Okay 
- Discord servers: I know of no way to simply search “in there” and click on ones which may be of interest to you. I cover this in one of the posts cited above – those with “open door” policies and those with “invitation only” policies.
- How did I learn all I posted about? Hard to answer that one, but I was a Business Systems Analyst, so “attention to detail” is just sort of … uhhh … “built in” to how I work … And I ask a lot of questions myself … 😉
- SBD vs. STEEM: Yes, there’s a lot of info on this question – on both sides of it … For what it is worth, I have always left it 50 /50, so I will have some of each. At times, when SBD is down, you may consider the conversion process, which changes SBD to STEEM. This option available to you on SteemWorld …
- Rep numbers: As far as I am aware, these are maintained by the core code of the Steem blockchain, so they are real enough. Again, like with the SBD vs. STEEM question, there are “raging debates” about how “real” the value of them is, since they can be “bought” in a manner of speaking, through the use of bidbots. I simply focus on getting mine as high as I can. For two reasons: 1) Helping others – when I upvote the higher mine is, the more it will help other reputations grow, and 2) Protection – The idiot “downvote goons” will have very little effect, as long as my rep is higher than theirs …
- Any link: ALWAYS hover over it, to see where it will actually take you. If the wording suggests one thing, but the actual URL suggests something entirely different, “alarm bells” should go off and you should generally just avoid it. Personal preference as to whether you still choose to take the chance … I almost never do …
- The interface I use is SteemPeak. In association with KeyChain, which is an add-on I use with the Brave browser … I do not experience the problems seeing reps and such you are describing, so don’t know specifically what that represents. It has been quite some time, though, that I had any need to use the SteemIt interface. I am not a fan …
Hope this helps you a little. Until “next time”
RE: Ways to get more followers and upvotes