RE: Does Steem Suck? Let Me Tell You How I Really Feel...
"How easy would it be to gather readers if you'd setup blog on some more traditional site?"
Honestly? It depends on the site, but I wrote a blog about Ubuntu on the Hungarian Ubuntu website and I had readers and people commented on my posts. Nowadays I am not so active on it (I wrote my last blog post on that site on 2018.03.22).
Okay, I didn't earned a single cent with it (directly from it), but I had readers and real good, meaningful comments and since that's a community site, there are several bloggers on the website and they also have community activity on their blogs.
I also wrote a blog on Blogger, where Adsense can be used and I used it.
I was not so active on that blog, but I earned a few cents with it. Most of the readers came from the above mentioned Ubuntu website, because I mentioned my blog there.
There are other sites, where you can write a blog and get readers relatively easily.
For example HUP (Hungarian Unix Portal) or WSPRnet.
These are just two examples and the statement about the community are also true for these sites. You just have to find the proper websites.
I'd guess it would be a lot easier to find audience, when you're writing about certain topic, on a website where people interested about it gather around
Steem ecosystem is small, certain tags do better, but it requires either connections or truly interesting content for wide audience to garner good traction just like in any other place.
Somebody could build or link websites with specific interest to Steem reward system, then it will make it easier for writers from that group to gain readers and meaningful interaction but now it's hard when everyone is competing with everyone else for attention.