I am not on any voting trails as I prefer to vote manually (and comment when I can). Although I agree to a certain extent that it is "about the money", for me it doesn't mean much if you get the sense that no one is reading what you've written. I remember the first time I was "Curied" (back in the good ole days when it looking like it was worth 150dollars) and I thought that people actually read my work! It was one part of a story I was writing and the next day when I published the next episode I was so pumped to see how many people were following the story (judging it by upvotes). I got about 2 cents for it. Man, I was gutted. It wasn't really about the money (because I have never removed a cent from Steem) it was about the recognition and the realisation that people hadn't really enjoyed what I'd written (I didn't realise how it all worked).
I try not to just upvote the people I know as I want to reward new accounts, those that don't get much recognition: future family if you will.
I see Steem as an investment - in time, people and money (hopefully it will be worth something above a dollar again one day!). Hopefully you get more back than you put in, but with any investment you might get a whole lot less!
Love and peace to you all and Steem on my friends!
20-25% is a good margin for family engagement. It is totally an investment. The groundwork we lay here matters more than a lot of people can see. It's really sad when I see people slipping away and haven't posted or commented in months. It's also, as I said, a cold truth about this chain as should be apparent with the new HF quickly approaching. I'm really gearing people up for a tighter 'unit' that can withstand it which is why I'm putting all this out here. If we all band together more closely, we won't be affected nearly as much.
EDIT: Also, never mandatory to be on a trail. Just makes it easier for some people trusting their vote to us.
There are so many good things happening at the moment (dtube, palnet and others) - and so many exciting things that could happen - I am sure we can withstand the coming HF storm... and come out the other side stronger