Nice swan song there friend, massive upvotes tp see you off. I also struggle with the years of producing Hive and Steem content yet having very few readers. And the fact that whales votes make or break you, and how you end up spewing out mediocre content with lots of photos just to attract the few whale upvotes.
Poor old Hive, it's such a brilliant concept that simply doesn't get the traction it should to really thrive and flourish. I have also lost the few whale upvotes that made up 90% of my payout and so post my art now regardless of upvotes or readership and more as my personal legacy, portfolio and record keeping gallery or visual and written content on my personal favorite subjects, which have very little readership at all.
I'm not leaving. I retired from writing Hive posts. Writing about Hive is something I rarely did anyway...
Striving to attract whale upvotes is a common mistake people make. It's up to authors to attract interest in their work, and nobody else.
The post states I'm done talking about this stuff, and moving on.