Hi Acid, your post is like it is good said in one very famous Russian quote: do not pour salt on open wound. It is really quite a hot topic and it is obvious that many Steemians went into "winter sleep", just waiting what happens next, but some quitting Steemit due to the long standing trend of Steem that goes down.
Being more active in artistic community I can say there are few reasons why many artists stop producing their posts and their art. There are at least two main reason:
First, until few months your project @OCD-resteem inspired artists to create as they were granted high attention from OCD curator and being re-steemed on OCD blog definitely made many of artist visible. But currently OCD-resteem is inactive.
The second main reason is @slothicorn, the project of @stellabelle, where she delegated Steem power and daily @slothicorn curated 17 artists with good upvotes, but couple of weeks ago, the project stopped because delegation was withdrawn.
The only curation trail left for Artists is @curie, of course there are many other contests running and @minnowsupport project is something that really currently does a lot for minnows.
I believe all those factors together made their impact too.
As to my blog, I am soon one year on 25/08 and I will keep going and producing my art. As I mentioned before Steemit inspired me to re-start my hobby after more them 12-15 years and I am going to develop me and continue developing my skills. My experience I would like to share on Steemit Platform because I WANT TO BELIEVE that it has FUTURE. Regards, @Stef1