Yeah, definitely see your point. Stakeholders being myopic is exactly the tragedy of the commons that I often talk about.

I have always wanted there to be a separate trending page on steemit: a front facing one with normal blogs, and a circlejerk internal trending page. My post here would fit in the latter. Perhaps communities, when they arrive, can help this this kind of separation.

I think you have a bigger reach than you think. I personally regard your opinion extremely highly due to all the effort you have put in this platform, and I know I am not the only one. As for my influence, I still struggle to get people to pay attention to plagiarism. :p
If you have ideas to push this forward, you'll have my support for sure.