I'm following along to see what juicy bits of information you may uncover. I imagine digging through and sorting blockchain data is not a fun task.
On a side note: If I'm not mistaken, using # in front of your memo makes it private from the Steemit UI, just as a way to hide the message from general view. But of course, it would still be recorded and visible in the chain for those who know how to find it or other sites using the chain data that don't apply the # rule to their UI. So that in itself is not always a sign of wrong-doing, but could be used as a low level mask for general users who don't know any better.
That's totally true but, as you say, it's being hided to the general public. Why would be the reason you would hide almost 500k worth of Steem to the regular user? Starting with the fact that -hypothetically-
you were in a 50k voting circle. I think that is only a piece in this weird-ass puzzle.
That is true - technically there is NO reason to hide memos considering it's all on the chain as a record. Bring on some more puzzle pieces :-)