I agree with and applaud this practice.
The only issue is you actually finding my wonderful post and reading it. Most posts just fall into the abyss to never be seen or read. If a post gets on the trending page or the hot page, people will read it and that is why, at the moment, bid bots are so heavily used.
It is also, unfortunately in my opinion, in the SMT whitepaper that Steem is to become the "advertising blockchain" where people will pay to get on trending.
It is a complicated issue. One where the community that exists beyond it is going to be fine but could end up not existing due to the direction steemit inc and the ponzi players take this ship.
This is the big issue.... Searching for content. There is no middle ground between New (and Noisy) and Trending (and Spammy). I've spent hours trying to find the quality posters amongst the topics that interest me and still my Feed is quite sparse.
I agree that it is likely SMT will be the death of steemit... There is so much mess to resolve with just one currency on the platform! There will be no help for us when the Jerry coin comes to town.
You sir get a follow!
I wrote an article all about the SMT's and how it doesn't care at all for steemit. I think they will be good for the currency and the blockchain, but not this platform or the community.
As for the vote bot debate... I think we either lead by example or do as the romans do. One will make you more money (and potentially destroy the platform and currency) the other is altruistic.
It is a prisoners dilemma. While you lead by example, you watch people make off like bandits. They could end up bleeding the system dry. There are no promises on which way this goes. It is a tough one.
Personally, I am moving towards not using bid bots and letting the chips fall where they do.