adam, as far as I know (indeed it is really hard to understand thoroughly):
- the ability to make a difference depends on: SP level (most crucial), your voting power when you vote, the level of payout of the voted post, and, I guess, the price of steem - this one is from my experience but not 100% sure.
- when I had around 2000 SP, I started to see a 0.01 impact (for a near zero payout post) but now my influence is almost the same - so I guess Steem price matters
- I actually want to propose to Steemit showing payout to third decimal place - letting the level to 'make a difference' 10 times smaller without changing anything. But I think this will affect minnows' perception and less frustration, which is really important. If you agree with me, you are welcome to write a post about it as I do not have time for several weeks to come. Actually steemstats.com already shows the impact of upvote to the thrid decimal place.
Thanks @deanliu. Really important points and it leads to a discussion as to how to increase participation. Whilst we have 100,000 accounts, steemd.com shows many, many less active users
I'm not sure how it works but @mauricemikkers the author of the Steemdollar.com site has an area that lists dollar value per 100% vote (link to post): http://steemdollar.com/dollar_per_vote.php
yeah, I know. but somehow it doesn't reflect reality currently... not even close. take me as an example, Its number is 16 times larger than reality.