"There's no quantifiable measure of quality OR community value. The incentive structure of Steemit is entirely focused on grabbing people's attention."
Yup... sadly... that's how many people curate as well and jump on the popularity bandwagon...
I the end, in society, on Steemit, it comes down to people and their consciousness that directs them to act in certain ways. People are loath to think and improve their quality of thinking to better themselves, the platform, and the world. I do a lot of work on this. I create quality content.
Good luck to us all who want to make Steemit a success, it all depends on us, the community.
All of my well composed quality pieces earn like 1-2 upvotes.
Every time I grab a Clickbait article on facebook, copy the pictures, and retype the stories - BOOM, a few dozen votes.
I can't decide if I want to write at a 3rd grade level just for the cash, or if I should stick to my guns and write my book and go to a normal publisher.