About 30% of the inflation goes to curation, so I think it is a fair portion, considering it doesn't take much work other than consuming.
Blogging is or author rewards do involve developing writing skills, and if you take photos or make videos, editing skills, too. I consider this self-employed income, not investing. It's harder to value this, but I think to a certain point it's an investment. Some people may even be improving their English which is huge value for non-native English speakers. It's this aspect in particular that draws me to Hive.
Using current skills or building new skills is a huge value here. Most people take photos yet have very little purpose for them, let alone return on the time spent. Here there is the chance for something.
That said, I'm in for the speculative nature most, but this is more for other cryptocurrencies and not Hive specifically.
THis is what is interesting about Hive - it can actually be a gateway into crypto for many. Most people are going to struggle to pull any trigger having to do the initial work to invest straight into crypto - Hive can be a bridge.
Part of Hive's appeal is that it is more than just a speculative asset.
I also think curation + inflation rewards are fine. The operating expense of hive is cheap compared to some blockchains, but calling it free (as some people do) is misleading. We all pay for it in the form of inflation.
The bridge aspect is an interesting point. I wonder though if it does more harm than good especially for investing? People mine Hive first then sell for others.
Actually, I am not sure if you consider that many people haven't bought any - meaning that everything they have earned is on the platform - so the inflation isn't a cost, it is part of the system they opted into. Possibly wrong,, or semantics :D
This has happened since the start.
Interesting chart from @dalz
Look at all those powerdowns early on the chain (2016) - that is all the ninja mine as so little had come out of the rewards pool at that time.
But If you have 1000$, Hive may not be the best crypto to invest it in, especially if you already have a somewhat decent account and can just eventually get it for free from blogging (something I should get back into ;).
I actually let Hive creep up to a huge % of my crypto portfolio just before the Steem thing. It's back down to a more manageable amount. I sold a ton of crypto in March that I acquired in 2019 when the prices were low to take advantage of the dip in the world stock markets (no regrets) and used my Hive/Steem to slowly get it back due to the 13 weeks powerdown.
Looking at that graph is neat, I like the little PD ticks every year when people are selling to realize their losses for taxes or whatever. But it really gets confusing in early 2020.
I think the only way to consider it fairly is to start counting Hive around July 2020 when people were finished powering down Steem.
It really complicated the analysis situation. I don't consider people who sold their Steem to buy Hive as outside investors, but it's hard to consider it as a continuation.