I would not gamificate it too much. Value4value is well defined and it is what it is. But I understand there is always a need to fight against spam bots etc...

My gut reaction is always to shy away from too much gamification, probably my PTSD from my time in the crapto token social media sites that were constantly trying to tweak issuance rates and all that, trying to reduce people's ability to pull funds out or encourage them to keep it in the platform.

I say let the sats fall where they may, SN is a satoshi disbursement tool, the amount of sats circulating to me doesn't really matter, but I guess its a measurement of growth and a nice PR talking point to say we cycle x or y amount of sats per day/month or year.

But I think that circulating sats for engagement and content are only a piece of it, if those sats can be used to turn over exchange of goods and services, then we're cooking with gas, be that with SN's own marketplace or using SN to advertise LN native marketplaces

That way ads/promotions can drive real world trade and connection labour or goods with demand

I don't withdraw from SN but if my balance ever got high enough I would withdraw some. I think the most sustainable model is a hybrid of a circular economy and external revenue sources (ads, promoted posts, job postings) that allows SN to generate revenue, share rewards with users. I don't think there is anything wrong with people taking the time and effort to create content and engage reaping some of the reward for that and withdrawing some sats to their savings.

What if the criteria for withdraw of rewarded sats was above a certain level? Say 10k sats.

You could split deposited sats and rewarded sats. Obviously deposited sats would always be available for withdraw but rewarded sats need to meet a threshold to be removed from SN.

Great Post by the way.

I understand the problem you are trying to address.

I would caution making it harder to withdraw Sats. A new user being able to create an account, make a post, get zapped, and remove the Sats all within a matter of minutes is great feature (with some downsides).

The quickness helps a new user see that Stacker News is legit and shows it won't be a walled garden where you can not get your Sats out.

Another thought I had is letting users burn sats (give back to the general pool) in exchange for higher trust value. I know boost kind of does this for an individual post but I am thinking for all future post of the stacker.

I use SN as a philanthropic wallet & the ability to engage with other ₿itcoiners Humbly stacking & gladly zapping

A lasso would be nice - you have throw the lasso (ie cast out your locked sats / the contingent loot) in order to secure the thing you’ve been chasing (ie capture the unencumbered sats / your sustenance for the day)

I have the exactly opposing behaviour... As more sats I earn, more I reward others although I must confess is never the same amount.

So I can understand such economy is not positive for Stacker News....

I confess: I withdraw sats from SN to buy some beers. I want to buy beers with sats from SN so I can write more guides and posts on SN. Beer is inspiring me. So in some way those beers are coming back to SN.

Don’t limit the sats. They aren’t CBDC. If someone wants to withdraw their sats let them do it without any barrier

could we have a more simple name for the "loot", like a beer or cowboy ring? 😂

also, I found it a bit hard to understand.

this idea feels a bit too complicated, and feedback is confirming that.

appreciate all the thoughtful comments here!