Before I created my Hive account last year, I had this misconception that Hive is a place where "only the whales get the bigger rewards." This was background information I had from people on some of the l blogging platforms I used back then. On most occasions, when discussing the Hive platform, there were usually remarks like 'Hive is a platform built for the whales and their friends to self-reward, and unless you have connection to a whale account holder, your contributions are unlikely to get you anywhere within this system.
Even on Hive, some users, especially newbies, believe that only those who have money to invest in HIVE or other community layer 2 tokens are the only ones that earn good rewards on Hive. However, this misconception is worth clarifying. As someone who has been on Hive for over a year now, I have had the privilege to interact with notable Hive authors, who shared with me their humble beginnings as an encouragement for me to work hard and stay committed.
The common striking point in our interactions is that they didn't invest a dime but had to grind harder and stay committed to engagement and creating valuable content that gave them the exposure they needed to attract value for their work.
Even two days ago, a prominent Hiver pinged me on this matter in a reply to my thread. He even went as far as pointing out a Hiver author who grinded it all out from the bottom until he found what works for him that is giving him the desired rewards. From my experience within the time I have been on this platform, I have seen a newbie introduction post that earned over $100. With this, I think I can confidently tell anyone that "only the whales get the bigger rewards" is only a misconception that is baseless and untrue.
Talking about the whales or the big account holders, we must first of all know that Hive is a Blockchain, not just a blogging platform. As a Blockchain, it has its native coin called HIVE, and every Blockchain coin needs investors to grow and succeed. HIVE has its investors which are independent from writers on the Hive platform. Anyone can be an investor and may not have anything to do with the social blogging aspects of the platform.
However, there's a connection between investors and the Hive blogging platform. The reward pool is designed in such a way that to earn on your post you must be curated by others, and the HIVE Power (HP) of the curator determines the size of the reward their votes can give. Moreover, the reward is sprint in two by 50 to 50 percent ratios. 50% payout to the post author, and 50% to the curator.
It's therefore very logical for anyone including writers with enough HIVE to power them up and earn curation reward rather than just leaving their coins sitting in wallets waiting for the bull market to make some profits. By actively engaging on the platform and curating posts that they find worthy of their votes, they each are rewarded for their time and from their investment. This is why you have the big accounts that we call whales that have higher vote value payout. So, the assumption that Hive is all about the whales rewording themselves do not hold ground. It's baseless and unjustifiable.
The Hive platform is a community centric platform. You need to be a community player to get the best from the platform. It doesn't matter how good you are as a content writer or what influence you have elsewhere. Once you join the Hive platform you must play by the rules, and top of these rules is joining a community of your interest. Each community has their curation trail, which is a sort of communal combined investment to curate their members posts and reward them for their participation in the community. You cannot just expect to be noticed in the community except you let them know you are there by engaging with others.
Engagement plays a key role on Hive, it's a medium where you have the chance to announce yourself to the community and get your content to be seen by others, and possibly get a few votes organically. Hive is not a platform where you get tipped on your post by a bot as soon as you drop your content. The curation trail may resemble a bot from a glance, but until someone says yes or approves a particular post no community curation votes comes in, to a post.
Some Community may have their own native tokens for rewarding community members in addition to what they get from the Hive reward pool. Members are encouraged to invest in these tokens, but it's not obligatory or compulsory for anyone to invest. However, those who invested in those tokens get more respect in the community than those who are only takers. In such an environment, it's not a bias to see some people getting more value than others, because they are the stakeholders and deserve to be rewarded for not just the quality of their content but for standing for the community project.
I consider the Hive platform as a fruit bearing tree that produces different kinds of fruits. They say do not put all your eggs in one basket, but Hive in my own opinion is a basket you can safely put all your eggs in and have no need to worry about brokages. There are lots of earning opportunities for people to take advantage of. Even if you don't have anything to do with the social blogging aspects of the platform, you can still earn good rewards.
Hive has a great savings system that is not only secured but also pay good dividend or ROI. The stablecoin HBD's savings system pays a mouth watering ROI of 20% APY on any amount saved, and there is no limit to the time you can keep your funds saved and earn APY rewards. The best you can find in the web 3 ecosystem today. Those who save in HIVE also earn a dividend on their savings. Moreover, a lot of layer 2 tokens are also on Hive where you earn daily rewards by simply stacking those tokens. You get this payout daily just for holding those tokens in the form of powering up. Also, the more tokens you stack or power up, the higher your vote value in those communities.
In conclusion, anyone saying that Hive is a platform where "only the whales get the bigger rewards" need to have a rethink. It can only be so for a person who does not understand how Hive works, and for people who have not truly explored the features of this platform. As a person who has tried over a dozen of web 3 social blogging platforms, I can confidently say that the Hive platform is the best I have seen on Web 3 in terms of rewards, longevity, and community building.
A platform fully decentralized, built for the community by the community. Four solid years of rewarding community without fail and still growing. Hive is truly for everyone!
A submission for the #juneinleo daily writing prompts.