With an 800mv influence cap, rewards and curation worked just fine.

That might be a good idea to bring back, or anything else that will cause diminishing returns in power the more popular you get. For example logarithms (e.g. 1 popularity measures = 1 measure of power, 10 popularity = 2 power, 100 popularity = 3 power, 1000 -> 4 or 1->1, 2->2, 4->3, 8->4, 16->5 etc.) or roots (e.g. 1->1, 4->2, 9->3, 16-> 4, 25-> 5 etc.).

This way you could both "climb the social ladder of importance", but you couldn't as easily become a "social tyrant" of sorts, who cannot be "overthrown".