(Note: Rereading this I see it looks critical and selfish. I feel, though, that it is the clearest way of getting my point across, so I will leave it as it is.)

I fully understand what you are saying, but I have to ask why would people invest in Steem Power if they can't use it to their own benefit? Or maybe we shouldn't bother investing in steem power at all.

The truth is that I can't make an income from my investment, I will simply power down.

The question also has to be asked what makes a post so valuable that I would effectively give the person who wrote it some of my own money. I say effectively because that reward would otherwise go to me when I vote up my own post or comment.

The argument that people should vote up their own posts but not their comments also doesn't wash. Of course, anyone producing a few posts per day will agree with this because they will benefit from it - they get to use most of their own power on their own posts plus they expect others to vote on them.

I feel that your post is more about blaming the users than blaming the system. Before the hardfork we had a system where whales had way too much power, now I feel it has gone too far. People don't seem to understand that for the system to work, people have to invest in it, not just by producing quality content, but by actually putting money into the system.

Unfortunately, money does make the world go round. Money in this case is what is attracting new users to the platform. There is very little altruistic about it.

One last thing.
How much content is there here which people would actually read if they found it somewhere else? You can get upvotes here simply by putting up pictures of cute little kittens. My point is that in the real world very few people pay for content. I do upvote content that is of interest to me, but there really isn't that much of it. And upvoting friends so that in return they will upvote you is just the same as voting for yourself in my view - it just looks better.