You do not need paid upvote bots to gain exposure. Sure, it's one way to get on the trending page, but I have personally experimented with them and they aren't all they're cracked up to be. I have gotten noticed several times by curie and Dtube because I put effort into writing my posts and have lots of high quality photos. If you make good connections with people, you've basically got a free resteem service because they will share your content. You can also join curation trails and they can upvote your own content as well.
Before people used upvote bots, the only people on the trending pages were whales or friends of whales. They were the same old people that would write whatever they wanted, give themselves a $70+ upvote and boom, they end up on trending again and again. Now that minnows have the power to combat this issue, people are still complaining. I'd say it's a step in the right direction, and things are evolving.
When people realize that being selfish doesn't get you anywhere here, they will realize the importance of building relationships here. I am in many discord servers and we help each other because that does a lot more for our success then trying to scavenge for $0.05 upvotes like a dumb fuck.
Big goals aren't always better than smaller ones. It depends where you are in life. A small goal can be more motivating because it can give you a sense of direction. A goal that is too big can often times make you feel lost and uninspired. A small goal can inspire you because you might think, "Yo! That is totally realistic! I can do that!"
I do think Steem can become really successful. A platform that becomes successful isn't necessarily the one that doesn't have any problems. It is the one that sees it's problems and takes action to solve them. Tired of spam? Downvote shitty spam comments. I noticed a drastic reduction is spam comments. Phishing scams? there are bots that go around reporting this shit and you can downvote scam accounts. Whales are assholes? Delegation, curation trails and relationships will save you.
Those are my thoughts.
Another $0.05 upvote seeking Habibi. I doubt if you have read everything he wrote above. Just another skimmer for comment Habibi you are. You rambled as if what he wrote above encourages selfishness. For the second time, let me post the sub-headings maybe you'll read them this time.
Those are nuggets for not only steemit but copywriting and whatever concers writing, and life in general. If it still sounds selfish to you, then I doubt if your situation can be salvaged.
You have my upvote though.