Witnesses work hard to improve the Steemit community and maintain the blockchain, so I interviewed @aggroed, @theprophet0, and @ausbitbank to help understand exactly how hard they are working for us, and why they deserve our votes
If you are a new member on Steemit, or have been around for a while you may or may not have heard about Witnesses and are probably wondering what they are and why it concerns you. Witnesses are responsible for maintaining the integrity of the blockchain and validating blocks so that transactions run smoothly. This is a very time consuming process that requires a costly dedicated server and a flawless internet connection. They are rewarded for their efforts, but they need our help getting votes to move them up the list so they get the chance to verify more blocks!
Someone that is ensuring that your hard-earned cryptocurrency stays secure, and maintains the blockchain's integrity, deserves every bit of Steem Power they get rewarded (and more). This is a call to action, to bring awareness about what they do, and how hard they work to keep our community flourishing. Hopefully when you realize how important they are, you will commit your votes as you see fit. I will go over exactly how to do that later on.
A bit about the Steem blockchain
Steem is a cryptocurrency based on the open-source Graphene blockchain that has produced bitshares, golos, Steem, and Peerplays to name a few. These blockchains are decentralized open ledgers that maintain the database in multiple locations on nodes. No single person has the ability to tamper with the ledger, which keeps all transactions transparent to the general public. The Graphene blockchains differ from your standard Proof of Work (PoW) blockchains that use lots of energy to mine blocks through the use of computer hashing power to solve algorithms. Steem uses Delegated Proof of Stake (DPoS), wherein appointed delegates (Witnesses) are used to perform a variety of functions that contribute to the overall health and security of the blockchain. For this effort, the Witnesses are awarded with .89 Steem Power per block witnessed according to @aggroed. Awarding the Witnesses with Steem Power gives the Witnesses an illiquid reward that requires them to continue to invest their efforts back into the community, or wait 13 weeks for the Steem Power to convert into liquid Steem that can be sold on the open market.
The Steem network produces 21 blocks every 63 seconds with 3 seconds in between blocks. The top 19 Witnesses each get to verify 1 block every minute or so, and two spare blocks go to both miners and Witnesses equally, depending on their overall voting weight.
These Witnesses depend on your voting weight to increase the number of transactions (blocks) they get to produce within a given round.
The Witnesses are expected to perform a number of functions
- Maintain a block-producing Steem node that runs 24/7/365.25 (average including leap year).
- Verify blocks to ensure that they are legitimate missing as few as possible.
- Maintain an up-to-date price feed on Steem.
- Keep their server updated with current versions after hard forks, which just happened with HF19.
This is very much unlike conventional PoW mining where you just set it and forget it, and requires constant attention to the price of Steem across multiple exchanges. These guys and gals are constantly at work, maintaining their servers and contributing to the community.
Why should I vote for a Witness?
As I mentioned previously, a Witnesses position is determined by their overall voting weight provided by us, the general Steemit public. This position determines how often they get rewarded with a block to verify. Without our votes, they move farther down the list and all of their time and effort is left unrewarded. Everyone has their own reasons that influence their choices when voting for a Witness. Some of the main factors when deciding who to vote for are:
- Accuracy of block verification
- Involvement in the community (giving back)
- Quality of posts provided
- Provision of platform improving software
A group of witnesses has pooled their resources to form a little group called PALnet (Peace, Abundance, & Liberty) which runs the minnowsupport project. If you are not familiar with the @minnowsupport project, it is a Discord server run directly and indirectly by a group of fantastic Witnesses dedicated to helping minnows (500 Steem Power and below) grow in the Steemit community. They are in no order @ausbitbank, @aggroed, @theprophet0, @someguy123, @canadian-coconut, @teamsteem, @thecryptodrive, & @neoxian.
Many of the same Witnesses are also involved in various crowdfunding initiatives focused on sending less fortunate Steemians to SteemFest 2 in Lisbon, Portugal. These types of initiatives, and the contributions to the community are a big factor in my choices for delegating Witnesses, and you should consider them when using your 30 allocated votes.
Three of these Witnesses: @aggroed, @ausbitbank, and @theprophet0 have taken the time out of their very busy lives to answer few questions about being a Witness, which I will share with you, my fellow steemians.
The first comes from @aggroed
@necrophagist Being a witness seems like a very time consuming process. Why did you decide that you wanted to become a witness?
@aggroed Steemit's a pretty amazing place. I'm a controvert with my opinions on the world and dont' much care for the mainstream. I basically think the world is run by immoral banksters and that their power stems from being able to print money at whim as debt. If we can cut that off we can make changes as a society. Steemit allows that, and as that sunk in I thought it was time to help this place as much as I could to grow. To me that means focusing on new users, retention, and support. That's why I ran as a Witness and why I founded the Minnow Support Project with some like minded people.
@necrophagist How long have you been a Witness?
@aggroed I've been a witness for 3 weeks or so. In that time I've sent a kid and his dad to steemfest, helped send 2 others, started a Discord project that now has 1150 unique members, and have helped tons of minnows go from 50 cent posts to some that earn several hundred. It's a pretty awesome feeling.
@necrophagist How many hours a week do you spend on Steemit, including server maintenance?
@aggroed Steemit is a time suck. I get up, write an article, get dressed, get on the train, answer questions about the article, work a few hours, stop for lunch, manage the discord server, work, hop on the train, write an article or manage the server or make another connection on steemchat, get home, eat with my family, spend some time with my kids, and then go back to helping this place grow. It's kinda around the clock for me.
@necrophagist What is your involvement in the PALnet and minnowsupport project?
@aggroed I started PALnet with @ausbitbank, @teamsteem, @canadian-coconut as a place for people that care about Peace, Abundance, and Liberty to gather and help one another. A few days later I added the Minnow Support Project too it and it's taken off. Since then we've grown by leaps and bounds. We have a bunch of other witnesses in the channel and some dolphins and whales that swim with us. I dropped a post with a picture of some pretty famous Steemians in the channel.
@necrophagist Why is it important to vote for Witnesses, and why should Steemians vote for you?
@aggroed I try to keep talking about what witnesses do. it's a shit ton or very little. You technically only have to run a server. When it's not hardfork time that's not the hardest thing in the world to do. The question is what projects do you take on and how do you help other people working on this. For a lot of them it's making apps and programmy stuff. For me it's all about the social side and the caring and feeding of the minnows in the pond we share. Hopefully, people notice that, vote for me, and as that'll help me do more social stuff for this place and grow the healthy community into an enormous healthy community.
Next up is Steemit's youngest witness, at 15 years of age @theprophet0
@necrophagist Being a witness seems like a very time consuming process. Why did you decide that you wanted to become a witness?
@theprophet0 Well, I decided to become a witness last October, and I made that decision because I just thought it was the next step in my STEEM journey.
@necrophagist How long have you been a Witness?
@theprophet0 I have been a witness since October, but, I had to shut my witness down for a month (April) because of personal issues and I wasn't able to maintain it at that time, but now I plan to run it... FOREVER! :)
@necrophagist How many hours a week do you spend on Steemit, including server maintenance?
@theprophet0 Well, I am on STEEM for about 12-16 hours a day, and I am actively learning server maintenance :)
@necrophagist What is your involvement in the PALnet and minnowsupport project?
@theprophet0 My involvement in the PALnet and MinnowsSupport project consists of helping new users, finding good content that is under valued, and guding people.
@necrophagist Why is it important to vote for Witnesses, and why should Steemians vote for you?
@theprophet0 It is important to vote for witnesses because we run the STEEM blockchain, without us, the blockchain would not function. But, you must look into all the witnesses you vote for, don't just vote for random ones... see what each witness has to offer. If you would like to see what I have to offer, check this out: https://steemit.com/witness-category/@theprophet0/theprophet0-witness-update-i-m-back-i-m-alive-and-i-m-here-to-stay-100-of-the-liquid-rewards-earned-from-this-blog-will-be
And last, but not least @ausbitbank
@necrophagist Being a witness seems like a very time consuming process. Why did you decide that you wanted to become a witness?
@ausbitbank *I decided to become a witness because I had been involved with the network for almost a year and was putting in full time work and promoting steemit to everyone I met anyway. When the time came it seemed like an obvious choice.
@necrophagist How long have you been a Witness?
@ausbitbank I've only been a witness for about 2 months now, but it feels like a lot longer already
@necrophagist How many hours a week do you spend on Steemit, including server maintenance?
@ausbitbank I'm generally awake from about 8am to 4am every day, and if I'm awake the first thing I do is check my messages and servers. I treat this like a full time job, but I put in some crazy overtime hours every single week. I would guess at least 40hrs a week of focussed time at a computer and the rest of the time I'm obsessively checking my phone anyway. I have a problem...
@necrophagist What is your involvement in the PALnet and minnowsupport project?
@ausbitbank I kickstarted the minnowsupport bot with its first 1k SP and I've been working with aggroed to help moderate and promote the initiative to new users. Its one of the fastest growing groups on the site, it's blows my mind how fast this place is growing
@necrophagist Why is it important to vote for Witnesses, and why should Steemians vote for you?
@ausbitbank It's important users are aware of the witness system and they vote for people who are acting with the best long term interests of the network in mind. There are witnesses in the top 100 that do not have any technical know how, do not contribute code or promote the network at all that are purely there because they made good connections in the bitshares space. Steemit deserves better representation by passionate visible active users not well connected millionaires that aren't even using the site themselves.
Convinced yet? Here's how to Vote
First, point your browser to https://steemit.com/~witnesses
Vote away, using your best judgement. If you want to know more about a Witness, be sure to visit their Witness feed. You can always add in a witness who is not in the top 50, or you can choose your favorite witness as a proxy and delegate your votes too!
Witness feeds
@ausbitbank
@aggroed
@theprophet0
@someguy123
@teamsteem
@thecryptodrive
@neoxian
You can verify how well these witnesses are doing their job of verifying blocks a couple of different ways and this may also factor into voting choices.
Stats on Witness activity are available at
Steemd & Steemdb
Thanks to the PALNet and MinnowSupport project
The PALnet and MinnowSupport project is one of the fastest growing Steemit social groups, with over 1150 members dedicated to helping each other grow into dolphins and eventually whales. Please join our Discord server at https://discord.gg/HYj4yvw
Tutorials from members
https://steemit.com/minnowsupportproject/@justcallmemyth/come-join-the-palnet-and-the-minnow-support-project-this-is-the-future-of-steemit
https://steemit.com/minnowsupport/@rhondak/tutorial-for-palnet-registration
Please be sure to Re-Steem this post so the awareness spreads!
Check out some of my previous posts if you like what you've read
Joining the PALnet minnowsupport group
Minnows get a Fighting chance, help each other grow
MS paint tutorial
How to customize graphics by inserting the Steemit logo with MSPaint
Self-improvement series
Self Improvement Series, 10 minutes to a better you (4th installment
Crypto Mining
Setting up a crypto mining rig to make $300 a month while you are away
Adventures in Crypto Mining, journey to stack future moneys
Watching paint dry, synching the Ethereum Blockchain. Adventures in crypto mining
Great information. being new to the Steemit community it is nice to read well written posts about important topics. Thank you.
Glad to contribute, thanks for reading!
This post received a 1.0% upvote from @randowhale thanks to @necrophagist! For more information, click here!
Great post - really enjoyed the interviews and learnt a lot - also I couldn't believe we have a witness who is 15 years old - amazing @theprophet0
Upvoted, resteemed and following you - thanks.
Pretty crazy, I know! We have such a great community here. I am glad to be a part of it
@Necrophagist... Noticed this Post because @Aggroed ReSteemed it... and try to generally follow his actions, @TeamSteem & now @Canadian-coconut.
Because I still have so MUCH to learn...will also be paying more & more attention to the others that are being recommended as Witness... @someguy123, @ausbitbank, @theprophet0, @thecryptodrive & @neoxian...
Just voted @neoxian as Witness.
UpVoted, Following You now & ReSTEEMed... Thanks Again 4 these interviews !!
Hope You're Having a Great Weekend !!
Wow, yeah, I really had no idea so much went into this. Thanks for sharing @sacred-agent! I'll also resteem and upvote.
You're welcome..the more we know, the more we grow! I am having a fantastic weekend with family and friends, hope you are doing the same
@necrophagist...I'm a bit of a workaholic when research is required...so my weekend was bit busier than normal.
Thank You again 4 the interviews You conducted... Well done !!
Glad i could give a fellow workaholic some purpose for the weekend :)
thank you for all the info
You're welcome..everyone should know more avout the guys and gals working behind yhe scenes to keep things running smoothly
Some of the people that are going to help propel steem to the next level. Great hearing from them. Thanks for posting these interviews. I hope to one day be a similar level to these guys above. Godspeed :)
Keep up the hard work and one day we may get there
I've only been on steemit for a week and I've been wondering what or who the witnesses are. Now I know. Excellent clear article. Thank you and thank you for the work you do for steemit.
Youre welcome, glad I could contribute something positive
GREAT IDEA!!! Get inside their minds a bit. I now add @necrophagist to my write i-in witness vote.
Haha, thanks but that is a wasted vote :) I am not a witness..maybe one day
PAL is a great place to be in. I will vote for the witnesses. Surely. Their work is highly appreciated by everyone.
Every vote counts..We can get move them up the list!
It's a veritable Knights of the Round Table up in this post. Great work y'all and I am definitely planning to be a witness here in the near future w/ a group like that representing.
Work hard and stay active, you will be a great witness
I ReStemed this because it is super important for anyone with an interest in the long term health & success of SteemIt to understand just how vital it is going to be to have top rate Witnesses involved in maintaining the Block Chain as we move into what looks to be an explosive growth phase. These Witnesses are going to need employees, probably, at some point. Building servers and backup servers is both time intensive and costs money. When a Witness speaks, listen the hell up. It's up to all Steemians to support quality witnesses and help them to help us.
I agree 100% with that. When we experience the type of rapid growth that steemit will potentially see, the witnesses will be silently keeping the show running smoothly
I've been wondering what a witness actually does and this explains why. Guess I need to try and register again in PAL/ Seems like everytime I tried it never took!
Hit up one of the greeters and they will help walk you through it :) totally worth it
Finally got registered!
Congrats, be sure to say hi :)
I LIKE THAT! Great read.
Glad you enjoyed it!
thanks for the mention!
No problem! Thanks for the vote :) see ya on discord
That is some great information. I was just wondering about the witnesses yesterday. This post just answered most of my questions. Deffinately going to vote for witnesses. :)
Fantastic! Im glad my call to action raised some awareness
I was just on discord asking about the witness voting stuff!! What timing, so we have an idea of who -to- vote for, how can we figure out who to boot. I dropped out of differential equations class so not sure I can sort through a blockchain statistical report, I'll check, thanks so much for this info it's been a great help!
Youre welcome, sharing information as a community helps everyone get a better grasp of the concepts of yhe steemconomy
aahha! I went to the link and could see exactly who is doing what, there are Witnesses that have never made 1 post in a year...not following anyone. I made a list !! many with 100% so they are not utilizing their voting weight to help Steem grow....
Yes, some inactive witnesses that do nothing but rake in the money..not cool right?
i was thinking about compiling a list, but might be suicide P*ssing off 12 whales at one time, but literally some of these people have fewer than 100 posts in one year the worst was 0 posts, w 100% next worse was 3 posts w 100% (that was going out to top 30) now some top 70+ people are involved in other Steem functions so I tossed them. but compared to some with 5K + posts, you know who's trying to grow the site.
It looks like they really have to work hard and they deserve our votes.
Absolutely, our knights in shining armor
A big thanks to you guys for your passion and hard work. 👍🏻
Good read. Thanks for taking the time to put this kind of info out there for those of us who are still learning how all this works.
You're welcome, it is my way of thanking the witnesses for all of their hard work
Thank you for helping the community Bravo!
Sharing is caring..you're welcome, that is nothing compared to what they do
Good article.
Just so you know, on PAL I'm considered an Honorary Witness,
but don't vote for me as a witness.
Thanks for clarifying, I should have mentioned that :)
Thanks for this. I'm always happy to read more about the witnesses as it seems like such a mysterious role.
It doesnt have to be mysterious, thats why i wrote the article:)
Seems you guys are really dedicated. I'm not really the most tech. type person but I can appreciate your hard work and commitment to the Steemit community. Keep up the hard work and i will continue to support with my upvote. Thnx again for your numerous efforts to the cause.
@necrophagist... How Steemit may actually be a more viable currency than Bitcoin in the future. What do you think of this as a possible future for Steemit? Please read here https://steemit.com/steemit/@wvm/a-future-of-steem-a-new-possibility
Temporarily set the proxy server for voting.
I will resume the voting manually - when I learn at least a little here.
Great call, let the experts handle it until you can do your own due diligence.
Thank you for understanding
All 3 of those guys are great for this community. I have been following all of them since the beginning and seen their real consistent contributions for about a year. I would give them my vote and would also say that they deserve many others as well.
Thanks for getting them some well deserved exposure. Hopes it helps get witnesses that really care and contribute into the top spots.
No doubt, thats exactly why I wrote this post, hoping it gets to as many eyes as possible and moves them up the list. Hard working group of folks and I greatly appreciate their hard work
Yes!
Keep up the good work!
Congratulations! This post has been upvoted from the communal account, @minnowsupport, by Ferdinand (necrophagist) from the Minnow Support Project. It's a witness project run by aggroed, ausbitbank, teamsteem, theprophet0, and someguy123. The goal is to help Steemit grow by supporting Minnows and creating a social network. Please find us in the Peace, Abundance, and Liberty Network (PALnet) Discord Channel. It's a completely public and open space to all members of the Steemit community who voluntarily choose to be there.
If you like what we're doing please upvote this comment so we can continue to build the community account that's supporting all members.
Thank you