The problem is that most rookies don't know how curation works and expect to gain more from upvoting high-value posts.

I tend to use my votes for developing personal relationships - as you pointed out, it is far more likely that someone who gets 10 upvotes on his average post will notice your upvote than someone who gets over 100. I also try to upvote everything that I comment, since I really dislike the practice of commenting (positively) without giving an upvote.

Cheers! : )