Valid concern. Very valid concern. But you jump to conclusions. I strongly disagree with your conclusions from the title: "blog rewards will need to go". That is a "cure" infinitely worse than the disease. Basically it's "killing the patient to stop the disease".
You are mentioning a "barrier". This is the right direction to look into: how to create barriers to prevent or at least mitigate the risks. Not dismantling the whole system
I don't want to burn down the house to kill the termites, I want to expose the damage and do a remodel to build it better and make it resilient against termites.
Starting this ball in motion right now is our only hope. Getting the discussion so we can determine what needs to be shored up. My title "blog rewards will need to go" was intentionally provocative, but if I'm being honest it should have read "blog rewards will need to go to the second layer".
In 3-5 years, it is predicted AI will be able to write novels on par with the best authors alive. This is going to disrupt TV, movies, journalism, and blogging. I'm not sure if moving things to L2 will fix this, but I do know leaving it on L1 is a recipe for disaster. There will be no consensus, user experience will be abysmal, and those who stick around will be taking the path of least resistance (except for @nonameslefttouse of course).
Was that a compliment? lol