I think people didn't attack @steemsports because they thought it wants everything for itself but because the users who used it to get money without risk and transfer that out of the system immediately. Everybody knows that it isn't sustainable on long-term.
I know it's a side-effect of starting up things. Someone could complain, but the reality is that new services could start with the freemium model more successfully. Also, there are a lot of requirements when you starting a bookie, that takes time, and you could use this time to build a user base. I've known from your first successful pay play game (the election, if I remember well), that you won't stuck in this phase of your service. The continuous support of whales despite the attacks just confirmed that. It's not difficult to understand you, just requires long-term vision.
Thanks for your reply, yes thanks for recalling the elections post, it was great fun, that was done with a crude manual script which became the basis for the automated platform we have now.
Regarding players using rewards to cash out of the system, I'm surprised because most of the rewards are in Steem Power which are locked up for a time period, sock-puppet accounts for blog author rewards are a much bigger issue, at least were a huge issue back in the day, I haven't kept tabs on that lately.
Our roadmap and business plan is rather ambitious, @smooth is the only one to have seen it besides my co-founder, which is why you may see @smooth actively defending us and taking some heat for it, since he has the bigger picture. If we can pull off our plans it will legitimise both Steem and Bitshares as formidable forces in the crypto community and likely increase the value of both.
We will reveal our plans over time, sadly there are many copy-cats and it is prudent to hold some cards closely.
I can fully understand how our account value can be a topic of discussion, it is not however even in the top 200 or cashing out as mentioned, we need runway for our project's future, certain licensing and incorporation down the line could cost 15 000 USD which is the entire account value gone, another blockchain project, Open Bazaar has 4 Million USD in funding, we are a drop in that ocean and yet have pulled some cool stuff off.
Personally I'm tired of seeing low post values in general, I don't get envious when others make high post values, when @xeroc had over 40K USD on his Piston post I was amazed and wondered if anyone could top that, and gave me drive to achieve as well. It's good for the outside world to see high post values to take us seriously as a place that influencers and business can take root and build a community around themselves.
Keep on being awesome and looking forward to Steem being great in 2017.