For once in my life I was in the right place at the right time. I hope you get to experience this. The key usually is being an early adopter. Have you heard of Panjea? It's a new social media platform built on the AlephZero blockchain. It's still in the testing-phase but you can sign up and be amongst the first users. Most of these projects fizzle out but you never know!
Yes, the whale-voting cabals have been a thing since the beginning but I'm sure they've changed throughout the years. It used to be that most whales/witnesses really curated their voting lists and just didn't put them on "autopilot" to be exploited. I'm not sure how it is now though. I haven't gotten consistently substantial payouts since 2018 or so. Every now and then I'll get a few larger upvotes but it doesn't happen much at all anymore. I do remember the Curie vote! There were a few like that and it was exciting when you were chosen.
You're right. I guess the real problem with the "perceived value" proposition I described is only a handful of accounts carry enough voting weight to make a real difference. I see some posts with massive numbers of votes but small payouts and vice versa. I suppose there is the same profound inequality here as there is in the real world. I think the creation of communities were an attempt to help mitigate that inequality but the communities will take time to build up their wallets.
The fake/disingenious comments really irk me, probably more than anything else on the platform right now. They harm the legitimacy of Hive more than most people realize. I guess I've been too nice about it. I always second guess if people have language barriers and are really making an honest effort. I imagine if they're not bots they'll disappear shortly after the comment upvotes stop.
Thanks, I feel the same way. There are a handful of people (you amongst them) who keep me around here. I don't post nearly as often as I used to but if I'm away for more than a handful of days Hive calls me back. Mainstream social media is so ruled by algorithms and ads now that post visibility is almost non-existent unless you pay for outreach or spend most of your waking hours interacting on the platforms so I appreciate that at least our writing is being seen.