I'm fairly new and still trying to wrap my head around all of this. My only reference is youtube where a like equals profit and a like on facebook acknowledges that I read the content.
I've been trying to raise my reputation and only voting while at 90% or better and my votes are still worthless. My posts are only bringing in less than 10 cents. I know it will get better with time.
I assumed that by voting for content that I enjoyed, that my vote would somehow propel the writer forward. I'm just plain confused.