I am brand new here, and actually have the exact same complaints (plus or minus the whales thing because I have no idea what that means exactly).
The biggest complaint I have is that it is so counter-intuitive to start with and it seems that if you already have a pretty good stack up outside of STEEM or own a DSLR you are made in the shade on getting some steem, basically with the rest of us attempting to be amusing, thought provoking or just random enough with our content to be found and hopefully skyrocketed into the STEEM-o-sphere(?)
Anyway, I wish I knew anything about ruby or even this whole witness business so that I could contribute back to the community, though that seems to also be about who you know.
I guess I will continue on.
The whales are basically the biggest fish on steemit.
Basically
There are minnows. Us, the small fish. Our upvote gives a cent at best.
Dolphins, they have a decent amount of steempower. Their upvote values at around between a few cents and a dollar.
And Whales, they have massive amount of steempower. When they like something, YOU'LL know. When they like something, you'll see it under "Recommended, Hot, Trending", and pretty much heading every other sexy category, with a good number of monetarily valued digits under them.
People follow them around (I'm also guilty) in hopes of getting their attention and hopefully an upvote or two (can you blame anyone?)
Not one little bit though. Is it any different than other popularity contests?
Oh well... I'll swim within the slip stream!!