You could also, you know, try not being so fake.
You're talking about reducing the awards on a post because you disagree with how much it's earned, but you're sucking a huge amount of money out for a feature you're literally plagiarizing.
Think I'm joking? The feature you describe was here for the first couple of months your account was active, are you really going to claim you forgot?
https://github.com/steemit/steem/issues/500
This is why I mentioned confusion and you downvoted me when I asked for clarification. But whatever.
Do you honestly feel like this post is worth so much?
Does this post really warrant the > $560 you've earned so far?
You're paying for tons of upvotes, then you are flagging many of the commentators to the point where they don't earn anything, just because it's a bot letting you know it voted for you. Doesn't that seem abusive to you?
To add to the intrigue https://steemit.com/@transisto/transfers shows you're receiving money from your delegations to the upvote bots, the very ones whose comments you are flagging. You'd actually earn more if you weren't flagging your own income sources every time they say hello. Is it really that hard for people who don't like the "bot spam" to use the mute button? Is seeing a "Thank you for buying your own upvotes because you couldn't earn organically" message offensive enough to your sensibilities to warrant a flag?
You're aware I wrote a bot from scratch to automate certain tasks such as curation and to leave some sort of message letting you know I'm reading the article, and while the AI isn't really making relevant comments for the most part at the moment she is just a tool to allow me to earn money because my posts aren't. She is upvoting and leaving a comment as a sort of bookmark because trending is mess and I'd like to earn a little bit by getting in there before it trends. I'm not trying to say I'm entitled to rewards at all. But it is shocking that I can't compete with posts like yours because you're paying for upvotes and I don't have money to buy significant steem nor do I have a following. Whether my posts are quality or not I guess is debatable. But if you weren't buying upvotes and instead let your post stand on its own merits then maybe I'd have a shot, who knows. But you're flagging me all over the place and it doesn't even make sense.
Do you really have nothing to do with your whale account except follow me around and downvote my comments whether my bot leaves them or I leave them personally, thereby negating my ability to earn for my work and my engagement? Is that a more profitable strategy for you? If so then please just be honest and admit that taking from others is a thing that has been working for you and others financially. Maybe everyone should try it. I can publish a free blacklist / flag bot as easily as I can write my cheery little upvote and comment bot. Imagine what a swarm of those would do to the wealth redistribution. Why go there though?
I'm thinking a better solution is a change to way rewards are calculated. Really there needs to be a per posting cap. My god is any post on this site really worth more than $5.00? Anything beyond that should just go to null. At that point there wouldn't be any reason at all to flag because of so called "disagreement with rewards" and it's still plenty of money especially for a posting of this caliber. It would drive more people to post more often because there would be a much more of the limited rewards pie to go around.
There should also be a differentiation between Flagging, "spam, morally reprehensible etc" and an "I disagree with what you're saying button".
I wonder what it would take to implement those and if a PR would be accepted or is the establishment too ensconced in drinking their haterade to realize that Flagging, Downvoting and Rewards should all be separate considerations and this failure to separate those concerns is a real attrition driver.
Is my comment which is longer than your article and in complete disagreement with you, going to earn your ire via retaliatory flagging or is it worth your upvote?