I think STEEM more than anything else needs the abuse to stop. We witness #newsteem try to fight that from the bottom up but it needs to be fought from the top down (One whale abusing the system hurts the system more than hundreds of redfish/minnows doing the same).

Some of the stuff that gets downvoted is of much higher quailty than some of the stuff thats making handfulls of dollars. If this mindset isn't fixed it will continue to hurt the USD value of STEEM.

I like both your ideas and can see both working. A Fiver Steem site that pays out in STEEM/SBD or even delegations could get popular. The Steem Ebay is a grand slam imo.

Removing RC limits wouldn't hurt either, we can't expect people to sign up to the STEEM blockchain and then not be able to use it. Most aren't paying for more RC when they can just skip on over to the next site. THere's too many free options out there to try and force people to pay.