This isnt the market speaking, it was a variety of other whales who got together and supported you becasue your presence here was determined beneficial to the platform
That is the market speaking. The whales are part of the market. It was also the market speaking when he got downvoted (by bernie first and then some other whales too). Works both ways.
I agree with you up to a point (esp the part about how his upvotes and downvotes all came from the same system). When i think market forces, i think the wisdom of crowds, decentralization etc. 6 or 7 guys isnt a "market force" its just 6 or 7 guys.
What i should have said was "your success wasn't based on your broad appeal to the steemit userbase, or a widespread appreciation for your content, but to the support of a very small number of individuals"
and yeah like you said, it was also a very small number of individuals who negated some of that success.
It was both really. HIs posts got 800-900 votes each, which is close to the high end of what any post ever gets (I think there were a few over 1000).
That goes back to the whole exposure debate. IMO, once a post gets "pinned" to the enrty page by high earnings, the votes it gets don't really act as an accurate market gauge.
that said, i think things are getting better.. ive definitely seen an improvement over the past several days.