When you say "7% p.a." what is "p.a."? Sorry, I don't know what you mean.
That's an interesting point about gaining more of a share than their investment would otherwise allocate. Unlike a mining rig with a somewhat fixed return... but I guess even that isn't fixed if a bunch of other people buy mining rigs but for whatever reason turn them off or don't use them effectively.
Interesting way to think about it for sure. Maybe I'll do some blockchain analysis to look at self voting comment rewards over time... that might be really interesting.
per annum
Ah, thanks!
Those people who "turned off their rigs", what was their intention for doing so ? Just to fund self-upvoters ? I doubt it.
I'll suggest another parallel.
Some people have made donations to some charitable foundation. The employees of this foundation are supposed to distribute donations keeping 25% as a salary ( curation rewards ) Some employees decide to keep 100% for own needs.
In my country it's a crime ;)
Interesting perspective. I think you mean someone is given, say, $100 and told to give $75 away and keep $25 but instead they are keeping the full $100? I guess that does make sense.
Not sure there's a way to stop it, but here's an idea: what if the steemit interface gave a visual indication of self-voted comments (red background maybe?) so people would know more clearly who votes themselves up regularly. Might that change anything or bring about some social shaming if the community feels it's not a good activity?
Might be interesting.