The whales who have invested in the platform (not those who mined steem before launch), have the right to power down for whtasover reason. While it further devalues steem, the focus shouldn't be on the whales powering down but rather on how to incentivizes powering up. Why should I buy steem? How will I benefit from powering up? What plans are there to improve the steemit platform. How long will it take? Why would people adopt steem other than other altcoins?
The amazing thing about building a social media platform on the blockchain, is that it opens a gateway for exposing the rest of the world to cryptocurrencies. Some people will learn about steem and sbd before they've ev heard the word "bitcoin" . I believe steemit will play a significant role in exposing the rest of the world to adaptation and to the benefits of cryptos and the its inderlying distributed ledger tech.