@xyzashu love your questions and am happy to answer!
- Using either https://steemit.com/~witnesses or the CLI wallet are the only options the developers at Steemit currently give us to vote. Hopefully it will be easier in the future!
- The active key is required because posting only handles making posts, upvoting, and commenting. Making a witness vote is a very important action that therefore any apps we use without the active key do not need access to!
- Yes I will make videos and posts explaining my votes for other witnesses to be transparent about why I am voting for a witness and to help educate as to what each witness is doing for us that may not be obvious!
- You're right the witness voting process scares a lot of us when we first see it as it did for me. While I saw the word witness and looked at the list in the first month, I did not make any votes. As I learned more about what witnesses do, how important witnesses are, and which witnesses were giving the most in a way I could see it, I started making votes and chose to become a witness also. Setting a proxy is the easy way to get started if we find one person we trust to help us make all our votes to start. As we participate here longer and invest more, it seems logical to remove the proxy and start setting our own witness votes.
- With voting for no witnesses, we are also not using any of our power we have of choice. While there is nothing wrong with doing nothing, we generally enjoy feeling included and participating fully in life because that is the real benefit of living. I felt much more included in the community when I started making witness votes and I think many of us feel the same. Any witness vote is likely to be the right one to support someone trying to help because I see no witness that is purely trying to sabotage our community.
- A chart of what each witness is doing looks like a trending post idea to me!
- Every witness at https://steemd.com/witnesses has a URL link where the witness announces their campaign and asks for votes. Some witnesses are available at https://steemit.chat/channel/witness while others are responsive to comments especially in #witness posts.
The best place to reach many witnesses on steemit is in the comments on witness updates. A few witnesses are hard to locate in the community which might also make figuring out why to vote for them challenging!
Thank you for asking these questions and giving me this opportunity to respond!
WOW @jerrybanfield, I wasn't expecting such a comprehensive reply from you. It made a lot of things crystal clear to me now. Your answer to point 5 prompted me to vote for you, which I just did. But I checked up and noticed that I've already voted up to 6 other witnesses. So as explained by you in no.4, I assume if I give you a proxy, my other 6 votes would also be judged according to your preferences and you may change those too. So I'm very much looking forward to your actions on your answers in point 3 & 6, as soon as it can be taken at your end 😊
Many thanks for pointing to the several ways to interact and know more about witnesses in point 7.
I'm glad to read all your answers. Wanted to ask a few more at the time of questioning but had to leave at that time for some other work. But now, I think you have given me enough pointers so that I can make some efforts to find those on my own. Many many thanks to you for all you do! 💓
Would you mind if I give you a small tip! post ed here?
@xyzashu thank you very much for your reply here letting me know how you read what I shared and for the tip also! I am going to start using @tipu soon too!
Hi @jerrybanfield! You have just received 0.101 SBD tip from @xyzashu!
Check out the newest post from @xyzashu: 50 Word Story Contest Week #24 - "Being Human " and follow if you like the content :)@tipU quick guide | earn interest in @tipU profit
These answers are really clear and make me study more.