Steemit FAQ
Table of Contents
General
What is Steemit.com?
How does Steemit work?
How does Steemit differ from other social media websites?
What do I need to do in order to secure my account?
Does it cost anything to post, comment, or vote?
Can I earn digital tokens on Steemit? How?
Where do the tokens come from?
Where does the value come from?
Why are people getting vastly different rewards?
Is there a desktop wallet available for STEEM?
What are Smart Media Tokens (SMTs)?
Accounts
How do I create an account?
What information do I need to provide in order to create an account?
How long does the account approval process take?
Can I speed up the account approval process?
Why do I need to provide my email and phone number?
Can I create a Steem account without an email and phone number?
What are other ways to create an account on the blockchain besides using Steemit.com?
It is not letting me create an account with my phone number. What should I do?
What happens if my email or phone number changes?
Am I allowed to create more than one account?
Can I change my username?
Can I delete or deactivate my account?
Community
Is there an Etiquette Guide for Steemit?
Am I required to verify my identity?
Site Navigation
How do I upvote a post or comment?
What do the Home, New, Hot, Trending, and Promoted links show?
What information is available in my account menu?
How do I see my recent rewards?
What information is shown in my wallet?
How do I transfer my STEEM or Steem Dollars into savings?
How do I send money to another user?
Will I receive notifications when there is activity with my account?
What is shown in my profile?
How do I change my avatar image and other profile information?
What is the recommend size for the cover image?
How can I control whether I see "Not Safe For Work" (NSFW) content?
How do I search for content?
Can I see which users I have muted?
Can I see which users have muted me?
Can I see the list of users I am following, and who is following me?
What languages are supported?
Posting
What can users post to Steemit?
What are the different choices for post rewards (50%/50%, Power Up 100%, Decline Payout)?
How do I add images and photos to my posts?
How do I set the thumbnail image for my post?
What is the recommend aspect ratio for thumbnail images?
How do I add videos to my posts?
Is there a way I can make my images smaller?
What are tags?
What tags should I use?
How many tags can I use?
Why is the "Post" button grayed out?
How do I format text in Markdown?
How often can I post?
How long can my post be?
If posting in a language other than English, how will I get recognized?
Can I delete something I posted?
What does "Promoting" a post do?
How do I promote a post?
Comments
Can I earn digital tokens for commenting?
How often can I comment?
Economics
Where do the new STEEM tokens come from?
How many new tokens are generated by the blockchain?
How are the new tokens distributed?
Which exchanges are STEEM and SBD listed on?
What is the reward pool?
How is the reward pool split between authors and curators?
Will the reward pool pay out more or less depending on who votes?
Why do the earnings for my post go up or down?
When can I claim my rewards?
What is the difference between STEEM, STEEM Power, and Steem Dollars?
What is delegated STEEM Power?
What determines the price of STEEM?
How do I get more STEEM Power?
How long does it take STEEM or STEEM Power that I purchased to show up in my account?
What is powering up and down?
What do the dollar amounts for pending payouts represent?
Will 1 Steem Dollar always be worth $1.00 USD?
How do Steem Dollar to STEEM conversions work?
Is there a way for me to convert my Steem Dollars to STEEM without waiting 3.5 days?
What can I do with my STEEM tokens?
What can I do with my SBD tokens?
What is a MVEST?
Can I sell goods and services on Steemit?
How can I withdraw my STEEM or SBD coins?
Will I get a 1099 from Steemit?
How much are the transaction fees for sending tokens to other users?
Are there fees for Powering Up, Powering Down, trading on the internal market, or converting SBD to STEEM?
How long does it take to transfer STEEM or SBD tokens between users?
Voting and Curating
What is my voting power?
How many times can I vote without depleting my voting power?
Can I vote with less than 100% of my voting strength?
Where can I check my voting power?
What determines how much of the curation reward goes to the author versus curators?
Can I get curation rewards for upvoting comments?
Do I get curation rewards for downvoting posts or comments?
What are curation trails?
Why don't my upvotes have an effect on a post's rewards?
Is there a way to make my votes count for more?
What are the valid reasons for downvoting?
Does a downvote mean that I did something wrong?
Will a downvote hurt my reputation?
What is the difference between a downvote and a flag?
Plagiarism, Spam, and Abuse
What is considered spam or abuse?
What are Steemit’s policies on plagiarism?
Is it okay to use random pictures from the internet?
What is Steemcleaners?
What is 
Where do I report a post or comment that contains plagiarism, spam, or abuse?
Reputation
What is Reputation?
How is the Reputation score measured?
How do I improve my reputation score?
What causes my reputation score to go down?
Why does my reputation score matter?
Followers, Feeds, and Resteem
What is Resteeming?
Can I share on other social media?
Blockchain
What is a blockchain?
What is the Steem blockchain?
How does bandwidth work on the Steem blockchain?
What is the difference between Steem and Steemit?
How is Steem different from Bitcoin?
What is the difference between Proof of Work, Proof of Stake, and Delegated Proof of Stake?
How often does the Steem blockchain produce a new block?
Is there a way to see the raw data that is stored in the blockchain?
Where can I find the information for the official launch of the blockchain?
Can I mine STEEM?
Steemit, Inc.
Who is the CEO of Steemit?
Can I invest in Steemit?
What does Steemit’s development roadmap look like?
Am I allowed to use the Steem and Steemit logos?
Can I purchase official Steemit merchandise?
Did Steemit "pre-mine" tokens?
What is the Steemit Privacy Policy?
Security
How can I keep my Steem account secure?
Why should I be careful with my master password?
Why is the master password a long string of gibberish?
What are my different keys for?
What do I do if I lost my password/keys?
Are my STEEM and Steem Dollar tokens insured in the event of a hack or if someone takes over my account?
What should I do if I discover that someone hacked my account?
How does the stolen account recovery process work?
How do I report a security vulnerability?
Developers
Are the Steem blockchain and Steemit.com code open-source?
Is there a Github page for Steemit.com?
Is there a Github page for the Steem blockchain?
What is available for developers interested in Steem and Steemit?
How do I use cli_wallet?
Witnesses
What are Steem witnesses?
How can I vote for witnesses?
How many witnesses can I vote for?
Miscellaneous
What third-party tools are there for Steemit?
Is there an official Steemit Facebook page?
Is there an official Steemit Twitter account?
What is the Steem Whitepaper and what is its purpose?
Where can I ask for help if my question was not answered here?
Disclaimer
Third Party References and User Links
General
What is steemit.com?
Steemit has redefined social media by building a living, breathing, and growing social economy - a community where users are rewarded for sharing their voice. It's a new kind of attention economy.
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How does Steemit work?
Steemit.com is one of the many websites (including Busy.org, DTube, and Utopian.io) that are powered by the Steem blockchain and STEEM cryptocurrency. All of these websites read and write content to the Steem blockchain, which stores the content in an immutable blockchain ledger, and rewards users for their contributions with digital tokens called STEEM.
Every day, the Steem blockchain mints new STEEM tokens and adds them to a community's "rewards pool". These tokens are then awarded to users for their contributions, based on the votes that their content receives. Users who hold more tokens in their account as "Steem Power" will get to decide where a larger portion of the rewards pool is distributed.
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How does Steemit differ from other social media websites?
While most social media sites extract this value for the benefit of their shareholders, Steemit believes that the users of the platform should receive the benefits and rewards for their attention and the contributions they make to the platform.
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What do I need to do in order to secure my account?
Unlike most social media websites, there is no way to recover your account if you lose your password / owner key! This is why it is extremely important that you save and backup your password somewhere safe. It is strongly recommended that you store an offline copy in case of a hard drive failure or other calamity. Consider digital offline storage, such as an external disk or flash drive, as well as printed paper stored in a fireproof safe. Use a safe deposit box for best redundancy.
If you leak your private key to another user or a third-party website, that user or website will have full access to your account. This means they can steal it, as well as the funds inside of it. It is therefore not recommended to enter your private key information with any other user or third-party website. If you believe your account has been compromised, you should change your password/keys right away.
Each account has multiple keys, which each have different levels of authority: owner, active, posting, and memo. The information on the different types of keys and their purposes, as well as more information on password and key security, can be found in the section on Security.