I completely agree with you. If there is no real ROI they can bring to the table then I don't see why we should fund development of such projects. I like your thoughts on the prediction market. What did they say about it?

The proposal system is very expensive and is this 20% decrease permanent or temporary?

Yes, it's very expensive indeed and it makes me think why there wasn't some sort of an auction to let other devs compete with @blocktrades and offer the same solution at a lower price. I fear that if implemented, this change would be permanent unless some sort of a major revolt happens.