I don't like bid bots and don't use them (I do use faucets and MSP). I doubt that most of them are profitable, especially after that 25% is taken out. But for the ones that are, you really can't stop people from trying to make a quick buck. Most people won't attract people with a lot of steem (it is always welcome when that does happen) in their post especially as more and more people join the platform, most of the upvotes they will see if about .00-.05 cents. In the end everything is just a points (SP) game and how wisely they play the game, and I guess they see thats how the game works for them. Because the rewards is convertable to money, you are going to have business models built around it whether they are viable or not. These models will have their own supply and demand curve, and plenty of suckers too. I don't think a boycott will achieve much in deterring them. I don't even think abolishing fractional voting would solve the problem either-they will just splinter out. The steem platform has some intrinsic problems, and probably the solution would be to make the yearly return of daily upvotes for a year worse than a risk free investment....and that would probably mean steem needs a few more decimal places and likely a sell off and disinterest in the platform. It is a glitch in the matrix so to speak, and ultimately creates demand and value for steem and hopefully keeps it out of circulation. Do as you wish, but is futile to fight against human nature unless you become a God that can change nature itself....which in this case would be those in absolute control over steemit.
I regret that we only have 7 days to lock in a profit, it would be nice if it was continuous. Sometimes I wonder if with all the automated voting, and services like steemfollower, if people even read what is posted anymore. But if something a few weeks from now, or a few years from now goes viral, there is a lot of profit potential lost because of the 7 day model. I am not sure that the numbers game makes steemit that useful for spreading ideas as it was intended anymore, especially when the quality posts may not be noticed for some time through google queries. Sadly the bots don't want us to include ads and referrals and want to restrict us to the 7 day rule which is also detrimental to viability of steemit.
The main positive, especially regarding controversial or gagged ideas, is that what is on the block chain can't be removed so long as the blockchain exists. Many gag suits these days are to try to obtain orders telling website to remove reviews about people or their businesses, so the block chain is a big f you to the courts/censors and to the petitioners. In many cases where speech is prosecuted criminally, the police tend to produce edited copies of what was spoken. They are quite limited in their ability to do so when it is on the block chain.