I have no idea what Im doing wrong

You're rushing colony ships at the start? Rushing constructors when necessary? (Grabbing resources)

Are you picking good starting abilities? Economy and research are nice, if you have no idea what else to choose.

Are you optimizing your taxation and spending rates?

Are you trading with other civs (especially minors) for technology?

Are you specializing planets that have bonus tiles, such as manufacturing tiles?

Are you building plenty of starbases?

Are you building enough farms, entertainment buildings, and money buildings on at least some planets to keep your income, and your spending up? One farm per planet is a good rule of thumb.

Are you keeping your military strength up to keep the other races fearing you?

Are you researching the government techs? Each one (Interstellar Republic, Star Democracy, etc.) provides a hefty boost to economy and production.

Are you conquering anyone? Minors are a nice target, since they have high quality planets, but they also occasionally build a lot of defensive ships around their planets.

The biggest thing might be Industrial Spending. If that's not set to 100% you will lose. End of story.

If it's not that, I don't necessarily know. I'm playing on Normal (I think, I can't remember what the difficulty was) and I'm dominating. AI civs call me up and give me money for being so cool.

The game has a learning curve, I'll grant that. However, you can learn how to win. You have to play somewhat aggressively at first, and I don't mean militarily. That initial 5000 BC is meant to be spent. If more than 500 BC remains in your treasury by the end of turn 20 or so, you aren't spending it fast enough. You have to buy colony ships (don't wait for them to be built); scout worlds with your flagship and build a scout or two to assist. Buy up factories (at least the first one) on each world you colonize. Remember that EVERY world needs at least 2 factories to actually get stuff done.

Follow the above advice too, especially about minor civs. Also, remember to TRADE. I usually ignore weapons for a while and go right into trade. For most of the game, your tax won't be enough to let you run your industry at 100% and still turn a profit each turn so trade is essential. Thus, forego weapon tech early and get trade ASAP. Then build freighters. I haven't found galactic resources to be as key as others, but economic starbases can really help your worlds in all aspects.

Oh, you also do need some military, or the AI will find you to be a tasty snack and declare war.

Oh, you also do need some military, or the AI will find you to be a tasty snack and declare war.

Yes... that is rather annoying. I find its best to chose a race to attack, and take over their planets as fast as possible, hopefully getting them to surrender their last couple to you. Just a strategy that totally helped me in my last game.

One thing that I like to do, is never buy ships, unless its a emegency. But early game, while you still have the funds, defesit spend, set militray adn reserch to 100%, and each turn buy a factory, and then later Labs. Then whe your funds start to get low you will have a better infustuture to build on. And you income will be enough to keep you going even with your taxes at a resonable rate.

I also almost never buy ships. In the beginning I always set spending to %100 then I'll buy the first factory (or two) on my home world and the first planets that I settle. Then I generally let the planets produce things on their own. Even just doing that will drain your money pretty quick which is why it's important to find other civilizations and trade with them. In the beginning I prefer trading techs for techs rather than money but later in the game (during that first war phase) I'll just go for money and do research on my own.

The hardest part of the game is the part after that initial colony rush. In my view you only have a year or so to build up some base techs, get your economy rolling (again, at this point you will be nearly out of money), and then start building a war machine to challenge another race. You'll have to sell techs to get money in order to push spending up to build said war machine. Do it that way though, don't buy ships; I usually don't even alter the percentage going into military spending.

Build up your military put research into planetary invasion and build transports. While your doing that try to research down that line so you can win planets easily (it really sucks having to use two transports to wipe 5 billion people from a planet). Oh, and when your don't this make sure you take any good planets (naturally) and resources your enemy has. I generally don't finish them off though (but that's up to you).

The war phase is really important. It boosts your economy (through conquered planets). Also, you'll some of your enemies techs which is nice too. At this point I fortify and then decide where to go for victory.

Sorry, one more thing, a good way to pick a race to attack is to go for the race that's taking all of the crappy planets in your territory. Just start scouting their territory and start sending transports and support ships to their colonies. If you think you can, just go after the good planets. I usually skip the crappy planets they've settled in my territory if because if I have decent influence (as I usually do) they will rebel and join me anyway. Otherwise go after a reasonably strong race. You don't have much to benefit from by attacking weaker races.

Hope this helps....

The biggest thing might be Industrial Spending. If that's not set to 100% you will lose. End of story.

Not so, I just won a game without firing a single shot at any of the main races and with the weakest military on the map. The only ships that I had at the end were freighters, a few lucky rangers and one or two transports situated on planets close to minor races just in case I needed to take them out.

I followed a line of research that made me the economic and diplomatic giant, coupled with trade routes into every major race I soon had them eating out of my hand & was careful never to ally with any of them ( a sure way to get dragged into someone elses fight).

What I have found with the game however is that starting position is all important. If you play Torian for instance and get stuck next door to the Drengin at the start you can bet your shirt on them declaring war on you pretty quickly. Also the ethical leanings of the races appears only to start taking effect after quite a few turns, once played Terrans and the Altarians declared war on me after under 30 turns even though I had chosen the good option for each dillema I was faced with, this of course may be a bug, not sure.

For your very 1st turn set your flagship to auto-survey, build colony ship and buy it (keep doing this until you can't afford to buy another), set your tax rate to about 50% or 55% and arrange the sliders so that you are just making money (I usually focus mainly on research at this point). When you meet other races immediately start espionage against them, you don't need to invest a lot of money as long as at least some is invested. When you notice a minor race talk to them and trade for technology, they are usually pretty eager to please. Do not trade superior techs for inferior ones with the major races, this is like swapping a $100 bill for a $10 one. Read the text carefully when a major race asks you for money, sometimes they are not threatening you but simply asking for a little financial help and if you can afford it go ahead as it will improve your standing with that race significantly.

Engage in trade early as sending freighters to the major races also increases your standing with them as well as improving your finances ( they get money from the trade route as well and if there are enough of them they will take a financial hit by declaring war on you ).

Most importantly at the start of the game make sure that you are not left behind in the race for empty planets and when you find one it only costs about 150bc to buy a starport on it instead of waiting for it to be built

Good luck