Hi Andrew,
Thank you so much for sharing your story! From reading your post (and from what I've seen for myself so far in the short time I've been on Steemit), it feels like this platform is finally pushing the Internet towards a truly democratic societal structure (if that don't sound to high falutin'), rather than the vehicle for corporate chicanery it has otherwise become in the past 20 years.)
Although Steemit is still something of a well-kept secret amongst Joe Six Pack and Sally Soccer Mom, I firmly believe it will make Facebook, Twitter et. al. irrelevant once it approaches the tipping point.
All the best!
Cheers,
James
Hey @jamesdeagle, good to meet you. Thanks for the thoughtful comment and I agree!
Perhaps not irrelevant but it will surely push them to update their current models. The two core things will be a monetary Blockchain Token system and the second will be a real reputation system so people behave great and to reduce spam. Even on these other platforms like Facebook, Instagram and Twitter it can be very hard to find quality content since everyone is trying to create shock factor material.
Personally, I've been thinking a while about how to address a reputation system. There are certainly things we could do to improve our reputation system, but I have believed for a long time that a well-designed token was really the only solution ... hmmm, this might be better to leave for a future post ;)