Good thoughts, worthy of discussion. What I do is divide my votes among those that are good posts from up-and-comers (most of my votes) and those that I think are likely to be popular (I find a few each day). One other point: I was flattered to see that you mentioned me in your post. I definitely am no whale. There are around 250 people with more Steemit holdings than me, many of them way more proportionally, probably putting me at the middle or lower part of the class in terms of my voting influence. I've been fortunate to make some postings that were well rewarded, so I certainly understand if you want to encourage folks to reward others who deserve it (please do), but I just want to point out that whales and good posters are not necessarily the same people.