Hi Kryptoe, first I wanted to apologise for not reciprocating on the interaction front. I appreciate you taking the time to check out the stuff that I've posted.

I've been here for a little while now and I've played out the argument a number of times. I used to use the upvote bots on pretty much every post and for a little while it felt ok - money for nothing, who could feel bad? I wouldn't say that it ever made me feel terrible but I definitely wondered if it was 'right'

Having spent some time in various group chats and reading up on the economics of steem etc. I started to understand where the problem is with upvote bots:
Reward dilation.

The 'money for nothing' thing doesn't exist because in a fixed reward system it has to come from somewhere and it's everyone elses posts.

Do what you've got to do though, because you may benefit from the extra exposure that appearing in the 'hot' feed for a given tag provides - you don't have to go nuts with it though, around $1-2 should be enough to put you there.