I agree with most of the points you've made.
To me, the term "circle jerking," in the context of the STEEM blockchain, really applies only to large whales who upvote only their own posts, and those of their whale friends, and ignore everything and everyone else.
That does nothing for the blockchain, and serves no purpose, other than to rape the reward pool. That I believe needs to stop.
As for autovoting, I'm all for it, as I follow a number of quality trails, such as @tribesteemup, @thealliance, @naturalmedicine, @poetsunited and others, whose members consistently make high quality posts, but which I simply don't have enough time to curate manually.
I've been here a while, it will be two years next month, and yes, I've made friends whose posts I nearly always upvote, as they nearly always upvote mine. Being human, it's easy to miss a few. But again, we're making real posts that require effort, not for example a single unattributed photo or meme with zero text, which is my go-to example of a worthless post.
I've followed your posts for well over a year, and generally upvote yours as well . . . because you're a damned good photographer, which is one of my lifelong interests. ;-)
My average post is 1,000 words or more, and I have a number that are well over 3,000 words. But then, I was a writer long before STEEM existed, and my whole point in coming here was to create and expand readership for my work.
The vast majority of my STEEM was earned, though I have also bought in small amounts here and there. I've never powered down a cent.
And still my vote is worth well under one cent.
I wish I loved New Steem as you do. For me, the jury is still out, and it seemed pretty self-serving on the part of the whales. We'll see how it does over time.
I do wish the witnesses would have given at least 1% if nothing else to show support for the hit the authors took.
Of course I oppose the zero effort post. That is just sad and pathetic and diminishes the author in my eyes.
I agree completely, on both points.
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