And now he is offering a service that allows people to increase their SP and get exposure for their content without having to participate in the massive circle jerk culture that exists on this site.

You’ll always have people that exploit the system as long as there is money to be made. It happens on literally every platform. This place has literally no rules, so just like nobody could stop him, nobody can stop you from controlling this platform by strong-arming people into following your rules. Rules which obviously benefit you and people close to you at the expense of new users.

No problem. The system is set up to allow that to happen. But you’re only going to make the culture/content on here WORSE - because now instead of there only being an incentive for writing happy wow Steemit is so wonderful posts/comments, you are setting a precedent where non compliant posts will be flagged “for the good of the platform.”

If this has all these bid bots then he doesn’t need our money to increase his stake on here. He can just upvote his various accounts if he wants to print more money. But by offering a bidding service, he allows users to increase their own stake without having to align with any of the factions on here that claim to know best. It’s not likely that anyone will reach whale-status, but at least they can derive peripheral benefits like a small overall profit, increased SP and an increased audience for their work.

But that “wouldn’t be fair” to you poor people with plenty of SP, influence, and a network of buddies who already promote each other’s work at no cost. Wow i feel so bad for you. $200 with no promotion at all. That’s just awful. All that contribution for nothing. Better push your anti vote bot campaign hard before new people come along and level the playing field.