This is an excellent post @cryptogee. However I feel compelled to correct you on one small point. Your article confused ninja mining and premining. Let me clarify, ninja mining is when the dev or insiders quickly mine the first blocks secretly without notifying other miners ahead of the launch, so only they can mine. Very shady!

Pre mine on the other hand is about intentionally designing a larger number of the coins to be generated in either the genisis block or the first few blocks.

Both result in devs with large % of total coins. It should be clear that ninja mining is shady always. Steemit, did NOT ninja mine. Premine on the other hand can be done for honest valid reasons, ala ripple or steemit.