I had a discussion in chat similar to this yesterday. The problem is in the fact that steemit is built upon the foundation of an existing society, not a new creation unto itself. Therefore, it carries with it a foundation that has all of the problems of our current society, and tries to correct things from there.
My previous conversation on this, in a nutshell, was that "sex sells" and how some authors feel slighted when a post that appeals to the carnal nature of others, no matter how poorly written (if there's really any writing at all) can garner a much bigger following and payout than a well-researched and excellent article on some other subject.
The base issue is similar. People with money can make money easily. If a famous actor joins steemit, they'll likely get a ton of upvotes and comments due to their pre-existing social and monetary status. If someone panders to the least common denominator of the masses, they'll likely get more attention than someone that spends the time to try to provide thoughtful content.
I dont have the answer to this equation, since we cant all have a factory reset performed on ourselves before joining.
That's an interesting comment.
I considered the parallels with real life while I was writing and it's true, they are there. I'm afraid of that being used to dismiss the way steemit makes me feel. I think that's what I wanted to get across, that I don't feel so great.
A lot of effort seems to have been put into the foundation of the economy in steemit, but the socio-political aspects are side-effects; at least from the political side.
There appear to be aspects of democracy (we vote), aristocracy (the whales have more power), capitalism (content rewards, mining), marxism (cooperative ownership in that wealth is spread out)...
Maybe there is more, I'm not an expert in politics. I would absolutely love to read an experts opinion on steemit from this perspective though!
I think one thing users should stay focused on is to upvote useful content, it won't solve the problem but your upvotes are the only way you can reward posts you think are worthwhile. Also I think for this community to flourish people need to feel an insentive to reply to posts and to get into discussions which means its super important that Ssteemians also remember to UPVOTE GOOD REPLIES. imo.