If, hypothetically, every single user used all of their downvotes there would be tens or hundreds of thousands of downvotes per day. The drama will fade away into the ether because let's face it, you can't get upset about something that happens literally tens of thousands of times per day to every single post. If nothing else, fatigue over the drama kings and queens trying to turn everything into a personal attack will set in and people will start ignoring it.
Posts will then get ranked and paid out on the basis of which have a more favorable balance of upvotes and downvotes. Some people will upvote stupidly and some will downvote stupidly but mostly that will cancel out and the sensible application of upvotes and downvotes will prevail (unless the majority of the user base and stake are simply stupid, in which case there is no solution). I could not think of a better outcome.
Downvotes are current a big deal and drama today because they are so rare. Whenever it happens it is seen as a personal attack rather than an expression of opinion.
In reality I do not expect everyone to use all of their downvotes, so the favorable outcome described above won't happen, unfortunately. Hopefully we can end up somewhere in the middle.
And that will still be based on financial manipulation rather than on content quality. That's not curation, and it cannot be made to be. It's profiteering, and that's all it can be.
I flag trash. You have received a flag.
As I have stated elsewhere I am not opposed to eliminating the reward pool (perhaps in connection with SMTs which can decide whether they want to use voted rewarding as part of their distribution mechanism, or perhaps simply on its own merits). But I don't think we are there yet and more to the point I don't think consensus is there yet to actually do it. So we'll need to try a few things first and if it comes to the point where alternatives are exhausted and things still aren't working that is likely where we will end up realistically.
Rewarding content creation is the primary value of Steem. I do not propose eliminating the pool (except perhaps as SMTs provide improved mechanisms) but eliminating unlimited extraction of rewards. Limiting rewards to some multiple of the median payout (Huey Long algorithm) will eliminate profiteering, if coupled with eliminating curation rewards (not the rewards pool).
We need to draw users to Steem, and rewarding quality content does that. Drawing users to Steem creates the market for Steem, which is why Steem has value. Increasing the market for Steem increases the value of Steem, which provides capital gains to investors. That's what we should be doing.
Encouraging profiteering and flagging is contrary to that, and EIP just makes it more profitable to extract rewards via financial manipulation. If Steem survives EIP making these problems worse, do consider the Huey Long algorithm, and dividends from funding development as mechanisms for creating capital gains.
I flag trash. You have received a flag.
No it won't. It will induce spamming and more low value posting in order to generate the maximum payout for purposes of milking on a larger number of content items.
I see no reason to expect more spam just because unlimited rewards aren't potential. It's remotely possible some folks would post more, lower value content. I don't care. That's an insignificant matter compared to rampant profiteering that has utterly broken curation, and is dropping Steem's market cap about 15 places per year. Leaving downvotes unchanged handles spam with facility now, and would continue to.
'Milking' posts is already done, and the additional work making more posts entails reveals good work ethic. These are trifles compared to the existential threat Steem is under presently, and that EIP would worsen.
I flag trash. You have received a flag.
We'll have to agree to disagree.
I can see why you wouldn't want to continue the discussion in this vein. It's pretty obvious that EIP just hands more Steem rewards to profiteers when such trivial justifications for it and better alternatives are carefully considered.
You have an agile mind, and I'm confident that were you interested you could devise better means of encouraging rational investment that drove capital gains. I'm not going to speculate as to your motivations, but I can see that your stated reasons to support EIP also support profiteering. Whether you discuss these matters or not, they'll be discussed, and the consequences of EIP will happen and become unavoidably obvious should it be adopted.
I have seen several comments in this conversation already referring to folks powering down now. Accelerating rapine of rewards via EIP will spread that exodus exponentially, whether or not it's discussed. The recent inception of centralized censorship of Steem accounts will make that worse. I find the faint opposition to both of these degradations of Steem strong evidence that the end is in sight, and better capitalized men than I are implementing their exit strategies.
May you enjoy every success in your ventures. Sometimes getting what we always wanted reveals we should want better, and I look forward to seeing what comes next from folks that have learned from the Steem story.