I made the observation this morning to a good friend that there seems to be two steemits evolving, one that is authentic and one that is bot-dominant.
The experiment is still in beta, after all, and it will evolve in the ways that prove most useful.
It's our job to make our voices heard by posting authentic content, responding authentically, and curating the things we like.
I like that theory that 2 steemits are evolving. I'd then be curious if one is succeeding more than the other. I'd also be curious if the incentives of the system are actually tuned correctly to encourage the authentic steemit vs the automatic steemit.
Right now people with high SPs no longer have to curate content. They don't have to participate or contribute to the community anything other than their voting power. They simply delegate to bots for the payouts, and then content creators pay for the privilege to self-curate. Once a content creator has built up, or bought, enough SP, they can then join the virtuous cycle. Its a complete breakdown of how things are 'supposed' to work.