This seems to happen with any social network where you can start making money. Its happened with many in the past and ended up crushing them which is why we here at Steemit need to do something about it. Luckly we do have a bit of power by not upvoting comments but honestly I want the ability to remove comments that are totally worthless or at least put a delay on time from posting to comment.
Social networks that got crushed in the past for this where commentyuwie and tsu. I really don't want to see that happen here with Steemit after I have put so much work into it and I know people such as yourself devoted a ton more effort then me.
Is it possible for the next hard fork to take care of this and combat it a bit?
no, it's a human behavior thing.....we need to think deeply about incentives.