that's actually quite an idea both the trending-promoting one as well as the passive income for the investors. I think as things continue like that it will only make things worse. Trending page is full of posts using bid-bots, the quality content is buried, the promoted page is buried and some whales keep on earning money without thinking that with practices like that they help only themselves. People start going inactive, others leave the platform, steemit doesn't earn a single $ to use if again for the update of the platform or any other project regarding. At some point something needs to be done for the sake of the platform and to reach it's full potential and ofc for the sake of every steemit member.

The idea of delegating power is really wise. Not only they will earn money, their delegating power will actually help quality content of quality people