I agree that we all need to "[cen$or3d] or get off the pot" when it comes to deciding how to make Steemit great. To your point, there are many ways to help the platform grow. One is investing in Steem Power, and curating content with your investment. Another is working on monetizing the new Smart Media Tokens (SMT) on the Steem blockchain. And the list goes on.
My investment (other than my time that I take to post content, read others' content, commenting on others' content, and thinking about what content to write about next) is the time that I spend on weeding out the scammers and spammers.
We have a lot of useful tools available to us on the Steem Blockchain, where we can "audit the transactions on the ledger" and identify risky transactions (spammers / scammers), if we know how to look for them and what to look for to identify the most prominent scams.
Now, this is unfortunately not something that I can devote myself to full-time because as (I believe you alluded to above), some of us have full-time jobs that we need to maintain in order to continue to exist in our everyday lives. But I do my part when and where I can, and I try to work with the community to make it a better place for us all.
As corny and cheesy as it sounds.. If one of us Succeeds in making the Steemit Community a better place, all of us Succeed! I believe that is true. And I believe it to be true because of the way the platform was developed and the original intent of the platform. Sure, there have been many changes from the original purpose of Steemit, but overall there are many people here (the ones who stick around the longest) who truly care about the community and who want Steem(it) to Succeed!
Yes, devotion full-time is a difficult thing for me and this eats every spare and often not spare moment I have. It is an investment into a potential future that does not exist for me in the real-world. This comes with many costs.
If enough people (big and small) choose to succeed here long-term, all others will benefit. The problem is, most are waiting for the benefits but are unwilling to step up and pull their weight.
This situation happens all the time, everywhere. It's just something that we're going to have to deal with, unless the rules of the world change. In the meantime, the people who don't pull their weight as much will not receive as much of a benefit in the long-run.
Patience is key, although I completely understand how the personal costs don't always seem to be worth the potential benefits of maintaining a consistent presence here. I'm still cautiously optimistic about Steemit's Future, or at least the Future of the Steem Blockchain.
$0 transaction fees is something that can not and should not be overlooked on the Steem Blockchain.
The potential to kill international bank transfers is one of the most underrated concepts. That alone can save a large company millions per year.