Not really, or maybe I do? Keep reading and have a kitten as reward!
Once I began here at Steemit thanks to my bff @atmoxphera, something really strange catched my eye, and that was the Follow x Follow thing. This ain't a foreing dynamic for me due to sime time I spent on Twitter a few years ago, and of course in Tumblr (while I was roleplaying). Reading some posts to understand better this platform (and of course improve my english skills #SorryNotSorry) and seeing how wonderful and warm some people where in here, obviously I found a fuck-ton of posts about Follow x Follow, as well as some posts about hunting whales (please, don't), minnow iniciatives, etc, etc, etc; this made me think "what do I do with all this random followers I have?"
Well, the answer came to me as easy as it could be: I followed them back.
Why? You'll ask "Why would you? When some people recommend not to?" or even "why would you if some of them haven't even posted yet?" well, daily I receive at least one follower, even if I have not much posts here, I reply some I like a lot, or even follow some people that seems to me pretty interesting.
No, I'm not that kind of person who obsesses about numbers (like in that one Black Mirror episode), but I do care about people generally speaking. So, when I follow back, I usually don't do it for their content (some times, I don't even open the accounts for they are too many!) but just to help them, or even make their day. Why, again? Well, when I first began here, it made my day that only with a sort-of introduce-yourself post I reached +20 followers; didn't help me with the money directly, but it just made me happy being followed by some people who shared the same insterests as me, as well as some people looking for feed their obssession with bigger numbers at their "followers" list.
I follow 99% of people who followed me, not because I liked their posts (70-80% were due to that tho) but because they took the time to enter at my blog and decided to press just one button, for whatever reason, but decided I was worth the shot, so why shouldn't I do the same for them and brighten a little their day? Later, if the posts begin to seem unconsistent, not useful, or just follow x follow propaganda (or worst, clickbait just for money), I can press the same button to stop following them. As simple and clean as that. Following back someone, for me, it's just as polite and grateful as smiling back to someone when you're on the street or like waving back at a kid who for no good reason decided to wave at you.
The only people I don't follow, are the ones spamming "follow me, my content's great" without even bothering about following you, or make a good content, and sometimes even just to erase you later when they reach the K's number. Those are just people desesperate for attention and money who doesn't care about quality but a number that comes and goes, and Steemit it's not for that, it's for us who love sharing some pieces of what we like and adore, and support eachother like a family. People like that shall be avoided at all costs. Minnows like us should help eachother, not use people just for seeing big numbers at left and little numbers at right.
That would be all, fellas! Feel free to comment, upvote, and/or reestem and hope you have a nice day!
-Nina
I have the same idea about followers, I follow them back :) . I`m still thinking if which way to go with my account. Should it be for gaming, blogging or maybe some livestreams I will broadcast via Youtube?
I see you love gaming, are you intrested in gaming-content on steemit? I think there is not a large userbase for gaming here so only option is to be the pioneer. :)
With live-broadcasting maybe it is possible to use voting on postst the same as donations as with Twitch or sort-like platforms.
What are you two cents?
I'm interested actually, but sadly haven't seen something big or relevant about it here. Maybe being a pioneer is a good option!
You seem to have some great ideas, and I wish you luck with your content <3 I'll be expecting to see some broadcasts from you. Followed :3
I am still new here so take my advice with caution.
When I started here I did some follow4follow and also followed everybody back.
And yes it is easy zo just unfollow sombody who annoys you.
But as I did this my newsfeed became full with content I was not interested in. The engagment with my posts didnt go up at all and overall steemit was not a fun experience.
So I stopped and unfollowed the people with content I didnt like.
since then I started to follow people where I am genuine interested in their content and steemit became a more fun and a place where I can learn about certain topics.
There it doesnt matter if it is a minnow/dolphin or whale.
The thing with minnows and dolphins is you usually get a closer connection since they dont have so many followers yet and that is something I really like.
Well, that's what I usually do. I follow back but when I begin to see stuff I don't like I press unfollow and keep the people I do care about, which is basically what I tried to say with my post.
But, thanks for your advice!