Using bid-bots is a no-go under #newsteem. But, what about TipU? I completely forgot about Tipu, but then I received a tip recently which made me look into how it actually works at the moment.
I guess you can find this information in a lot of places, but I didn't, so I thought I'd just summarize what I discovered right here for those who are interested!
@tipU is still active and doing well - But, how does it work?
First of all, TipU is still active and it is in use. But, there are two different ways in which you can experience and enjoy the TipU bot.
tipU curators rewarding your content
There are curators out there curating good content and making sure that TipU upvotes good content. There is a maximum number of curators, and it is currently reached. But, it might be need for more curators in the future. If such a thing should happen, you can simply rejoice and be happy, as it will increase the reward of your post, and come as a nice and positive surprise!
Other Steem users reward your content using TipU
This is the part I was most curious about. Doesn't tipping with @TipU conflict with the policy of no bidding-bots on #newsteem? Well, it would - if the goal was to get a higher income on your posts. But, if you decide to tip content on Steem using TipU, it will always be a minus project. In other words, if you send TipU 5 steem to upvote an article written by yourself or someone else, that person will only receive around 4 Steem as an award. In other words, it is a minus project. But, if you want to spend 5 Steem on supporting and encouraging a writer you like, then the most important is the chance to actually give a tip and to support the writer.
In other words, you can still tip and support writers using the @TipU bot, but if your goals are selfish, then it will not succeed. That is why the TipU bot doesn't get in conflict with the principles of #newsteem.
Want to tip some content? You need to send a minimum of 1 SBD or 5 Steem to @TipU. In the message, copy the URL of the post you would like to give a helping hand to!
Not really like you said. I'm among tipu curators and I can tell you that you don't send anything to tipu. You get some free upvotes daily. BUT how many of those upvotes and the value of them depend on your work. If you end with higher efficiency (post that you upvoted, are high value, specially after you upvoted them) you get more upvotes per day. And if your curations diversity is less than 100% (meaning that sometimes you upvote posts from same user) , well that's how much your upvote will be worth. So if your diversity is 75% your $1 upvote will be worth $0.75
Well, I know that as a solution as well, but since they do not accept new curators, there is also a way of tipping users by sending Steem or SBD to the tipU bot with the address of the article (author) you want to give a tip. tipU will then reward that article and author with an upvote. The upvote will be worth less than the tip sent (meaning that it will always be a minus project for the one sending the tip), but it is still possible and a way to support authors you like.
Oh yes. I don't do that. But it's possible to use that option