I noticed the same thing. My upvotes shot to between 43 and 48 within a couple minutes and then stopped.

At first I thought I had posted a hot topic, but then I knew why.

My post is here: https://steemit.com/steemit/@cryptommy/steemit-com-and-an-affiliate-program-could-it-work-pros-and-cons-of-the-system

I thought my post was pretty good so I knew I'd get some votes. But then all that came swarming was the damn bot and gave me pointless upvotes.

I have seen that too. Thats why we need a timeline like twitter, were you can follow and followed back by real people. Especially when more and more people start to come to steem it could be pretty hard to get/say in touch with people you like.