I agree that the overall quality is going down and I think that this is a symptom of price also as the space gets flooded and diluted. There are high quality posters coming in all the time but they are constantly getting drowned by the nonsense.
My hope is that as more front ends and communities come in, places can develop to hold what has value and expel what doesn't. The idea of inclusion only holds when everyone is willing to pull their weight in the ways they can and add value, not just remove it. Sadly, a long way off perhaps.
It might have been a good idea to implement some sort of probationary period when first joining, say for 3 days, in which time you would be expected to manually curate a certain amount of posts or something and during which time, every new sign up is exposed to some sort of etiquette guide from those who have been here the longest, after which time they are free to do as they please but have at least had some exposure to the positive examples. Haven't really thought it through but it appears to me as if this is a problem, reaction, solution type scenario where I'm sure the problems that the platform are currently facing, should have been and must have been anticipated, so I am a little confused, especially after the post by Dan last night. I've also come across a user called @basicincome or something to that effect, whcih offers everyone on steemit the opportunity to gain a basic income on the platform. The idea of this to me is worrying going forward and my skepticism has not really reduced since my early days here. I feel there is something more to steemit than meets the eye. Perhaps just overly paranoid. :)
THere are so many scams and play here and so few people willing to do the research first to find out if it is real or not. Perhaps new users should have to hit a few targets before they get their first payouts. percentage of income withheld or something. I will have to think more.