I have been on steemit for a few days now and am still trying to figure the whole thing out. In a sense it appears to be a complex Ponzi scheme similar to other iterations of the same concept in the past. However, in the same breath it does ooze potential for greater applications than its predecessors. It is obvious that the content that is being posted on here has little to no value considering the fact that it is not being monetized by outside sources. I have seen very little to no presence of advertising, affiliate marketing or other conventional forms of e-marketing on here. With that being said, the only value that is being created on here is from people buying and sharing their steem, nothing else. The more influence you buy, the more money you are able to recapture from the people who are just buying in. Maybe I am confused here and if I am I will readily admit it. But if the entire purpose of the steemit business model is to compensate the people at the top of the pyramid with the people who are just getting in, what is the purpose of harvesting all this data and information that is being generated from the blog posts?