Yes, the contests help a lot. It brings out the best in us, and can actually help us find our talents as well. When you have so little Steem power on your first day, it seems impossible to get anywhere. Even small contests mean a lot to plankton, as the curation rewards tend to reward the bigger accounts, even if your vote is timed perfectly. Thanks for posting this.
Yes, the whole system is set up to reward users in a top-down fashion. I think I may start doing some things with @steembounty and see how that works for users.
Very true, I wrote a proposed change to the curation rewards here, that I think would be awesome. https://busy.org/@giddyupngo/if-i-could-change-one-thing-about-steem-better-curation-rewards-for-plankton
Not a bad idea to be honest. Everything is built top down as it is that is why we have 1 million accounts signed up and roughly 50k using them and you have to guess 20k of them are bots of some sort.
I think the numbers speak for themselves, people feel slighted when they join. The biggest advantage to retaining new members and giving them a chance is bid bots, if we are going to be honest about things.
I agree, thanks for reading it, hope the idea gains some traction. Bounties may be a way to make things more fair in the mean time. I may have to try one. Take care.