I guess that would depend upon what you mean by advertising....
If "advertising" is posts up that are nothing more than spammy ads, then I would say it is censorship...plus we have tools for that.
If you mean Steemit selling ads on the side frames, then no I would not call that censorship...
I guess a big question in that debate is who is being censored. If we take the approach individuals should not be censored, then we create a forum where people can post what they want. However, do we give corporations the same right. One of the downfalls in the US is a corporation has the rights of a person.
So do we allow corporations to have accounts and post ads? Or is that only reserved for the individual?
Personally, I am all for giving rights to the individuals....but not the corporations.
I totally agree that corporations should not have the same rights as human beings.
It really is an interesting topic to think about, as we know FB has corporate accounts that you can like and follow.
I think it should be a community decision but if there was a ban on corporate accounts then I'm sure they'd work on finding marketing strategies to have their products and services promoted in some way.
Personally, I'm with you. I don't want to see corporate advertising on Steemit now or in the future.
I moved here from a big following on Instagram, mainly because I was sick of seeing an advertisement every third picture! My Facebook feed is similar and my business page is forced to pay money just to get my posts in front of people that have indicated that they want to see my posts in the first place.
Advertising is a disease that will spread once it gets any foothold. Censorship will become more prevalent when advertising works best on certain posts, which will favour fund generating material and silence those that can't turn a profit for corporations.
The day we see advertising on Steemit, that isn't part of the natural order of posting to a blog, will be to beginning of the end of this social media sanctuary.
The advantage the blokchcain has is that if Steemit does opt to go that route, anyone else can throw up an interface to access the same information that does not include advertising.
Unlike Facebook which monopolizes all data, on here, it is open. The interfaces are only a tool to access the blockchain.
It's an important issue, and one that seems impossible to resolve.
At some levels, all human communication can be seen as advertising. Discussing whether equal amounts of matter and antimatter were created when the universe began (if it began) can be considered advertising for one side or the other.
Defining advertising is therefore critical to deciding what advertising is acceptable.
I see a lot of posts that are advertising, in the widely acceptable definition. People advertise ICO's, cryptos, businesses, groups, and political positions constantly on Steemit.
A corporation is far more easily defined. However, telling a corporation from a person on Steemit is pretty much impossible. We can't even tell bots from people.
There are folks on Steemit that frankly state they are professional censors. @bloom's about me blurb states they are a 'paid flagger'. Questions on how to deal with such issues are bound to be difficult to answer in a way that doesn't prevent free speech.
I reckon free speech doesn't include paid speech, and that's where I'd draw the line, myself.
I think I know what one of topics I am going to post on in the next couple days will be.
Absolutely, the community should decide. That is the way it should be from this point forward.
Once question that comes to my mind as corporations shift to DAOs is what impact does that have, if any? Not so much on Steemit, per se, but advertising in general? I seems as if competition is a human need, will computers adhere to the same idea? I mean, does IBM's Watson feel like it is in a race against Amazon's Einstein?
It is possible as DAOs emerge, we are more efficient with resources, hence do not need duplicate companies. If a DAO is programmed to work as efficiently as possible, do we need multiple ones?
Another interesting topic to ponder.
I'll keep an eye out for that post!
My plan is to have it up tomorrow morning.