Well from the outset Steem's marketing gimmick is that you can make money. So let's keep in mind that is a very real and expected mindset when coming here. If you aren't seeing a path to money you probably won't stick around.

"You can link or post work not created by you just elaborate as to why you think its interesting or why you oppose it"

Yeah those still don't do well. Most people do not commonly write blog articles in the style of posts that do well on steemit. They share links and offer a few lines of opinion for the most part oh and photos. There are plenty of posts documenting the heart break people feel on steemit from putting in hours of work in the hopes of having a post trend.

"I am not a professional blog writer and I enjoy the platform a lot. Its a great way to meet people with the same interests."

You have to admit there are far better platforms available for that purpose. This is a somewhat hobbled social experience at the moment.

I'm not trying to attack steem but rather bring some of the very big hurdles it faces into the light. These issues won't go away by simply ignoring them. The proof is in the numbers being posted here all day long. Steemit has a user engagement issue, the daily active users have shrunk recently.