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That can be true for any type of writing published on steemit, not only fiction. And yet, we publish things on steemit. And some of those things are pretty good. Good enough to be placed into an online portfolio which can be referred to as examples of our published writing.
I understand about the 7-day window. To many, it's an unfair system. But again, this is where Steemshelves can actually help. Assume there is a fantastic piece you wrote that just didn't get enough views and therefore, not a lot of upvotes. Is this piece really THAT good? If so, does it make sense to allow it to sink ever further down the blockchain hole? If the piece is so good, maybe it would cause folks to follow you and see your more recent work, if they ever see it.
But they'll never see it, because it has fallen into the never forgotten but hard to navigate black hole of the blockchain. On Steemshelves, it remains easy to find. New people who read it will not be able to upvote it or resteem it. But they will be able to follow you. And that will increase your payouts on your current work.
If I had the concerns about publishing my work that you seem to, I'd be submitting my work exclusively to mainstream outlets. The only things I'd publish on steemit would be the rejects. And I don't say that in a dismissive way. I mean it. Some rejects are not bad at all. There are many reasons it may have been rejected, and not all of those reasons reflect the quality of the writing.
Don't get me wrong. I think this is a cool way for authors to showcase their work. And the example you gave here is apt. I might even put some stuff up there, too.
I have things I work on that will probably never see a steemit page for exactly the reason you cited above: it would make it unpublishable in the mainstream. But I do enjoy writing for the contests and what-not here on steemit.