A long but worthwhile post. Thanks for putting all the issues together like this so succinctly (and it is succinct when you think of the extent of the current issues). I still find a lot of the stuff about witnesses to be a complete mystery. I'm trying to change that and this takes me several steps forward so thank you :)
Appreciate you brother, I was in the same position up until last week and I'm glad I could help.
I feel many of us have trusted the official voting page to provide relevant and accurate information. Many don't vote period, those that do want to are likely only aware of the top 50 and that is compounding the dead witness situation.
I totally agree! For the longest time I thought that the top 50 list was everyone that we could vote for. And it does make it so much more difficult to find witnesses you want to vote for if you can't see their names in the list.
I think that is one of the bigger problems with steemit, for all its transparency the information users need to be informed and help steemit run well is still very much hidden.