There may be ways to programmatically identify auto votes - they typically always come in by the same user x minutes after post publish - whereas, I know with the people who manually vote my content - they come in outside of a precise pattern.
I think we all know (for our own stuff) who auto-votes us and who is a genuine "oh, I liked that content a lot".
I am also getting autovotes from people who haven't been on the platform for years. They're "dust".
On the topic of things like HSBI, I have quite a large number of HSBI shares. From a personal perspective, it does make me want to continue contributing to the chain (sunk cost I guess - from around the time of the steem/hive fork) - but the meagre rewards it provides to me (compared to my personal, perceived quality!) would definitely not make it worth while as a commercial or abuse vector.
But honestly, what keeps me here is the deep engagement and discussion I get to have with people who actually respond, without the fractured nature of multiple "networks" for multiple things.
The other important thing, of course, for people to get HIVE is the concept of the immutability, the fact you can see everything on chain (even if someone downvotes it!) and the positive impact it can have on people's wellbeing as social creatures who might otherwise not get any engagement at all.
They'd just get smarter if such ways were to be attempted to be identified I feel like.