We are not associated with Microsoft and are a community driven group to help maximize earning points.
Redeemed 372,750 rewards points over three days for Amazon gift cards in custom amounts ($100 x 3 , $55 x 1). Which fully paid for a Synology NAS (DS224+) and reduced the cost of a Crucial X9 Pro external SSD.
Subsequently the nerfs stacking up have crippled the potential for earning points since early December. Delay between searches, minimum 3 searches to start earning, 15 minute 3 search limit cool down, points reduced for activities. Among other issues; I was two pieces from completing the search puzzle for the 1000 point bonus (it has never reappeared), Gaming tab activity failed to reward points (has since disappeared), occasional periods where searches reward NO points regardless of time passed since previous rewarded points earned.
The Microsoft Rewards app on Xbox has been rather barren. Fear for loss of streak was averted though and I was able to earn 2500 points for my 90 week streak. The weekly punch card activity toward a streak is practically the only thing remaining in the app. The Rewards beta section has been somewhat consistent, but the tasks for the 250 points with activity in a specific game have had a wide variance of effort involved.
Overall I am glad I was able to redeem all those points for Amazon gift cards and avoided recycling all those earnings back into the Microsoft ecosystem. I will probably close out the year with some effort to top off for one last Amazon gift card and then in most any practical earning sense reduce my Microsoft Rewards activity to only the most basic click/tap activity that is circumstantial at best.
Essentially if the delay between searches combined with a finite limit to searches with a cool down persists indefinitely, so to will any of my search activity. Going forward I don't think search activity is worth time or effort in this crippled earning environment. I was a user that preferred to take a moment of my day to complete most of these activities in an efficient sequence. Microsoft has succeeded with influencing my behavior... I now find myself having an aversion to their "deals".