Maybe as a community we should start exposing these voting rings so people can know who is contributing to this and who is working to prevent it? Reputation should matter, and if some people who otherwise have a high reputation are enabling what others call abuse, that's worth discussing.
I have people who vote for me, but I have no voting agreement with anyone. If I was to some day show up as being part of "abuse" I don't think that would be my fault as much as the people who decided to vote for me even if the community disagreed with the rewards payout. To me, those are the people we should confront and that includes those who run voting bot services which enable this to happen and profit from it.
I appreciate you discussing this and the downvotes you do to protect the perception of the value of the rewards pool. I know, as an investor, that's a double burden you have to take because you're not only not making money on your voting strength you could be making, but you're also exposing yourself for whale flag wars.
It's also challenging to directly defined voting circles and abuse. I have friends of mine who I always support and some of them support me also. Is that abuse or natural? Who's to say and what role does the quality of the content produced play? Hopefully we can all figure this out as we vote up or down based on perspectives.
RE: Come to Steemit.com to discover the best content on the internet ... and make money commenting!!!