One fact check.
It will have little affect on the behavior of delegators and just be a welcome bonus if it comes through.
The affect of the mechanism is decided by the size of the prize and the power of the validator. So, it is a quantitative. We can make it significantly effective by making the number big enough. It is always affectable. Especially, it is relatively more affectable for smaller validators.
From my example above, the prize can be up to 10% reward at once. Is that not enough? Even 1% is the 1 year commission which is big enough to affect.
Purpose of this mechanism is not only financing contributing validators, but more importantly, reorganizing the power distribution to more active participating validators, which will strengthen the security of the network significantly and also at the same time, achieving decentralization.
The revenues would happen at unpredictable times.
This is correct and intentional affect. The prize is decided by future event. It makes delegators to think about long term contribution of each validator.(Because prize distribution is ALSO related to the length of delegation : the royalty of the delegator to the validator. It is basically reputation based decision.)
Reward of contribution should not be immediate to validator, because it can make validator opportunistic. Instead, the system should convince validators to become long-term supportor of Cosmos Network. Indirect reward by bigger delegation is what I think the most efficient way to make top rank validators composed of most contributing validators.
For non-validator contributor, we have ICF, community fund to support. Support for contributing validator is a different category. Both should exist in my opinion. Amount of each part can be organized for best efficiency.