I agree that there is a lot of money circulation between the different altcoins.
But also the number of altcoins is increasing and therefore it is in an ongoing process to attract potential investors/followers for YOUR coin (in our case steem)
I think the main reason that steem is going to rise is not the circulation of money or the fact that paying out the money is related to huge effort.
I trust in the rise of steem due to the unique business model. Social media platform have found many different ways to create and retain a well working business model. Steem has understood the power of social media and combined it with reimburse the contributors.
At the moment we approximately 500k accounts - nothing related to big players like Facebook, Pinterest and Co..
Let's open our hands for a bright future