RE: My version of Steem is NOT content based, It is Contribution based.
Same here. It's kind of tough because posting your own content feels like it's what the platform was built to do. Not "blogging" or "posting" feels like not participating. Curating and commenting definitely adds value, but your curation efforts as a minnow are almost useless, and comments certainly add something on "real" posts. But bid bots have created an atmosphere that fills the front pages with posts that people don't care about interaction with. They're just targets for bid bots. I'm guilty of the same thing. I'd like to have some influence here, and the fastest way to get there is to engage in a way that may not be best for the platform, but it almost feels like an ambiguous ends justify the means. The world can't be full of bloggers, there has to be someone to blog to, but Steemit doesn't offer much to the "viewer" so to speak...
Minnows curation needs to be much more highly valued to attract readers and engagement.
Nailed it with that one @surfyogi! If new user upvotes had some impact it would encourage people to stick around and create better content AND connect with the people with whom they find interesting. As it stands 30 upvotes from newer accounts still equal nothing, almost. I think this is a source of discouragement hundreds of people who would be great community additions if they could see past the zero they are "worth" when they get active and try to engage.
I think you nailed it @lorilikes... minnow newcomers see total garbage posts reaping huge rewards, they deplete their Steem power with just trying to vote on even a relatively few items per day, they come after seeing videos over on YouTube saying “come to Steemit and you can vote yourself money” which after they do so, it doesn’t take long to run into the current of some earlier adopters who discuss how they are resentful of people who comment without an upvote and consider it “spamming for upvotes” which leaves a minnow type wondering if they have any proper access to the conversation without running their Steem power out to nothing very quickly just so they can attempt to engage... its comes across as a lot of mixed messages sometimes. Are you supposed to participate or not... what’s the “right way” to do so... it can be difficult to know what your “value” is in these mixed messages.