I personally never use my DV power, nor is mine tied to any kind of voting chain. Neither is my upvote power for that matter. Before using a DV it would be better to communicate, I see people who leave Hive because they've become the target of a DV chain. Often they receive little or no communication from the initiator of the chain, and if they are new to Hive they're not going to be able to figure out how to stop it much less communicate with the initiator.
DV definitely doesn't silence anyone, but it does demonetize them which can be very dangerous for us as a collective. It it's someone who is a serial plagiarizer, a stalker, or consistently attacking someone unreasonably without a reasonable discussion the DV should be used. We are seeing to many people driven off of Hive though because of these DV chains, our goal should be to grow Hive and not push people away unless they are truly toxic.
!hiqvote
Yeah. I champion this a lot too. I was getting my posts zeroe everyday for over 6 months and by zero, I mean I was completely wiped out everyday. If it was a new user they might probably left in the second week. However these people will not stop the DV no matter what. They'd basically say it's an expensive of their will and all that.
It's just like the issue of the DHF, it's a concern but then it's a bit controversial, so.
I think the DVs have decreased though, it was notoriously bad q year or two ago.
It's a good thing they have, they really drive people away. If they would communicate rather than DV... It sucks that they put you through that for more than six months. Not only is it rude, it was damaging to you economically. A less patient person would have jumped ship and it would be another loss to Hive!
I understand the system and I knew it was a personal vendetta from one person and not truly Hive's fault by any means. It's why I think that it's better to tell a new user why they're downvoting them rather than doing it without communicating with them.