Steemit does claim that you can make [fractions of fractions of pennies] money by curating other authors' posts. In reality however, that is simply not the case for most members.
Steem-power does pay out about 8% APR, + if you setup automatic voting to instantly band-wagon onto the top earners like gooddream and nonameslefttouse and steemcleaners, then you can even boost that up a bit.
It's not bad for a hobby, but almost nobody is "making a living" at this. I mean, last time I checked, gooddream was making about $500 a month in payouts (which is hardly lambo cash).
The overwhelming majority make less-than-break-even for the electricity they pay to run their computer(s).
I'm just pointing out that even those at the TOP aren't exactly "rollin' in it".
And that's probably where most of steem's potential growth lays.
I have seen a few charitable organizations on steemit trying to promote photography and other work by accounts from countries with wrecked economies.
And I don't personally see a problem with that.
If people want to treat steemit as a sort of news aggregator, that seems perfectly reasonable to me.
Slashdot, FARK, GoogleNews, and actually most "news" sources don't post original content. They just regurgitate Reuters and the Associated Press.
Why do I care if it's "original" or not. I only care if it's interesting.
Although, I do find those on the almighty steemit "top trending" page to be pretty boring.