I made a post last week that shot up to $27 and was doing well, despite no votes being removed it will finish today under $15. Now Steem and SBD have gone down some, but they haven't declined almost half. In fact all my posts are down by a similar percentage.

After a reply on the subject from another user, he suggested it was the rewards pool shrinking and posted up a graph showing a sharp decline.

This seems to have happened just at the point where I was thinking "hey, maybe this Steemit thing is worth taking seriously, I'll work harder on my content".

Why are rewards being reduced, is it because some are dumping their SBD on the market?

Back to Pre- HF19 levels we go?

Is that where we're heading?Is it back to hoping a "whale" sees and likes our post, otherwise it's dead?

I'm not asking for The People's Democratic Republic of Steem.

I'm not asking for enforced fairness. Just that you give people a way to get their foot in the door and get the ball rolling. As it is it's far too unbalanced. I've read great content by new(ish) users, hilarious, informative and well-written and with 0.01 cents for a reward. I've also read utter banal shit that's barely legible put out by dolphins and whales getting thousands of dollars, everyone's chasing that curation reward I guess.

If I was a whale I wouldn't want the status quo either

There are "whale hunting" services where people are tracking the Steem online status of whales hoping for votes like peasants hoping the local lord will throw them a gold coin. That's just fucking weird and a sign something's not quite right. If I were a whale that would creep me the fuck out.

There's also the "excellent post" spam every time they write something, this must bore them surely?

I appreciate the minds behind Steemit are probably developers not economist, but can't you guys at least consult one to find out how to make Steem worth it for new users while keeping the price relatively stable?