There are lots of social media sites which is much more develop than steemit and if author or anybody wanted a pure socialization this is not the place for now because traffic are less and only few to none cares about it I guess. There are huge sites where an author can gain huge social networks.

Putting the trending page at the home page is the proof that steemit were advertised and promoted for that way. It was purposely placed there to entice anybody who visited the website.