In many ways writing helped me become more of an extrovert! Online at first I was extremely introverted like I was as a kid (new neighborhood I guess!).
I was for most of my childhood and early school years an introvert. Today I'm more of an extrovert but that comes from the same frustration you mention- introverts are unfairly seen in the wrong light or not given special consideration without some extra "work" on their part for what seems to be given freely to extroverts. I know it "seems" unfair but it really isn't. Instead of just maintaining frustration I decided to learn to become an extrovert. The reasons are that:
1. The world isn't going to change
2. The world works in two ways- those that go out and make things happen and take steps to plant seeds, stimulate change, and take your life's control and those that are introverted often miss out on A LOT. I get that it's not just something easy to change, but since I'm a "converted" extrovert from introvert I have some insight into this.
3. You have to really look at it in the frame work of not just fair/unfair, just or unjust but rather based on the rules of where you plan to put your time. In the writing realm, your goals are what truly make or break weather or not being an introvert will limit you or not. If your goal is to just write to share, but you want to quietly do so without so much fuss, then you can do that without a problem.
If your goal is to earn money, to drive massive traffic to your articles, gaining a lot of attention (which is how the money comes as it's a numbers game really), and you want your work to reach a global audience with comments, flags (like, tweet, etc...) then you should realize that introversion is not the best way to reach that goal. it's like trying to enter a marathon when your out of shape, overweight, and malnutritous, don't drink water-ever, and expecting the other runners to slow down so you have a better chance to win the race.
My bottom line was that I wasn't going to sit back and let my limitations (or what others considered limitations) weight me down. I say limitations loosely to mean what limits me in certain realms to excel) I started to learn all about how to extrovert, how to be more social, how to participate-
Frced or not, (it only feels forced because you don't "want" to do it, but if you practice doing it you will grow out of that mindset and realize want and need (as required by the laws of physics) are different.
In just doing it I learn the value in not only taking action and changing the patterns I'm so accustomed to that have imprisoned me for so long, but also that when you do participate enough you stop seeing it as forced and start seeing the benefits of doing so. Participation stimulates "planting seeds" which create cause effect relationships. A mouse cannot play in a cat world- so to speak.
It's true some extroverts are naturally that way (they figured out that this is due to a predisposition in the brain that these people are born with where there is literally, physically more dopamine and serotonin (mostly dopamine) receptors thus they tend to be more naturally energetic and "have" to extrovert just to burn that energy they can't hold in- off. (I'm so jealous of these people!)
Other reasons are the abundance of structures like Acetocholine receptors (the brains cell phone neurotransmitters/message actuators) that make their minds work clearly and thinking very easy, memory is almost photographic and the like- this causes them to see things more clearly, make decisions faster and with that comes extroversion in the form of "ease".
Many introverts are such because they have to work at the extroversion concepts- being out going is a dopamine firing kind of thing, and one thing that sets extroverts apart is with clearer thinking and more energy they can often figure things out faster thus don't run into what introverts do- social anxiety.
It's not so much about being a social hermit but more so about not feeling like you can keep up or impress upon people consistently things that interest them, or that what you would share wouldn't be of interest. Nobody likes to talk and find they are essentially ignored. Other boundaries introverts run into is laziness- not feeling like it is no excuse for not doing it!
Wow this could be a wizzle all it's own.
The bottom line here is that there is no way around participation. It's the life blood of networking and the actuator, as you mentioned, of natural backlinks, more fans (thus more people seeing your articles right away and passing likes, links, even syndication out).It's simply cause and effect, physics of the realm and regardless of your reasons, if you don't do certain causes, certain effects are simply not possible.
My advice to you would be not to feel victimized by this but realize that if you want to be in this world and thrive, writing articles will do that to some extent but you will need to learn to extrovert more, at least where online participation is concerned or simply you will miss out. One thing I can tell you about web 2.0 properties such as this are that introverts do tend to do better here than say on your own site where your commissioned with 100% of the SEO, social bookmarking etc...
In short, you can actually just write here and that's it and it's possible, if your work is brilliant, people like it, and the editors (the wizzley staff) likes it they may pick it for "editors choice" which helps without you doing anything but publishing it. They do a lot of SEO work (why I like these sites), so although participation socially is the faster track- it's not required to succeed.
There is no work around, no cure, just practical awareness that extroversion although to some is natural, is a skill set building concept or those of us that are introverted. I didn't even talk to people, including teachers until the 9th grade, I was a wall flower at dances, I kept to myself always, and even had to be forced to go to recess in the 6th grade where I always hid behind the bungalo's to study homework. I was smart but not at all social, but teachers forced me to "play" and that started the chain of events that turned me into an extrovert (My fiance doesn't understand how I could have ever been an introvert!)
I can tell you that in the years I've spent breaking out of my introversion shell, I discovered that extroversion is one of those skill sets that set you free in MANY ways. It shouldn't be looked at like rich/poor- the have's and the have not's or based on fairness, but rather that in this business, in this realm, you really have to develop a sense of extroversion or it's going to take a lot longer to get syndicated.
Once you do develop a realistic view of extroversion and get your skill set going you'll find it's self perpetuating at some point. You just become that person. it's not about becoming something your not but rather becoming more of who you already are. You should extrovert so you can make your mark, show the uniqueness that is who you are, instead of hoarding it to yourself by not expressing yourself. If your here writing, my guess is that you want what all of us want, to be heard and to share your point of view with the world, to help people or simply to be a voice. If earning is your main objective extroversion is likely going to be a necessity to some degree (participation)...
You can make as many excuses, rationalizations, or beat the thing to death but in the end your not going to get anywhere until you throw in the towel, accept that extroversion in the "social" web is a requirement to really flood your work out to the masses and to become integrated into the community. I think you'll find extroversion is like being let out of a cage, and really seeing the world for it's glory and magnificence.
My fiance' Michelle is a strong introvert and I'm a strong extrovert (I know what your thinking but really it works amazingly well because I bring her out of her shell and she takes me down a notch or two!). I read your post to her and she got passionate about it saying that it's really not fair that I, just because I'm quiet and don't babble on about ridiculous or useless things, that I'm not seen for who I am.
She further stated that people tend to judge her as stupid, quiet, non-intellectual, and the like because she doesn't just open up to everybody- but in our discussion of what I put here (the fall out of our discussion actually) she came to see that what I wrote above (and I didn't try to convince her) was true... It's not a matter of fairness, it's a matter of the rules of engagement, the rules of the games you want to play, writing is a realm, and you can be either one to exist here, and even thrive, but if you want to tackle higher levels of earnings, traffic, and enjoy the sweet fast track that social engagement brings... you have to do what everyone else does that makes that possible.
I hope you see what I mean. I wish you luck... by the way just posting this was an extroversion in progress :)
@kajohu - I loved how you said I almost didn't respond because I'm inclined towards introversion :) glad you took the initiative none the less :)
Jerrico
p.s.
I wrote a wizzle about "what it's like to be a Wizzley author" that you may want to read for perspective. One thing that makes our community so valuable as you mentioned, is that they help one another and even an introvert can find some solace in that... Just go at your own pace and talk to people, get comfortable with others here one at a time, eventually you'll have a lot of fans and what you fear will limit you will actually just be a longer road to the same end.
My Wizzle is here: WizTronics
. I can go in spurts for awhile to participate in forums and comment on pages, but then I just....sit back and observe. 
(I can't believe I said that)
