so whomsoever may be powering up and down is directly accounted for
I'm sorry, I don't quite understand what you mean here. If, on a given day, a minnow powers up 5000 Steem Power, they'd get around 18.3M VESTS, correct? That's not a content creation or curation distribution, but a financial one, right? If, on that same day, a whale finishes the first distribution of a power down which began 7 days before (for example, Ned could have powered down $700k in value each week, at one point), then their VEST amount would decrease (again, not related to curation or creation of content). Though the overall power down process takes 104 weeks to fully complete, the weekly impact of a large account powering down is significant enough to matter, right?
Sorry if I'm still missing something there. Thanks for answering my questions! :) I've been thinking about this stuff in terms of who is cashing money out at exchanges and who is putting money in. If the financial side of things end up being more significant than the curation/creation reward side of things, that's important for us all to know about.
Ah, I see what you mean. These numbers aren't just about content creation or curation - It's the overall impact. Whether someone increases their Steem Power holding through rewards or powering up is irrelevant - their votes will still carry the same weight.
Perhaps you are looking for statistics regarding exactly how much influence is flowing directly from the whales to the minnows and the life? I'm afraid I don't know how to track that - perhaps someone can devise an automated tool to do so. I think each account's activity will need to be tracked individually to get a precise picture. That's a different topic though!
Ah, I see. I incorrectly thought you were addressing power redistribution instead of just distribution. I get that now.
Since I already typed this out, I'll just include it, but I see what you mean now that it's a separate discussion:
When discussing redistribution, it can only happen in three ways, as far as I understand:
When analyzing the overall distribution, I think it's important to clarify which aspects are impacting it the most. If we create the picture, for example, that curation and content rewards are the primary driver of redistribution, and later we find out powering up and down (again, I don't know if that's the case, just giving an example) is far more significant, then I feel that's an important aspect of the redistribution discussion. Incomplete information could lead to incorrect expectations and, ultimately, frustration.
I hope someone can track that activity overall so we can have a better picture of how the money moves around over time given the various inputs to redistribution.
Thanks again for your answers and this great post!
It is relevant when you put forth theories about who is gaining or losing share and why. Are dolphins gaining due to rewards or buying in (powering up of SBD is some combination of these two)? Is the slowdown in orcas due to a slow down of reward earnings or have they stopped investing or increased power downs? These are all interesting and relevant questions. Not disagreeing that just the distribution numbers on their own are potentially important, but many times they raise more questions than they answer.