody can recover for you. Instead, it lives directly in the blockchain and you're the only one responsible for its security.
Wait, but what about:
- what is a public / private key pair?
- if my account is public, everybody can access it?
- what is the Hive master password?
All these, and a few more, are answered in this post:
The Beginner Guide To Not Getting Hacked On Hive
4. Is It Ok To Ask Around People To Upvote Me?
Short answer: no.
Long answer: no, and if you do this, a unicorn will die in wonderland.
Seriously, there is a lot to be learn in terms of social behavior on Hive, specifically because this site is loaded. The presence of money changes dramatically the goals and the approaches of people here. From spamming to whale-hunting, newcomers are trying all sorts of strategies to increase their rewards. Most of them fall dramatically.
If you really want to make it here, I recommend starting here:
Netiquette: How To Avoid Being A Hive Douche?
5. How Accurate Are The Rewards Displayed Next To My Posts?
Not very, at the moment. It has to do with the currencies in which you are paid and also with a thing called "the peg" between HBD and the USD, which, at the moment, is broken. So, if you really want to understand what is going on, I highly recommend the explanation on the following article (it also has a nice simulator, so you can see in real time how much you're getting for any arbitrary amount - also, there are a lot of nice stats there):
Hive.Supply: Rewards Calculator
6. Can I Mine The HIVE Token, Just Like I Mine Bitcoin?
It used to be possible, in the beginning, but, due to a bug in the implementation, the mining queue was hijacked by only a few players, making it almost impossible for other people to get something. It may be possible that mining will come to Hive in another forms (specifically, for mining the fee for creating an account), but, at the moment of writing, there is no possibility to do that.
If you want to know all the details, have a look here:
How Can I Mine Hive And What CPU / GPU Power Do I Need For That?
7. Can You Make Money On Hive?
Short answer: yes.
Long answer: yes, but...
I'm gonna be really, really, short on this one and send you instead to a longer post I wrote last year, after I reached my 5000th post here. Yes, you read that right: the 5000th post.
Can You Really Make Money On Hive? 5000+ Posts Later My Answer Is: "Yes, But..."
Well, that's it! I think these are the 7 most fundamental questions about Hive. If you have suggestions or questions, feel free to ask them in the comments.
I'm a geek, blogger and ultrarunner. You can find me mainly on my blog at Dragos Roua where I write about productivity, business, relationships and running. Here on Hive you may stay updated by following me 
Wanna know when you're getting paid?
| I know the feeling. That's why I created hive.supply, an easy to use and accurate tool for calculating your HIVE rewards | |