That does seem to be a prevailing sentiment going around right now, that somehow ads will attract users or investors to STEEM.
So, let's think about this a little bit.
As far as anyone outside of the company seems to know now, the ads are intended to lift Steemit Inc. out of a rather problematic financial problem, given that we've been in a bear market for months. Steemit Inc, nor Steemit the dApp are STEEM itself, though, yes, the company has pretty much been the driving force behind the creation of the blockchain and everything has happened since its launch.
However, with the ad revenue going exclusively to Steemit, all that's really going to do is benefit them. At the same time, it seems to me, that it basically says that a social media website can't make it on STEEM without old school ways of generating revenue, which goes against what STEEM was supposed to be—a place where businesses could come and create income.
I'm sure this is not the intention, but it seems like someone is saying that a business can't make it on STEEM via the rewards pool method, including the flagship site.
Also, as someone else stated, ads are meant to take people away from the site they sit on to another site where they're selling something. If people are actually clicking through to the ads, then they'll end up spending less time on STEEM.
Personally, I think it's just as possible that the opposite will happen—that the ad revenue might be cool to start out with, but that over time, it will drop significantly, as either people get tired of clicking on ads (especially if they're not really interested in them), or the advertisers themselves will put out of deals because no one is buying. Right now, the majority of the ads are Google Ads, so most likely cost per click. But CPC doesn't necessarily mean sales, which businesses are ultimately going to want.
Very well then. I understand better. Thank you