Yes you are right @kudgar. The few bucks that don't hurt either one are essentially a gift from @ned and @dan.
None of us deserve any sort of reward. A place to voice our opinions without censorship of ideas by a large entity it a reward in itself. Yes whales can make content less visible, but they do not erase it.
Whales votes are like giving some people a megaphone and others laryngitis. Most people will hear what people are saying on the megaphones, but if you listen closely you can make out what those with laryngitis are whispering.
The money we get for content is a simple bonus on top of this and people shouldn't feel enraged to "lose" money that wasn't theirs to begin with.
The payout system could change tomorrow and posts could be capped at $5. Some would leave and take content elsewhere, but many would stay. If steemit were solely about making as much money as possible by any means, it will become corrupt and cliques and groups will form that attempt to destroy one another.
So far the developers and those heavily invested have shown that they care about their userbase and rely on us to continue to create content and generously reward us all for doing this.
I have no complaints from earning over $1,500 on a $0 investment. My total time on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube has left me with my initial investment of $0 for as many hundreds of hours I have spent there making the founders rich.
Sounds like the definition of a Feudal system. So does everybody basically have to blow @berniesanders on a regular basis to make any money on here? I have to say I am very dis-enchanted with what I've seen on Steemit. If this is the future of crypto, ugghhh.. We've replaced a handful of oligarchs who own the real political-economy with a handful of obligarchs who own the crypto economy. They set the rules. They shut people down. How is this different form the default world? It appears worse to me because there is ZERO accountability and they are totally anonymous.
Its ironic that he goes by the name bernie sanders, a socialist, when sounds like he is promoting tyranny.
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