The issue of fairness, especially when it comes to compensation for work, is an interesting question. I think everyone has a different opinion of what is “fair”. For many, fair would mean that a doctor that saves someone’s life would be compensated far more than someone who can kick or hit a ball. And yet athletes make exponentially more than that doctor. But athletes are the holder of a scarce resource that many people find has value. This includes me as I pay to watch athletes while I do not pay to see doctors do a life saving operation. But if someone did want to pay to see an operation or wanted to donate money to a hospital, I would say “Cool. I hope they get joy from that.” Perhaps a better example would be the fact that I pay to watch professional basketball but would never pay to watch soccer (futbol). Again I would never stand outside a soccer stadium and scream “Booooooo you’re giving too much money to soccer players! Now there is less left for basketball players.” But that is what sometimes happens on hive. People downvote because they don’t think others should like something as much. To me, that is just very odd. Different people see value in different things. I tend to vote for things on hive not because of a person’s demographics but because I want to reward behavior I think is positive. I reward people who try to be creative and who do not plagiarize, do not write things that pull others down, and write things some regular people might find interesting. I then vote people who leave comments as I think that is a cool thing for people to do. It especially helps little people just starting out. Maybe someone disagrees with that. But that is what I value. In the real world I’m allowed to direct my attention where I want while others do the same. But with downvoting here, a person can very easily say “Don’t direct your attention there!” And if they have enough of a stake, they can overrule my desires. That is one of the things I do not think is fair. If a person with a large stake likes something different, it is very understandable that they would vote on something different and assign a bigger part of the reward pool to that. They have a bigger scoop so they give a bigger piece of the pool. But it is simply bizarre (emotionally) that they can also use that bigger scoop to take away from what I think is deserving. For me, that is the hardest thing to explain to a person who might consider investing in hive. “You can vote on what you really like and want to see more of. But a person with a bigger stake can say ‘no. You can’t value that as much as you did.” Although the reward pool may work logically, that reality is emotional and unpleasant for most humans. The “I can’t like what I like” is a huge way to scare off regular people. This becomes even more important when you factor in the fact that curation rewards are impacted. “I need to vote 11 times a day to keep ahead hive inflation. I found 11 things I liked. But someone with a bigger stake did not think I should like them that much so they negated my curation rewards. Now I can’t earn hive for liking what I like. Yeah that feels unpleasant. I’m out.” And to be clear, I 100% understand all of the logical arguments for how the reward pool works. But the vast majority of human beings, operate on emotion and/or logic. If logic were the only thing that mattered doctors would be paid more than basketball players. So if we ever want to attract “regular” people to hive, we have to stop gate keeping and saying “you can only use hive if you only think about it logically.” We have to accept that emotion matters.