Wow, excellent! You have pretty much outlined my own thoughts about this aspect of life and reality.

Prior to my finding Steemit (about two weeks ago) my exposure to cryptocurrencies was limited to a basic awareness of Bitcoin, as an extension of a few of my nerdier acquaintances asking me if I were interested and wanted to invest. I could never get around their argument that fiat currency was based on "nothing" and central banks could just "print money" and that was BAD... and yet they were advocating a virtual currency based on? On? On? Turning on a computer?

I get that currency is merely a "a temporary store of value" that exists only because of widespread agreement that it's a store of value. It allows us to trade apples for carpentry... and that's a pretty nifty thing.

My primary hesitance around cryptocurrencies (aside from the legitimacy issue) has always been that they are "small." Meaning, what it to stop a virtual kabal in the tradition of the Koch Bros. from coming in and taking over "the system." The market cap of Bitcoin is about USD 16.5 billion, which is not very much in real world terms. Humans are opportunistic and greedy.

I, too, like Steemit because there's a tangible "thing" here, a longer term store of "something" to warrant the existence of Steem, as a currency. That's pretty cool. Am I merely showing myself to be "old" by finding that a positive? Maybe. But there's part of me that knows I can't "eat" dots and dashes... I need food.