There's way more development for Steem than I imagined after reading this. There's one thing that bothers me when you cited Adam Levine and his utopian vision about how if people are compensated for content, the content will somehow be better. I don't think this is the case at all.
People being compensated for content just means they will create generic content to try and appeal to the maximum number of viewers possible to extract the maximum amount of dollars possible. It will be a replica of the generic, corporate-style, SJW promoting, you can't offend ANYONE corporate world.
In other words, you cannot tell the truth and everything is a mixture of white lies or just plain fraud. In my earlier posts, I would somewhat self-censor to avoid any monetary retribution from others, but I decided telling the truth about the way things are is more important.
Now I feel like I'll be run off the site in no time by posting about actual controversial subjects like this and not censoring the truth:
RE: Steemit Winter Update: 2017 reflection, our Vision Statement and Mission, and a look forward