Correct, by the voting habits (specifically of whales) do decide where those rewards get allocated.
For example, if they downvote a $300 post to $0 - that $300 is added back into the rewards pool, where it will mostly be awarded to the top posts at the time.
All Rewards are mostly distributed to the top post at any given time, independent from downvoting habits.
I disagree with most voting habits on-chain too, but that's a totally different story for a small fish like me. I don't even get how you ended up as a target.
Very true - and the folks downvoting have admitted many times that they agree trending is mostly over-rewarded crap.
They just claim they don't have the voting power to do anything about it - while simultaneously zero-ing out posts that were near the top of trending.
Yep, very risky for a small fish (or anyone really) to call out this activity - because it will get you downvoted (often to negative reputation), and has guaranteed no further rewards for many a user.
Because I dared to speak out against their targeting of others, because I do have a high rep and many supporters (less risk), and I honestly don't care if they try to cancel me as well.
Well, they could be honest and just outright state that the downvotes are 'mostly peaceful' subjective disagreements. That would indeed cut some corners.
I wonder where Blocktrades is on this topic at the moment.