Barry, appreciate your posts, and I think you have articulated concerns that many have. However, I think concerns stem from a misunderstanding of the current development state that Steemit is in. It is just now in the initial launch phase. IMO the issue of lesser known talent not getting adequate exposure will not persist as Steemit gets further along in its development to a more steady-state phase.

I think of it this way: Steemit is setting up a an ecosystem......a large shopping mall complex if you will. The first thing that needs to happen is to attract the big, well-known box stores as anchors to the eco-system so that the traffic they pull can then in fact spill over to the smaller mom/pop stores in the ecosystem.
If we did the opposite and instead, started by populating the mall with a few small, not so well known, mom/pop stores who have little ability to pull traffic on their own, the entire ecosystem will soon fail.

Of course in this scenario, the big box stores are the well known writers and personalities with large followings. The smaller stores, are the lesser known talent that are looking for exposure. So, currently the problem is that a lot of that great but lesser known talent has set up on shop in our "mall" a bit early and there is not quite enough traffic to help them get the exposure they need. Meanwhile the "whales" are (correctly in my opinion) giving a lot of attention to the more well known talent to help them feel comfortable and happy in this shiny new "mall" of ours, since they know that in time these bloggers will be the foundations of a great and thriving platform that helps to lift us all.

Before we bringing in all the animals of the forest, Steemit needs to plant some trees.