I suppose I shouldn't have said "they are not worthless" after listing reasons why the point system could be compromised (emotional voting or the vote dilution

I suppose I shouldn't have said "they are not worthless" after listing reasons why the point system could be compromised (emotional voting or the vote dilution of agenda-driven automated bots). I think it is because you said the word "earn" which I thought may have reflected the outlook of most digital forum participants (earn implies value). In a physical space we may evaluate reception of our ideas through nodding, verbal affirmation, or during our turn of the conversation. I would think it would be more difficult for a malicious actor to manipulate public opinion with these classical communication methods. Perhaps now it is more difficult for quality content to be injected into society (or for society to think for itself) when most folks may naturally feel more comfortable consuming content with the largest (potentially artificial) view, vote, stream, or click count. Maybe there are entire divisions of allocated cognitive labor designed exclusively to determine authenticity of traffic, which is unfortunate but necessary (and will likely not be thorough). Maybe there are not.