Depends. I don't write for rewards, but to deal with the world :-D Still, it is awesome to see those 20+ notifications after writing a post, including some comments that I can answer. Especially when there's a big, genuine (not automatic) upvote among them, either from a personal account or a curating account. That means that my post was liked enough by someone who has a lot of weight, and hopefully criteria. In that way, it does matter.

Also when it comes to be able to reward others with my upvotes growing. Reading a great post and being able to give a bigger vote than a month ago is kind of great. And it only grows if I either buy HIVE, or get upvotes on my posts. So, in that way, it does matter, too.

But luckily, I never depended on HIVE rewards in any way, and never will. So in the long run, they don't matter to me.