Its shady stuff like this that calls the system into question. In economics its called 'rent seeking.' The few that greedily game the system end up sucking the lifeblood from it and it dies. Such a shame. Its the weakness of POS, you end up with a degenerate aristocracy who centralize power.
I thought that crypto was all about breaking such unfair choke holds, but its amazing how the old ways creep back in and corrode.
Unfortunately, greed can win out in a community like this. Steemit has some great intentions but the reality can be different than the ideal. You can self-police all you want, but if there aren't rules and tools to stop the gamers of the system, they just keep on taking home the money.