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The witnesses for Steemit are the block-producers. A little like miners in other currencies. Their servers secure the block-chain, so voting for trustworthy ones is crucial.

The Steem blockchain requires a set of people to create blocks and uses a consensus mechanism called delegated proof of stake, or DPOS. The community elects 'witnesses' to act as the network's block producers and governance body. There are 20 full-time witnesses, producing a block every 63-second round. A 21st position is shared by backup witnesses, who are scheduled proportionally to the amount of stake-weighted community approval they have. Witnesses are compensated with STEEM Power for each block they create.

Steemit leverages Steem because the founders of Steemit believe Steem’s decentralized text content storage and governance model makes Steem an excellent platform for supporting the long term success of its social network and digital currency tokens.

Well said.

" for supporting the long term success of its social network and digital currency tokens."

I wish they were a little more focused on the former than the latter.

Excellent explanation!

I just hear it but do not understand what is it..

Think of them as the server-hosts that run the block-chain.

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