The last massive influx of new members on the platform is, by and large, exciting. But, along with this wave, a few other things are coming, which are not very well catered to the specific of the Steemit platform. Hence, I decided to wear my community witness hat more often and to write a series of posts about the nuts and bolts of this, seemingly familiar, but completely revolutionary (Im not exaggerating) social media platform. You can find the first two posts, about rewards and witnesses, at the end of this post.

Today, we'll talk about netiquette.

What Are That Basic Steemit Netiquette Rules?

• be polite
• post original content (we hate plagiarizers)
• discuss ideas, not persons - all persons are, by default, ok
• when you comment on somebody else's post, try to bring at least a minimal contribution
• if you follow someone, try to really follow up and engage. Don't try to build numbers, instead, go for interactions, that's from where the power of the platform comes
• this is a decentralized platform, so that means we're all equally responsible for what it happens here, based on our level of involvement
• other than that, use sunscreen, don't text and drive, don't drive and drink, you know the drill

What Are The Dont's Of The Steemit Netiquette?

• never, ever, under no circumstance, beg for reciprocation (of comments or of votes). We're free and we can express freely here, so one will comment or upvote only if he / she feels like. Don't try to force reciprocation using sentences like "I just upvoted your post, can you please upvote mine?"
• avoid excessive tagging of other people. Don't put one hundred "@" usernames in your post, hoping they'll come by and support you. More often than not, the opposite will happen
• don't follow somebody until the other person follows you back and then unfollow. We see you, you know. And this is not Twitter. It's 2017, for God sake!
• don't fire up a bot with standard comments on all the posts published, hoping they'll come back. Steemit has a few built-in spam protection mechanisms and, rather sooner than later, your reputation will go down dramatically if you're caught. And you will be caught.

What Is A Flag And Why Is It Used?

A flag is a downvote and it has the same consequence as an upvote, only in the opposite direction. In other words, it will take from your potential rewards and put it back in the main rewards pool. You will see that as a decrease of your potential payouts. This happens for a number of reasons:

• the downvoter didn't like the post
• you used abusive or spammy language
• you are engaging in a direct controversy with somebody else which uses his downvote as he sees fit
• you're using plagiarized content
• you try to game the platform in some way (luring people into clicking shady links is a form of gaming the platform, for instance)

I've Been Flagged, I'm Going To Cry All Day And Rage Quit

Better not. The psychological effect of seeing money disappearing from your potential reward is hard, I agree. But it's part of the game, just like illness and death are parts of life. We should rejoice in whatever we can get from life, despite of the trouble. So head up, and keep writing, engaging and creating great stuff. That too, shall pass.

I've Been Flagged By Mistake (Or So I Think). What To Do?

Contact the flagger - either by leaving a comment on one post on his profile, by sending him a message (transfer 0.001 Steem to him and use the memo field as a message, this is a common practice here to get in touch with somebody else) or by getting in touch in the steemit.chat.

What's Whale Hunting? Should I Engage In That?

Whale hunting, in the Steemit ecosystem, means following obsessively and trying to win the favors of some large Steem Power holders (whales) in the hope of getting upvotes from them. While knowing as many whales as you can could prove beneficial to you, engaging in whale hunting, especially when you're doing it only to get back votes, is not.

Other posts in this series:

• Steemit Newbie FAQ - Witnesses: What Are They And Why Should You Care?
• Steemit Newbie FAQ - Rewards: Were Does The Money Come From?

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I'm a serial entrepreneur, blogger and ultrarunner. You can find me mainly on my blog at Dragos Roua where I write about productivity, business, relationships and running.
For the Steemit ecosystem I created a free tool for checking your potential rewards at steem.supply.

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If you appreciate my contribution, you can vote for me as witness here:
https://steemit.com/~witnesses