You guys are proving me wrong in a way as you really do have some excellent content that needs to be seen by a wider audience. There are a few others I could list too. You are having to fight it out with your Steem Dollars to get up the trending page when this site is supposed to be about the opinions of the community. The trending page has been corrupted by paid votes, but then there were always issues as some people happened to have powerful friends.
I think there's room for the whales to act as patrons who support good content to get it trending without the creators having to pay and they would actually get much better rewards as well as recognition. The whales would profit from curation rewards.
I really don't have all the answers, but I see issues with how Steemit is working and wanted to offer an opinion. It's a whole new economy on Steemit and we have to find new ways to make it work for us.
Thanks for giving your input on this. This is exactly the sort of feedback I want. I don't pretend to always be right, but we have to have the discussions.
It's all good with me. I need to work on my next open mic song. Not got an original this time, but I'm working on some.
Cheers