The 'bots' have distorted what Steem is. It is really hard for anything to trend without buying votes, but then we get a lot of people doing that on junk posts, so trending is useless. It also allows them to get a crazy rep without real community engagement. I don't know if HF21 will be good for me, but if it makes buying votes less profitable then it will help matters. I have opted to not buy votes and I am happy enough to be making a few dollars. I have flagged plenty of people who abuse the system with @crystalliu as a prime example. Luckily most of his rewards are being cancelled out.

The downvote pool may help, but will people still be afraid of retaliation? Some are just against the idea of downvoting at all, but I see it as necessary.