I am asking myself the same questions as you are. It is for this reason I am only invested for a little bit into STEEM. I can see the potential, but it's really hard to grasp the value proposition. It could be valuable, if business would buy Steempower so they could advertise their messages on the Trending page, for example.
Also, just having the biggest amount of users is in itself a value proposition. Look at how many multimillion dollar companies with large userbases have never turned a profit.
Then again, I have trouble with those investments too.
Lastly, the newly announced Zappl and D-Tube are enhancements that are sure to bring in many new users. Wether it will bring investors as well? I am not sure. I think, with today's market and hype surrounding crypto, Steem has a short term potential to double or even get to 1 billion if market growth continues as it has been. However, in order to get anywhere bigger I think we are going to have to wait for mass adoption of the platform in order to capitalize on that.
Thanks for the comment. It is a strange situation as before Facebook had adverts it was valued into the billions, Steemit's user base is growing at such a pace and the backbone is ran by Steem. So for me it's logical the price of Steem would be on the up with it. I think the fact it is created out of thin air is a major sticking point, but only time will tell.