Sadly, I'm coming around to this point of view on HF19. At first, I was very encouraged by the additional voting power, and thought it could make a huge difference to those trying to grow out of the minnow pool. But the reward pool shrinkage has dampened my enthusiasm. If I understand it correctly, that pool depends on interactions, and it seems pretty clear that the hardfork has decreased voting to a substantial degree.
My hope was that a reduction in voting would lead to an increase in commenting, but that also doesn't seem to have happened. On balance, I don't know that HF19 helped a great deal. Surely linear power is a step in the right direction, but the downside of reduced interaction and more autovorotic--love the term--has blunted the impact of that improvement. Sad.
Still, nothing to be done but what was smart all along--keep producing good content, interact, and vote for the good guys. It isn't as if it will take LONGER now to get out of the minnow pool.