I think it is going to be a lot better for the platform as well.  I think a lot of people came into the hardfork without educating themselves and that caused a lot of panic when things happened that they were not expecting. 

I think that the witnesses and the Steemit team did a really good job working to get the issues fixed in a way that was quicker than they had previously anticipated.  The fact that there are so many people dedicated to ensuring the blockchain runs smoothly and well is a great indication of what the future of Steemit will be like.

I am not a fan of bots either, and only time will tell if these updates are going to cut down on that sort of activity.  There are always going to be people trying to game the system though, so all we can do is put out the best content possible and hope that it gets recognized.