With all the negativity of curation bots, consolidated SP, etc. lately things like this are inspirational in my opinion.
Not only on the part of @smooth who seems to put in the personalized, extra effort (as some of the other whales) enhancing the 'human' side of curation, but also those content creator themselves that asked to have payouts reduced preferring it to be spread to others.
Inspiring acts like these need to be on a feed somewhere for the community to see and ideally strive for. Leaving the voting debate aside, it's the sentiment that needs to be shown. I'm not against anyone making money, but I truly appreciate those times people choose the non-monetary gain.