I really would like to see that experimented.
I find that an appealing suggestion. Leaving it up to the user actually seems to me to be a kind of inbuilt code of honour, where people are perhaps more likely to behave in a way that motivates them to give an accurate self-assessment of their published content. Rather than engaging in wishful thinking that mediocre/low effort content should be rewarded in a wonderful way. Although I would still say that, for example, visual material that is generally considered "valuable" because it is a contemporary testimony or other "low effort" products at first glance are not at second or third glance. The same applies the other way round: postings that appear elaborate at first glance can be quick and superficial products.

Thinking of widening/varying the functions here, I often thought about experiments with the "buttons", like for example to switch my user habit from the voting scale (preference method) into something different, the method of "least resistance".
On a scale of 0-10, one decides what resistance they experience towards a posting. Where one decides upon the least resistance, one gives a 0. Where one decides upon the most resistance (pain), one gives a 10. All values in between are given by feeling.

I think that would lead to significantly different results in the overall outcome of a posting and change as well the payout results (in the background, a 10 would correspond to a one to zero percent vote and a 0 resistance would correspond to a 100 % upvote).

Are you in the position to be able to code something like that and run it as an experiment?