The whole foundation of steemit.com is rewards based. This is why I have no issues with someone upvoting themselves.

One way or another you have to convince one or more people to upvote you. In the end, it is all about what others can gain in return to upvoting you. There is a reason why some users are popular with rewards, because there is predictability for those who want to make a buck or two by helping others to make a buck or two with their votingpower.

It would defeat the purpose and turn this place into an ordinary social media site if you removed that. People have to find a way to "mine" the STEEM. But then, I do understand that some comments and blog posts are not worthy what they are rewarded. This is really hard to define, though. This would destroy this platform if we started to define what is good and what is not.

To every mother her child is extraordinary and exceptional. It would be hard to convince a mother otherwise.

Censorship is something that can easily happen if we even try to define what is a good post and was is not. That will always be subjective. If we go that way to define it, you will turn steemit.com into a police state with a million vigilantes.

If you really want to go that way, then you would have to first write out what the standard should be for a worthy post before a HF can even take place. This is virtually impossible. Only the market can make that value assessment. The market can be 1 person, 10 persons or 100 persons. Now, that 1 person could be the user themselves thinking their material is worthy.

The consensus of the whole community is really important if we are going to start monitoring what is a good post and what is not.

Those who have invested a lot are going to be the losers, but then again if the "abuse" continues that could also kill this place. So it is a fine line. I put abuse in quotations because this is a word that people are throwing around. I don't know whether it is the right word to use or not.

To continue, the communuty has to first decide whether this place is for everyone or some. If it is for everyone then no to flagging comments and posts. If this place is for certain people then we need to define that and start ganging up on those the community has decided are not welcomed any longer.

I think if we leave it as is, it will correct itself very shortly. The value of each vote is going down on a daily basis. Because, let's be honest, in the end, it is all about the money. Those who are abusing won't bother because the rewards will be too low and those who care about the abuse won't care because the rewards will be zero or low