Haha, well I'm glad someone finds value in my peeved rants! >__<
Steemit is a tough egg to crack, honestly. I love the concept of blockchain-based social media, I love that your work is the product and not corporate ads, but you're totally right: It's hard to gain any traction, especially when taking the time to produce quality, original content.
The highest-value accounts I follow are ones that already had a large following pre-Steemit, like @corbettreport and @dollarvigilante. Then you come across accounts that are raking in the dough doing nothing more than reposting YouTube videos because Cheetah isn't smart enough to recognize that as "duplicate content."
For the time being, I'm treating Steemit as pretty much a blockchain-hardened backup of my blog(s) moreso than an avenue for earning.
Thanks for the follow, @f3nix, and I am likewise following you! I see you resteemed a post about MinnowBooster - have you used the service yet? I'm considering giving it a shot.
I agree with the way you're dealing with steemit..it's good especially for someone that already has some content to publish. It can enhance the communication channels, leverage them. Minnowbooster seems interesting, with the delegated Steem Power (SP) leasing..i think i should try to send 1 steem and make an experiment. Another one i'm trying to apply for is qrator.