You have made absolute sense than most people on the trending & hot section. One of the realest posts i have read on steemit.
You sir, deserve a beer, or whatever it is that you prefer from me.
All points made are spot on, personally would like to contribute on the point regarding use of bots.
There is a lady that i know here, her posts always make it on the trending page, (atleast before the steemit eco cleaners started flagging her for spending too much on bot). As i joined the rest of them to frown upon her behaviour, i pulled back and gave it a deep thought.
her bot buying gave her account more value, in terms of increasing her rep, and because of that, she moved from a minnow toma dolphin real fast, which also gave her upvote more value.
she gained religious followers, that even though she posts about pizza alone, she would have people "drooling" and commenting on how "beautiful" she and the pizza looks, and dropped their heavy upvotes. And thats what we all aim for here at the end of the day.
All this happened to her on her 3rd month here on steemit and by her 5th month, she had 4k plus followers.
Meaning at this point, even if she did not use the bots, she still would have her followers upvote her.
I could go on and on about her activities here, but what i would like to emphasize is the fact that she helped her self grow. If she let her self grow based on the system. She would take age , too much effort and not much outcome.
Thanks for the thoughtful comment and for stopping by my page. Each person has to do what they think is best to achieve what outcomes they want. As long as they don't do it at the expense or detriment to others, I am for whatever they choose. Some people have natural advantages over others and we should applaud their uniqueness and not denigrate it.