I'm not at all married to the concept of paying people with inflated currency in order to mitigate the effects of inflating the currency. So on that, we can reach agreement.
What I find, however, is that most of the ideas that are suggested or proposed never address the purpose of the incentives or how to balance the rewards structure for both authors and voters/investors. Many of the solutions focus on how more rewards can be given away to those who have no desire or need to be invested in the system. The original ratio was 50/50 for authors/curators. It was changed to 75/25, with an added reverse auction to mitigate automated voting, which ended up creating the 88/12 average.
So to me, the first step for increasing demand for STEEM and more participation in the platform for a larger number of users would be to increase the rewards/incentives for those who are not and have no desire to be bloggers. If we want to eliminate the SP "interest," then that should be the next logical step. Increase rewards for those who actually take a long-term approach and want to be influential and involved in the day-to-day activities on the platform.
And as far as centralized development is concerned - as I already stated, Steemit, Inc. hasn't exactly demonstrated that increasing/improving development is their goal. They have stated explicitly that their flagship site likely won't be improved beyond "just good enough." If they want more money than the many millions of dollars they already have, then they should demonstrate that this money will actually be used for development, marketing, etc.
I can live with eliminating the 15% inflation/distribution altogether...if curation rewards for SP holders were brought back to 1:1 with author rewards. We need less money flowing out and more incentive for more users. Votes will always outnumber posts. Voters will always outnumber bloggers. The focus should probably be more on the average reader/voter and not the average content creator. That's where the real growth lies. Well, that...and having an attractive UI that people actually want to use.
Yes, I'm glad we align in our view that using a bit of the inflation to pay an amount to mitigate inflation is pretty inefficient.
I think we both recognize that rewards on this platform has to revolve around creating, discovering, curating, maintaining good content and the platform/s necessary for such actions. Other forms of arbitrary rewards like a direct pro rate inflation of currency, or a random lottery that are not directly promoting those above effects are probably sub optimal.
You make a strong argument that the balance between authorship and curation is too skewed to the author at an effective rate of 88%. I am inclined to agree here. My initial instinct is that 50/50 would be a little too heavy on the curators side and perhaps insufficient motivation for authors to create quality content, and maybe something close to a 75/25 effective split would be closer to the mark.
Having discussed it in chat however, it appears I'm in the minority here and that most ppl would rather see a stronger balance towards curation more in line with what you've suggested. Perhaps my lack of experience and authorship bias is compromising my judgement here, as it is sort of an initial gut instinct. Either way I do agree it needs to go down from 88%
As for steemit,inc I feel that they do work hard and Steem's success is heavily dependent on them for the foreseeable future. I've already put forward my case as strongly as possible, but it is quite reasonable to remain unpersuaded.
Ultimately real growth lies from a well functioning streamlined platform/s with easily accessible top quality content. This requires talent that's willing to create that content, people willing to discover and make that content more accessible, and developers to make and improve the platform. The incentive balance we eventually get probably won't satisfy everyone perfectly, but hopefully satisfies most people sufficiently, and on point enough to lead a bright future for Steem
Thanks for sharing your thoughts @ats-david, I enjoy your posts