Yes, it's a Pyramid! - But wait, listen me out - It's a good thing...
When I talk to people about Steem, I often get to hear "But, but...isn't that a pyramid scheme?" and I lately I started to answer: "YES!" followed by a wide grin and a long pause. (Don't worry, you get the pause - they don't expect you to admit it and just grin at them).
Guess who else is a pyramid scheme?
Facebook! Twitter! Linkedin! - actually every successful social network or service is a pyramid scheme. If something is really, really good (and Steem is better than that) then people talk about it - and thus bring new users to the herd. That's the very definition of a pyramid, right? Right!
But it's not a Ponzi Scheme
Ponzi and Pyramid are very different things, and I am surprised how many people can't tell the difference. In a Ponzi Scheme old users get paid out by new users entering the chain and bringing fresh money - That's an evil thing, because naturally the poor suckers who get on the train late, will never see their money back.
Pyramids however, are a good thing - it just means word of mouth is spreading fast, because people like it. And if we like something we care to share it with the people we like. The news spreads from one person to the next very much like a virus (and if you didn't know what "going viral" really meant - well, now you do!).
And pyramids are a perfectly legal thing, too - A lot of companies structure their sales in so called "MLM" (Multi Level Marketing), which is again just another word for "Pyramid". Many of them are household names for us, like Amway, Herbalife or Hamburg-Mannheimer Versicherung in Germany.
Fun Fact: Most Ponzi Schemes are not planned
Let me make that very clear: Some Ponzi Schemes are well elaborated Frauds from professional Scammers. OneCoin being one. But many just happen to become frauds because good intentions, pressure from investors and stupidity mix with a well intended entrepreneur and things get out of hand. Mr Ponzi actually never intended to defraud anyone. He took on investment and was unsuccessful...well unsuccessful with the planned business, not with attracting new investors. But as the old investors kept pressuring him about their profits he couldn't withstand the pressure and started paying old investors with fresh money he got from new investors - That's how most ponzi schemes start and turn into something illegal.
As illegal as the picture in the post, which was taken illegally by some schmock who illegally climbed the pyramids to take this pic. He is a schmok for climbing on thousand year old pyramids, but the picture is breath taking nevertheless.
Now, go out and tell everyone that Pyramids are great!
(That's why they call'em the great pyramids, after all....no?)