oops I'm sorry I guess I misunderstood the initial question.
I thought it referred to beginners with bitcoin. Maybe it is beginners with the forum
The biggest issue with the forum is I can't find simple answers to simple questions without being contradictory.
Example:
#1) I bought bitcoin on coinbase. Where are they?
answer: they don't actually exist, they are just numbers.
#2) how do I keep my bitcoin safe?
answer: put "them" in a wallet (contradicts #1 answer)
#3) Am I supposed to keep my private key secret?
answer: usually yes
Why then is there a post on this website asking newbies to sign their posts with their private key?
Is it a scam post to scam newbies?
If you are referring
to the pinned message here, no it is not a scam. More of a poor choice of words.
AFAIK it means: Using your wallet software be it Core, Electrum or whatrever- that only YOU have the private keys to - create a wallet then have the wallet generate a signed BTC address. You post that newly created
signed BTC address - NOT your private keys!
That way if something happens with access to your account it allows admins to recover your control of it by having you send them another signed message FROM THE SAME WALLET to prove who you are.
As for what a wallet actually is... All blockchains are a ledger. that ledger holds a history of all transfers ever done on the blockchain. Refer to this
Wikipedia entry about what a blockchain is.Start with that a crypto coin network be it Bitcoin, ETH, whatever, is housing a series of scripts that are all linked together in a chain - the Blockchain. Those scripts assign encrypted values to anything be it money, documents, hog belly futures, whatever, that all uniquely identify and refer to an originator of a transaction. The owner of the wallet that created the address & transaction is assigned a set of private keys. Your wallet software uses the private keys to create the tx/rcv addresses so the addresses uniquely point only to the address you created and in turn, the wallet that created the address.
The main points to all that are:
1) KEEP YOUR PRIVATE KEYS PRIVATE!
2) Use your wallet software to generate a Recovery Phrase for your Private Keys!
Keep copies of that recovery phrase(s) somewhere very safe and NOT on any computer! If you somehow lose your data those Recovery Phrase(s) will allow you - or anyone else who has access to them - to re-create your wallets.
edit: All of that applies to using software wallets ran on a PC. In the case of webwallets - like Coinbase.com or Blockchain.com et al you do NOT have Private keys - only the website has them so there is no fear you of accidentally revealing your Private keys. HOWEVER - they DO provide you with a Recovery Seed Phrase that if needed can be used to regain control of your account.
Treat that Recovery Seed Phrase the same as Private Keys because anyone who gets access to that seed can take over the account!