So I've only been actively using this platform for about a week now, so forgive me if I have some misconceptions about how Steem works as I am a newbie. This may have been covered before, or I might be totally off-base.
But when I look at the crypto markets, it's clear that we are in a bear market. Having said that, certain cryptos are performing better than others. Bitcoin fell from 20k and is currently trading at 5k (a 75% decline). Binance on the other hand is making new highs (a very rare exception). Most cryptos seem to be down 80-90%, but Steem is down over a whopping 95%, a clear laggard in the top cryptos of coinmarketcap.
I am wondering if this is due to the nature of Steem inflating itself, thus increasing the total Steem supply. Steem users are incentivized to try and duplicate as many Steem coins as they can without investing more fiat money, thus they find a way to exploit the system, thereby diluting Steem for everyone. Such a system seems like it is doomed to fail if incentives are going towards exploiting loopholes rather than contributing quality content.
I saw a YouTube video of a guy explaining how it might be a better system if we had to trade the Steem we earned through content generation for ad banners on our posts, which burn the Steem in the process to prevent currency dilution.
Again, I'm not sure if the logic is sound as I am relatively new to this space, but I am hoping for some comments that can educate me further on this topic.