Are you fine with people just upvoting you to get the curation rewards? If they never comment then you don't know their motivation. Downvoting to adjust rewards was in the Steem white paper from the very start, so I assume you were aware that is part of the mechanics of the platform. What you have been making it not typical at all and I know plenty of creative people who make a lot less and probably work just as hard. Hive is not 'fair'.
The whales have generally invested money and time in the platform. They could easily have left when things were not looking great, but they have stuck with us. You may not see all the good they do. There can be selfish whales too.
I expect you can continue to earn well if you stick with it, but stakeholders are allowed to adjust your rewards. I suspect it has a lot to do with ranchorelaxo, whoever that is.
Well it very often has absolutely nothing to do with rancho because I don't get rancho votes but have gotten three downvotes in a row from smooth, edicted got 4 in a row, and I have checked and a plethora of his downvotes are not countering rancho, while at the very same time he upvotes other rancho content, it's time people stop peddling this misconception that his votes are being given out to counter ranchorelaxo and haejin whoever they are.
If people truly think rewards are disproportionate, go upvote small payout posts, not punish users for being rewarded for good content that oftentimes has users who like it so much they leave tips, even reblogged posts that have good engagement! As it is, smooth has proven he downvotes not only to adjust rewards, but also based purely on content he doesn't like, when he downvotes those who challenge his methods, even when such posts are not making big rewards at all...
It may be written into the white paper / code / whatever, that doesn't make it good or honorable or beneficial to the growth of the platform. Many laws in many countries make immoral behavior 'legal', but it doesn't make it right.
People who work hard to make both original and well-sourced content are leaving, people are discouraging potential new members from joining, and people who see such behavior as unwelcoming are going elsewhere because of such behavior, and if the other whales and devs and programmers don't do something to discourage this as a norm or get rid of the built in function that encourages such power abuse, this platform will implode or at the least become stagnant and barren of the growth it initially had. I hope people who truly care about growth and sustainability of this blockchain that has much potential can see that.
Well I still think downvotes need to be more accepted as normal on Hive. I was making guesses at what smooth was doing, but you can ask him for yourself. Maybe he disagrees with your opinions. At least you can express them freely here and earn.
I see your posts still made far more than most people, so is it really so bad, whatever the reason? It would look better if some of those 'old guard' who always make a lot from auto votes also got some big downvotes to adjust their rewards.
Others may see you complaining when you make $50+ and they are lucky to get $5 even when their content is great. What counts as 'fair'? Hive is a tiny community for now, but I do want to see it grow. That can be driven by a better distribution of rewards.
!ENGAGE 20
Thanks for your thoughtful response, and I will also elaborate and respond to some of your thoughts and concerns on the matter.
First off, this isn't about me, I was only made aware of smooth downvotes to lower rewards because of his hitting my posts multiple times in a row causing me to research the issue, but this is a prolific pattern and he has taken rewards down on many, many other posts, and downvotes by him and others is driving people from the platform, that is why I am trying to raise awareness.
I and many others have asked him and only receive generic answers about subjective lowering of rewards, but then downvote actions contradict that statement because he gives out punitive downvotes on posts that challenge the ethics of downvoting when they aren't high payout posts and other patterns are pretty clear as well.
Because of this lack of transparency and refusal to make clear the reasoning behind his tactics, I hear many theorize as to why smooth downvotes, and based on my research these reasons are not the case very much of the time, so I am just attempting to share what I have learned so people can stop spreading these misconceptions, for it isn't just you, many others are under the impression he is downvoting to counter autovotes, but if you look at the biggest voters on my posts, they are not autovotes, they don't vote all of my posts, and their vote weight is adjusted from post to post.
Also, I am not complaining about my payout rewards, I feel blessed to often get amazing rewards on here, that was not always the case for a long time, and it was only due to consistent engagement and posting, countless hours of research and writing and video creation involved on hundreds of posts to reach that point, so sorry if I don't feel that if others want to support my work, I shouldn't get what they want to award me based upon their own discretion.
If the point is to cap rewards at a certain payout, then cap rewards with the code so nobody can make more than $50 or $100 or whatever limit is decided, but as it is tons of people frequently make huge payouts over $100 and never get a downvote by smooth, while many others get downvotes with posts under $100 that weren't even on trending.
I wish I had more hive power to reward those people I support who make less than me, I often reblog what are in my opinion exceptional posts, but I am not financially rich, and crypto 'donations' are my primary means of income at the moment, so yes it is demoralizing when a whale comes along and on multiple posts in a row dings rewards with -$20 to -$40 downvotes (even higher for others) without any explanation as to why accompanying it in the comments, despite the posts having tips, comments, reblogs and clearly are supported by many real people who wanted to support the content with their wallets. Isn't the possibility to eventually gain a following and get higher rewards an incentive to be worked towards and supported in order to encourage growth, rather than something that is shunned for most, but encouraged for others in the 'in crowd')?
This isn't about the amount of money being rewarded or diminished by votes, this is about the fact that whales can come along and take away rewards that others have consciously decided to give users based on their own choice and use of power based on their own investment in the platform, and the fact that this is done to so many others and not just myself.
'better distribution of rewards' can be accomplished by whales upvoting those small $1-5 posts with great content that you reference here, but that is absolutely not what is happening in this case, and this is what I take issue with, that the supposed need for downvotes does not match up with the reality of how downvotes and upvotes are actually given out by these downvoters. Instead of supporting vastly under-rewarded content, the few upvotes given to others by smooth are dished out to high payout trending posts (from what I have seen, there may be a few exceptions, but he downvotes far more than upvotes apart from posts funding his own project), with all the rest going to his own project by repeat voting on spam comments which earning go to his hbd-stabilizer account, and from which he rakes in curation rewards. So I do not buy the claim that 'better distribution of rewards' is driving smooth downvotes, on the contrary, and I do not see downvotes as accomplishing better distribution of rewards at all, because the only way the best distribution can be accomplished is by people supporting and sharing good under-rewarded content, not punishing users for being well rewarded for great content while others who spend much less time and energy on posts are making even higher rewards at the very same time.
To even say that a few Hive elitists should, due solely because of their immense holdings in Hive, have the ability to determine what is and is not acceptable payout, and be in charge of what constitutes 'better distribution of rewards', is tyrannical at its root, extremely subjective determination that will vary from user to user (with vast majority of users not having the stake to weigh in or counter downvote they disagree with) and it is the reason such behavior is driving users away. This alone should cause all supporters of downvotes to re-think their position, because it is driving users making good content to other platforms. That is a far bigger concern to me and many others attempting to raise awareness and spark debate on this issue, than getting slightly lower rewards on a couple of posts. If you think that's what this is all about, you have misread my intentions, and hopefully I have now made them clear.
I think what can drive growth on here is a friendlier and healthier environment that encourages good rewards for good content, instead of penalizing and discouraging it with rampant subjective downvoting by users who refuse to clearly lay out the reasons for downvotes and who refuse to leave explanatory comments in the posts they downvote. I would say a great step in the right direction would be to only allow downvote if accompanied by a post explaining reason for downvote, and also a function requiring the downvoter to manually select the reason for downvote from the list of 4 main reasons given. Next step remove 'disagreement over rewards' as a valid reason, it generally only serves as cover for punitive downvotes based on disagreement of opinion and encourages power abuse. My personal proposal would be to give every user equal downvote value, the only way to harness 'wisdom of the crowd' in flagging content, so that hive power weight amount only determines upvote value, while all users have an equal say when it comes to flagging and determining 'proper' distribution of rewards, as obviously there will be disagreement of opinion over what constitutes best distribution possible, and if everyone had an equal say, it would make things much more fair it would seem. No doubt such a function will never get implemented, but hey, it's worth throwing ideas out there in hopes of changing something in some way so as to help retain some of the users who are on the fence at this moment about leaving in response to rampant downvoter abuse, not only by smooth but a small number of others as well.
A 1000mv voting limit fixes this.
Cool, maybe programmers will institute this or many of the other viable options that have been suggested to counter such abuse into the code. Until then it is just a reality of the blockchain we all must live with, which is fine, just sad such behavior is driving away good content creators and discouraging new users on an otherwise thriving and growing platform
Not as code, but as custom.
If the 33 accounts impacted by a 1000mv limit voted with all their strength now they would suck up all the rewards, so it's not like they don't already exercise constraint.
It is much better than when we had the n2.
If we had this 1000mv limit, we could look at bringing that back as a superior content finder.
I doubt anybody that can afford to pay a dev is likely to pay him in order to cut his own paydays out of the code, seems a bit much to ask, but if the crowd calls for it, probably should give it to them.
If everybody leaves, they can keep their coins for all the good it will do them.
If Satoshi had kept it all we wouldn't even know what btc was.
Hive could be a faucet handing out whole btc's in 2009, if we play the cards right.
Hive is designed so that those who have a stake through investment or other means have the biggest say. That is important in dealing with abuse and I have downvoted plenty, with some retaliation. I don't want good people to be driven away. If some large accounts were enforcing a general rewards cap that might be better. That is their personal choice. As long as smooth is not taking all rewards from posts that have some value I do not think it is as big an issue as some make out. I cannot speak for him on how he makes the judgement.
I do have a fairly big stake and it is largely used to support smaller accounts as well as dealing with abuse. I want the best for Hive.
ENGAGEtokens.