Steem's market cap was over $1.2 billion. Yes, it has been a bear market since that peak but in my view it truly wasn't necessary to see the market cap drop by more than about 75% (overall market average) and probably less given that Steem has a lot more substance and promise than the true trash in the market (which, to be fair, a lot of which has dropped even more than Steem). Instead poor economics sent us down 97-98% and from the top 20 in terms of blockchains to barely hanging on in the top 100. In this sort of market, that degree of visibility and credibility loss carries its own added costs.
Steem's economics are, quite frankly, more than a bit bonkers. @burnpost is my small (albeit growing) attempt to make something of a course correction within the system, since getting to consensus in a decentralized system to make a more substantive pivot is very difficult, even if justified on the merits (which is debatable).
And by 'economics' above, in VC terms, I include burn rate, not just what things look like if and when you get to a sustainable mature operating model. Too many arguments are made on the basis of this or that economics weakness not mattering because demand will be so massive once we 'get there'. Well, for that to matter, you still have to get there. We haven't even figured out how to grow yet. Getting there is a huge challenge and will take time (if ever).