Very nice read. You are absolutely right. But being the minnow that I am I am guilty of using Randowhale twice... forgive me for my sins!
What I'm seeing after HF19 though is that my posts hardly get any upvotes anymore... I mean I wasn't getting much but it's been declining and declining. Instead I get people upvoting their own posts :(
It's not about the money but if I've put in the work to write a post with my view on something or I write a story a little appreciation is always nice. But I think I'm lucky if my posts get 10 views... seems if people are hardly even viewing anymore.
Gotta keep gomy my though because I do have more interaction here than on any other platform and the quality of the content is nice.
I was one of rando's biggest customer til yesterday when I had a hard think about it.
Yes I agree things are tough after HF19, but I think things will change soon, and there is plenty of other ways to get your post some attention.
I think interacting with the community and doing nice things works better in the long run, steemit is not an instant thing it's more of an investment.
Thanks for the interaction