I am new on Steemit and so I guess am a Minnow, if not smaller 😀
I joined the platform because an FB (or as Barry calls it FascistBook lol!) friend recommend it to me. My friend felt that I wrote good posts and I would be better appreciated on Steemit informing me that my content only added to the pocket of Zuckerberg. I was intrigued and took the plunge. And I have to say that one of the first people to welcome me was @barrydutton and also @dreemit and if I had not had those "welcomes" well let´s just say they meant a lot. And because of this welcome it encouraged me to do the same and so I also use some of time to welcome newcomers. This is part of the "human" factor that Barry speaks of here.
I am still learning the "system" and as such I have made some mistakes I did not even know were mistakes. For example about a week ago suddenly this box appeared when I tried to upvote a post. It was this percentage box. No one told me about it and I had no idea what it was for. Now I am not stupid but I was nervous as it looked scary to me lol! I actually thought I had done something wrong. Why? because I am new to the system. My first thought was that Steemit was telling me I was using too much account activity and so I turned down the bar to 10% just to see what happened when I voted. Nothing bad happened. 2 days later I got time to do some investigation about this percentage bar after I googled it. And then I realized with horror that I had actually voted on a post with using only 10% of my "power". I felt awful guilty and I did not know how to fix it. So then once I understood how it worked I found myself "judging" how much % I should use. But now I have come to the point where I think it is nonsense and so I just use 100% on all posts. Whether or not I will stay on Steemit does depend on the human factor as Barry mentions. I do not want to live in a world of cold calculating bots. This island earth belongs to humans and we have to make the best of it faults and all.
With regards to the Whales dilemma, who are "naughty"- perhaps something could be done with their reputation in that they could become known as "sharks" lo1 -well if Steemit is a mirror then we know in the real world of business and money, that term is used.
I think you do a great job Barry and I for one appreciate your efforts.