Correct. It’s important to note the “strength” of your vote will adjust dynamically after you’ve voted, so even if it’s worth .02 when you cast it, if the post goes on to earn 20+ Steem, thereby moving up the reward curve, your contribution amount will grow.

I preferred linearity, and yes, this system does make it much more difficult to give out small “micro rewards” in comments and one on one interactions. It’s meant to enforce “consensus” of many people liking content. I think it has a chance to work at scale... if we get to a point of millions of active users, but in the short term, especially when combined with 50/50 curation,  it may slow the broader distribution of Steem and growth of a “middle class.”

the people that make the decisions will never understand that point.  But I get it, I'm just tired of wasting my breath.

well I can say that there are contests that get 20 steem upvotes all the time and give votes back and rewards....

I will not list them here, but I know of a few if you contact me through discord I will point you to them....

It's sometimes safer to rent Steem Power from blocktrades.us or dlease.io than to outright buy it, kind of a try-before-you-buy scenario, once price looks like it is starting to increase again then you can buy in and ride the wave up.