There is no doubt that Steemit is a revolutionary social media platform. Nonetheless, we tend to forget that it is still based on basic human behavior. People expect to be paid based on the quality of their content but they soon realize that this is not the case. In fact, getting paid based on one's merit is rather the exception rather than the rule.
This is not necessarily bad as people might perceive. Much like the outside world, the economics of Steemit are first and foremost based on social and less on intellectual capital. The relationships Steemians form are perhaps their strongest asset. In the outside world we call this nepotism. Whether we like the idea or not, this is how the world rolls. It is what it is. No need to blame Steemit for this.
Social capital is much more important than intellectual and financial capital. Humans are up and foremost social species. The concept of economics is based heavily on our sociality and less on the subjective value we ascribe to things we produce. Sooner or later, every human realizes that is all about who we know and less about what we know.
One can produce good content but maintain a rather negative attitude. Most likely, they will never get noticed. I know because only recently I got to enjoy high rewards for my posts. I used to engage in a lot of debates and criticisms about the platform and that got me a bad reputation amongst most whale circles. I was called an asshole, and still appear to be to some people's eyes. Remember, you can make 100 good deeds but it only takes a single bad day and you can be marked for life. First impressions matter. Bad impressions matter even more. Again, no need to complain about our "homosapien behavior". It is yet another extension of who we are.
Whether you want to call yourself a straight talker or contrarian, very few people accept criticism and almost everybody welcomes praise. If you have any doubt about this, check the "Here is a Steemit post about how I made money on steemit that will make me even more money" or "I have X followers and I joined Steemit last year, pay me". Obvious self shilling posts, are way too obvious and we all know this. We just prefer to turn a blind eye because it gives a positive vibe.
The competition is so tight that some might find that they are not really good with their content as they thought they were. A bit of ass-kissing and political maneuvering can go a long way and some find themselves rise to the top. At the end, not even the newcomers mind about these tactics. It is no secret that the majority of the comments are junk, sucking up to the author as a last resort in order to be upvoted or followed. It looks ugly because it cannot be anything else.
I want to stress out that is not an inherent problem of Steemit but rather how economic dynamics flow in any system. We observe this behavior everywhere in any economy. If you have worked for a large company, you know exactly what I am trying to illustrate.
Another important aspect that we all forget is that the early investors in cryptocurrencies are few, very few. Those people were often getting ridiculed for owning "invisible money". They hodled. They believed. Later on, they got to diversify some of their bitcoin assets to Steemit. They took the risk so we could enjoy the fruits of their labour. They are the reason we have all this. This is part of the reason the wealth distribution of Steemit looks almost identical to what we see in the outside world. The whales are the ~1%, the ~15% are western civilization (dolphins) and ~85% are the minnows (rest of the world).
Statistically, some posts, even if they are exceptional, they will never rise to the trending page. Much like the rest of the economy, the same names will appear day after day on the front lines because they managed to make an impression early on. Similarly, the same companies seem to hold the power the longest due to reputation while the rest fight each other for the breadcrumbs. Sure, there is disruption from time to time but the big boys make sure to pick out the early birds before they take off.
Even if some make it at the end, they too join the upper circle and it gets even harder for those at the bottom to break free. Heck, even if the whales have the best of intentions, it is humanly impossible to manually curate hundreds of new posts. This is why even after HF19, for the most part, some top authors earn even more and the middle guys get to split the rewards between them. Again, not a flaw on Steemit but a human dynamic that has to be properly evaluated.
TL;DR: Steemit reflects the economic paradigm of the outside world right now. This is to be expected since the blockchain is still a novel idea. Steemit is the first platform of it's kind. We shouldn't be surprised or disappointed. Like a friend told me yesterday in the comments "Apes Gonna Ape" so we owe to lan accordingly.
Right now, a few people hold all the Steem Power even if that has been somewhat delegated to a few dolphins. I believe a wider spread of Steem Power delegation to a few reputable people will change the scene. There are a few people in here that have been in the platform since the beginning and really care about its potential. Delegating this voting duty to them will empower more Steemians and also take the burden away from the whales. After all, with all these taking place, no matter what they do, they appear to be the bad guys.
Let's not forger that even power delegation can be abused. This can be controlled by manual reports to the community (much like @Steemcleaners and @cheetah do). We can even push this a step further and assign specific curators with power for specific Steemit tags. In this way, we won't see uneven distribution of rewards from only one category.
The trending page will also change every day. Competition and anticipation about who might be trending will create more engagement among Steemians. It will also build more trustworthiness to new (and increasingly skeptical members) that see the same people trending on the front page day in day out.
My last recommendation will be a payout cap for each post. If a post cannot reach more than a certain amount, more rewards will be distributed to more people. This will help the platform grow even more since it will create competition among popular tags that will diversify the content. This will enrich the platform and raise it's value even further.
I understand that these recommendations will not be well received by some people but I am being so critical because I am beginning to see some red flags that might get pretty ugly. Right now there is dangerous draining of the reward pool. There is an immediate need to bring stability into the system. We got a pretty good push from the general crypto pump of the last months but we owe to use this leverage as best as we can while it lasts. I don't know about you, but I want to enjoy Steemit for years to come. Otherwise we might be already killing the goose that lays the golden eggs...
