Well, I have to disagree that people will leave platforms if they don't get rewards. Very few get any financial rewards on X, Meta, Youtube, or etc. They are there because they get to discuss with folks about things they want or need to discuss. Hive enabling people to directly fund the creation of media they prefer is an enormous draw, both to the market for that media and the creators. That potential is what makes Hive so promising. That promise gives people hope.

For many years I refused to hope at all for anything, because I had been so crushed by grief when my hopes and dreams were crushed. I very nearly died. While that hope is Hive's greatest draw, when hope is crushed that is when we suffer. Pain isn't suffering. Expectation of living without pain and then living in pain causes that hope to be crushed, and that causes suffering.

It isn't the lack of rewards that drives people off Hive when they're DV'd. It's the unfairness, the crushed hope that Hive could make a difference when they see that centralized money power prevents free speech on Hive just like it's prevented on X. Dogs will fight to the death over scraps, despite being well fed, if the tidbits are distributed unfairly. So will monkeys.

When a monkey in an acrylic cage next to another monkey gets a bit of cucumber, it's happy to get a reward. When it sees the monkey in the cage next to it hit a button and get a bit of grape, it starts mashing the button in it's cage because it wants that grape. If it gets a bit of cucumber instead of grape it will literally go into a rage and throw the cucumber at the researcher.

It is not pain that causes suffering. It is the crushed hope.