Wouldn't say a downvote is censorship at all. It's a reputational hit, for sure within this realm.
Content that gets upvotes or an upvote from a prominent HP holder tends to become more viral and possibly most importantly - read.
A post with only 5 upvotes and generating less than .01 HBD after 12 hours is likely being read by only 1-2 people maximum.
If I see a prominent community member upvote a post of mine, I generally know that I'll see a lot of tag-along botted upvotes to follow and that there will be people who choose to read it since it hits trending or hot.
The content on here is generally all over the place and the quality varies GREATLY, but the upvotes do not necessarily reward quality or anything that would necessarily spark discussion. One of the limitations is that some of the content would be more suited for a blockchain version of Instagram rather than a blog post. The forced interconnected nature of the community is something that needs to be addressed to improve the quality of this experience.
PeakD/Hive.Blog should be more like a blockchain answer to Medium/SubStack. In a way, the centralization effort of OCD has done more harm than good in this case. Breaking up the content and promoting different avenues that are within the Hive blockchain is the way to go. Some communities/tribes may be wise to reinvent themselves rather than just merely being a carbon copy of what already exists, but with a separate token to be earned.
Gangs benefit their leaders the most, and disadvantage everybody not willing to join.
I've been pointing this out to them since 2017.
You can imagine their response.