For example a quadratic function in votes, i.e., someone with twice the votes of someone else should receive four times the payout and someone with three times the votes should receive nine times the payout
To comment on this, I think this Idea is better than what we have now. However, I already foresee ( the same people draining the rewards ) making multiple accounts to upvote their main account. So in a way it won't really solve the problem that much but at least it is an extra step for the abuser to take rather than seeing how simple it is now to upvote themselves for $$$ with posts and comments with equal to no value.
On a side note, I really enjoyed reading this. Very enlightening and hope to see more posts like this. A view of a whale looking out for minnows :)
That's always struck me as odd too. I get how you wouldn't want two accounts, with half your net worth in each upvoting each other (under a quadratic model), but you could have one account with 100%, upvoting an empty sock puppet account, getting the full amount, either pre or post hf19.
Oh yeah that makes sense too.