The IDEA is to read something, like/dislike vote/not vote/ flag.

Because money is involved, the system needs to be setup in such a way that it can determine which content is "good". If there was no curation reward, there would not be very much incentive for people to spend the time finding good undiscovered content. They would just upvote for their friends stuff, and random things they came across that they liked.

In fact I wouldn't argue to hard against eliminating curating rewards altogether.

You should read the comment from @luzcypher in this post. The post itself has nothing to do with curation, but the comment does a really good job explaining its importance.

If I invited someone to come play in my sandbox and they started complaining about the toys I might just kicke them out.

Hehe, yeah. I totally agree. I have that exact same thought when people go on rants about how much this place "sucks". I'm not against constructive criticism and feedback (even this post has one thing I disagree with Ned on), but this place wouldn't exist at all if it weren't for Dan/Ned and the people who designed/built it and helped bring the system/community to life. We are interacting in a world that they created for us, and we should be thankful it is as awesome as it is :)