I know you've been here a long time, too, @jsantana... and I well remember blogging everyday through 10-cent and 7-cent Steem!
As for the value of Steem, there are a lot of projects already developed and running on the Steem blockchain... and I'm particularly excited about Steem Monsters because the gaming industry is HUGE, and this project is designed to be functional outside Steemit.
The centralization issue is a tough nut to crack. Decentralized exchanges seem slow to develop... and they seem held back by lack of money, lack of coordination and a failure to ever secure enough trading volume that it makes sense to trade there.
I hope you're right about steemmonsters @denmarkguy. I just got into it a day before yesterday and it's not easy collecting them especially the golden ones.
I really hope this takes off.