You're right, and as someone who has been here for less than a month, I can tell you, that it is extremely frustrating. I see great posts all the time, but my little $0.02 upvote don't do a lot to get them up, and then I see completely garbage posts that are trending because the poster is a whale, and it was upvoted by himself and an army of update bots.

Sad. If the community stays like that, it won't flourish and eventually, the price of steem will drop.