Funny you mention the government, because I think Steemit has an "inequality problem," too, and the way to solve that would be acting more like a responsible and rational government.
That would mean not creating "feedback loops" for "rich people" to get even richer, but instead making it easier for the "little guy" to become "middle class" faster.
I believe this is how the Steemit platform should work, too. It should try to put as many people in the "middle class" of Steemit authors as possible, rather than just show-off with a handful of authors (no offense to Jerry here) that can earn more than a thousand of dollars per article, almost every time.
Yes, I do think that "draws-in" people to the platform, as they see the platform's potential. However, I also think this could be temporary (as in a matter of months to a year). If the platform grows 10x in number of accounts, but 99% of the users still make less than $50 a month writing an article every day, while top authors earn, presumably, over $10,000 per post by then, then this will end-up being a big turn-off for everyone, and they will start dumping the platform.
The platform would be way more successful if, maybe not every user, or even half of the users, but a good percentage of them can say that they can live off Steemit earnings. This doesn't necessarily need to happen right now, as the platform still has too few users. But when it's say 10x bigger, I do expect to see that happening.
Steemit could solve the inequality problem rather easily by using an algorithm for the payouts that gives diminishing returns for top authors. For instance, if a post has already made $200 from the first 100 votes, with an average of $2 per vote, then the next 100 votes should only give the author $100. The next 100 votes after that should only give her $50, and the next 100 votes $25. Something along those lines.
This is just a solution for capping the earnings of authors that consistently rank at the top due to their big initial followers on the platform, or perhaps by bringing their followers from Twitter or Facebook or YouTube to Steemit, which in a way gives them an "unfair" advantage compared to others who want to start from scratch let's say in the year 2019. Then spread that "unused money" in some way to authors of less popular posts.
There could also be some ways to solve the whale problem and/or loopholes used by vote rings and such. For instance, a "whale's" upvote should be worth more when given to a post that has under $100, but worth much less when given to a post that has over $500. The same diminishing returns idea from above, but applied to whales directly.
Obviously, these algorithms can be tweaked, and they don't have to work exactly as I said. But I do believe something along those lines is needed so that the newer authors are encouraged to stay with the platform and see that they can indeed have good earnings potential here by seeing it with their own posts, rather than just staring mesmerized at how some top authors (consistently the same ones) keep earning $1,000 per post.
As a new user, I see the same issue. There are posts created by the early adopters that have so many upvotes and with plenty of earnings even when the quality of posts is so poor.
I appreciate this concept - diminishing financial returns as the viewership increases through virality. Sounds like a good way to even the playing field and avoid fraud.
@jarexx: you have hit the problem absolutely correctly and your solutions in principal are excellent. That is the only way the platform can be saved from greedy and creepy people
I guess we as human beings are inherently flawed, and always tend to create these circles and loops. It is not a flaw in the system as such, but more a flaw in all of us. We have to be more responsible citizens.
I agree to it.. Let's wait and see what happens in few months.