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If you earn some Steem Based Dollars (SBD) then convert them to STEEM (the main currency of this platform) you can power it up to have more influence over who earns more with your upvotes. My upvotes are worth less than 1 cent, whereas someone with 1000 STEEM Powered up will give 1 cent for an upvote. The more in your wallet the more value you can give from an upvote, there are some accounts worth hundreds of thousands and even millions (Whales). A single upvote from them and you can get tens of dollars, doesn't sound a lot but if lots of people upvote your post you can earn a decent chunk of change :]

Does it help on the return you get on your own posts?

If you upvote your own posts which you should :] then yes the more STEEM power you hold the more value your upvote will give (to yourself). If you don't upvote your own post or comments then it makes no difference.

Thanks! What is powering down? I believe you gave me some steem last week? Possibly a lot of people?

STEEM power is locked away, if you power down it takes 13 weeks to get the full amount out. So say if you have 130 STEEM power and start a power down, first week you get 10 Steem, 2nd week you get 10 STEEM etc. It is a slow release to prevent a market crash if everyone withdrew their STEEM at once and sold it on the exchanges. It also acts as a security feature in case someone has your keys and tries to steal all your funds. At least you would have time to change your keys when you notice a powerdown or a portion of your wallet is stolen.

This helped me tremendously! 🙂
You friggin rock! 🤘