I am reminded of the open letter from @justinsunsteemit.

We have so much to work to do to make Steemit.com the power that it really can be. And there are many ways we can get it there, from bridging TRX, TRC10’s and TRC20’s into Communities to marketing and growing Steemit.com. From invitations and referrals to simpler and instant signups. From new listings of STEEM on ALL the greatest exchanges to integrations in critical hardware products. From bringing more influencers to the community and creating more content. There is so much I still want to give you from documenting and marketing my vision for steemit.com to connecting with the passionate folks here in this community.

It's not like there's a shortage of ideas. But yeah, it seems that there have been multiple changes of funding/direction and nobody (outside Steemit) knows what the current direction is. My assumption has been that JS was demoralized after the Witness Wars, and Steemit was left with skeleton staffing/funding level that's not able to do much more than just keep the lights on - although, as you point out, they have done some creative and useful things with their curation capability. So kudos are well-deserved for that.

I'm totally guessing, but I suspect that what is needed is not just ideas, but ideas that can be implemented by means of voting power in order to rekindle support from the owners - also, ideas that don't depend exclusively on Steemit, but can be implemented by cooperative community action. Some quick thoughts:

1.) I really like the "Teaching Teams" concept. I agree with @steemitblog that this can be a USP for Steemit. But, I would be more utilitarian about it. Don't just teach generic concepts, but teach things that are useful here. Don't teach "programming" and "algorithms", teach github navigation, steemd or condenser, or interaction with the API, etc... If it's not a skill that the Steem ecosystem can directly harness, then don't teach it. Not only does this this generate useful skills for the blockchain, but it shows other small businesses how they can change training on their products from a cost center to a revenue center.

2.) Put out a formal marketing Request For Proposal (RFP) asking professional marketing organizations to submit proposals into the SPS and let the community choose the best for funding.

3.) Steemit (and the Tron Foundation?) could find people on staff to use Steemit daily, the way that Elon Musk and Linda Yaccarino use Twitter (while maybe toning down the controversial topics). This would be a real, identifiable person, not a nameless/faceless XXXXXX01 account. Frankly, if none of the premier stakeholders use their own platform actively, it's a hard sell to others.

4.) Partnerships with firms like Brave, Dlive, Rumble, LBRY, and others beyond just advertising their products. For example, Brave could ship BAT tokens to Steem creators the same way they do with YouTube; and videos could be embedded in condenser.

5.) A development program that's funded by the SPS and modeled after the DARPA Grand Challenge to fill strategic needs for the ecosystem.