Pretty much everything you write is about the back end....what about the front end? How much longer will the "beta" be posted on the steemit logo? When will the layout enhancement and the searchability, etc etc etc features ever be upgraded into the Steemit platform? These seem to be on the back burner and perhaps will be rolled out with HF50.
The whole analytic features of HF20 have ALL been a Developer push process and what's clearly missing is the User Pull criteria. The network effect is ALL about the users and not enough resources are being deployed to enhance the front end.
A world class blockchain can only go so far with Developer Push process (e.g. SMTs) because often what they think is right misses the mark to what the users want. From a user perspective, this HF20 has missed big to address any Front end upgrades.
As far as I know there is absolutely no plans to further develop steemit. As we know steemit != steem - A little while ago there was an ample conversation with @lukestokes regarding this very subject. I must confess at first It made me upset, but after the emotional initial reaction subsidized I understood what he was trying to say.
Steemit.com is probably best described as proof of concept, a somewhat successful experiment (because it's not perfect) that has given this blockchain the opportunity to lure in (yes, the right word) a community that would care for it's future.
We are already seeing new front ends that are vastly superior to steemit taking over, and in my personal opinion steempeak is so good, it makes steemit look like a dinosaur, but I'm not sure I'm in the majority.
In the future however, the plan is for communities to branch out, specialize if you will and for the box of unmarked legos that steemit currently is to fade into the background.
To me this makes perfect sense, but I realize there are some emotions invested into the idea of steemit the ultimate blogging platform, and I don't dismiss them. However, we would be silly to believe that everyone wants to be a blogger or that can for that matter, so the specialization into niches is nothing but a natural step.
Would updates come to condenser? Sure, I'm sure some will... but I doubt profoundly that we will be seeing something that will blow anyone's mind front end wise. I think that's nowhere on anyone's roadmap.
I think the same way as you @meno, I'm not that old here and it took me some time to understand and differentiate Steemit from Steem - now I can see it.
For me it sounds natural to see Steemit.com fading away slowly, indeed SteemPeak does a much better job, so good that when I try to bring my friends into the chain I show my blog through there.
It also sounds natural to see the niches finding their own way into separate dApps, from there we already have dTube, Appics, etc.. At least it'll make the experience of finding high-quality content much easier than this chaos that is the tag system.
It's important to know that about steemit.inc and the steemit.com frontend so we don't carry expectations!! I would like to add to your excellent suggestion of steempeak, (which let you decide if there's going to be beneficiaries or not), also eSteem surfer which already is giving the option to edit old posts!!
I think what you're looking for is the communities update. There are three code changes all working hand in hand.
Velocity lays the backend groundwork to allow the platform to scale sustainably.
Communities allows a better custom user facing interface with all the search features you're thinking of.
SMTs allows communities to have a central token of exchange and share the rewards of growing a project.
These three things are what will make Steem moon. The first just got off on a rocky start. There are additional changes on the horizon. SMTS are in March. I don't have a date on communities.
Thanks for the quick update. I'm happy that you are still so pumped about SMTS :)
You are right on with all of that. Who would want to invest any serious money in a "beta" platform?