This is why we have a 95% kill rate and most people who walk in the door leave in two weeks or less.
I've spoken to countless people that have decided to sign up here and soon after decided to leave. Their reason was never a lack of understanding behind the tech. It was the fact that they had no interest in producing any type of content, and to add to that, they saw the rewards and felt it wasn't worth the effort.
These are people with jobs of 30k+. It's the curiosity that pulls them in, and then disinterest and a content financial situation that pulls them in. They were never interested in buying Steem. They were simply interested in seeing how much they could make with minimal effort. When signing up is free, people will take advantage of that.
Now, another reason why we have so many minnows is that simply so few are willing to take the leap to buy Steem to power up. Why would they? They're here to make money as struggling artists or students; then there's the photographers that came here to post their works because simply anything is better than nothing for their efforts.
When you add into the equation that earnings are absolutely tiny due to the majority being minnows and not even bothering to attempt to curate due to the pointlessness of the returns, that's why you have so many people abandoning ship. People see select groups making bank and think "Well why the fuck isn't that me? I'm out."
That isn't to deny the fact that people enter and are met with nothing but confusion regarding the wallets and the concept itself, I have no doubt that it happens often, but to ignore the bigger reasons, I have to say, is a bit delusional.
A handful of crypto-nerds downvoting each other is not an ecosystem to draw people in.
It's already evident that it's enough to make the existing users far happier than before as a result of the endless reward pool and bid bot abuse.
Your experience is different than mine, @namiks. I've been lucky enough to see a lot of people thrive after getting my help. They power up, they SPUD and will SPUD again on Sept 1. They are content creators who find their niche here. Often they see this as a way to supplement other income they make online even while growing sp. This is why I am passionate to do what I do because I see the potential of STEEM even through the difficulties.
Somehow the masses have to get in here. Retaining those who make it to 45+ rep is key and many of them will thrive. The question is how to help them be competent here.
We used to have about 10K "people who matter" posting here about one year ago. Now that number is 8K. So now what? Get more people to kill or help the people here now succeed?
I work with the ones trying to stay.
We saw a massive bull market, so of course a lot of people entered and a lot of people left. There could have been more to entice them into sticking around, sure.
That's what the last HF was for. People now have a bigger incentive to curate and support each other.