I agree with you @liberosist .
I have been here since June of this year and I must say that I have been curated once by curie.. I really post good contents but being noticed is the hardest part. I write a blog for so many hours and big whales do not notice me at all. I have joined a community and that at least helped me earn a reward.

I did buy votes from a bot only to get noticed although I knew it´s a lost investment..let´s say if you invest 1 liquid SBD to a bot, and you would get an upvote for $1.40.... the margin of $0.40 is minimal which will still change within the 7 day period before pay out. You´ll have to share 25% of that $1.40 to your curators which is $0.35. What is left is $1.05 , so why should one give a liquid $1 SBD to a bot if the ROI is only $.05. and the authors 1.05 would have to be split 50/50 Steem and SP. It is a bad investment and besides, I am not even sure whether I get noticed at all. The really best thing to do is write good content and join communities. I don´t use bot anymore. The question is where are the big whales when the noobs needed their curation and upvotes? There were big issues and discussions raised recently about the big whales being given huge amounts of SP and they, big whales upvoted each other using SP delegated to them. Isn´t that Abuse of power?