I think the the future of steem will largely depend on growth of its userbase. If it is regularly getting more eyeballs on its content, then the value should increase. The community seems committed to trying new and crazy ideas to get new users and keep them engaged.
Yes. But they are not doing anything to foment the growth of Steem outside the crypto-currency enthusiast world.
If they don't create a decentralized environment for content creators which does not force them to leave their own blogs (e.g. creating a "steemit button" for CMS' like Wordpress or Drupal) then I think they will go further down. The concept is not bad, but it lacks a long term strategy.