When I joined Steemit in May 2016, just one month after the birth of the site, there were 1000 accounts (400 of them held by @berniesanders, lol) and making a name for myself was simply a case of getting my stuff out there, commenting on posts and trying to gauge the interests of the whales.
I remember taking a daily look at the top 20 authors chart and doing everything I could to climb up it and rise to the top (the highest I reached was number 7).
In those early days I had high hopes for Steemit, after the first July 4th payout the price was around $0.20 and the only way was up as more and more people jumped on the bandwagon. My dreams of getting to number one spot on the Steemit author chart dissipated as numbers swelled by thousands of new users each day.
Present Day Reality
Today Steemit behind the scenes is a very different site to the one it was three years ago. For a start there has been a mass change in personnel.
Secondly the way the site works has changed, there have been about 20 hardforks, altering the way in which the site functions.
One of these major changes has been the addition of Google advertising, which I felt represented a poorly thought out plan which fundamentally changed the ethos of Steemit. However there was nothing I could do about it, and I use adblocker so at least I don't have to see them.
Google's Gambit
Google's whole reason for existing is to make money.
Wow thanks for pointing that out @cryptogee, we wouldn't have worked that out on our own!
Okay, just bear with me a second here.
Google makes money from people paying to advertise. This means that the number one priority for Google is its customer base. In other words the people who are putting food on the table, the advertisers.
Trash Talk
We all know what a shitpost is right? I mean there are subjective posts which people argue over, for instance you may feel that this article is a huge steaming pile of crap. However there may be people who would argue that point and say no, actually, this article is well crafted and insightful.
I'm talking about the objectively crap posts, the ones that all but the most sycophantic among us, can agree are just terrible, or as they say in Northern England, shite.
Like for instance @berniesanders posting the word hello, or even worse just putting some punctuation in the title and nothing in the body of the post. Or @haejin posting up a screenshot of a stock chart with no accompanying explanation whatsoever.
We can all universally agree, either privately or publicly, that those posts are indeed shit.
Paying For Shite
Advertisers are simply individuals or companies whom have products and/or services that they want to sell to me and you. If they have signed up for Google ads, then they know that the algorithm will put their ads on as many relevant(ish) sites so as to maximise the chances of somebody clicking and buying.
Imagine your horror in finding your advert blocking a comment section. You would quite rightly be upset with the placement of your ad, because you know that it is very likely annoying a bunch of people, and the last emotion you want associated with your product is anger.
Then after you are just getting over the terrible placement of your ad, you see that it has also been placed on a @berniesanders post telling someone called @cryptogee to go screw himself!
Aaarrrgggh! Quick, get onto Google and tell them you don't want your product on such nonsense, in fact Steemit seems riddled with this kind of rubbish, so please do not show my ad on this site.
Of course Google will tell you that the algorithm does not allow for such individual tweaks. However after a while they keep receiving similar complaints, so in order to appease their clients, they simply take Steemit off their list of viable sites to place adverts on.
A typical BS post.
Would you be happy for your product to be advertised on this post?
Shadow Ban
If you believe the above scenario is unreal then consider Youtube.
Many conspiracy buffs have been opining as to why Youtube has demonetised all the flat earth/anti-vaxx/Illuminati videos. Some say that it is the deep state trying to close the floodgates that have drowned the internet in truth.
However the actual truth is a lot less sinister. The advertisers, the people who are responsible for ALL of Youtube's profits, are not happy with their ads being associated with flat earth nutjobs and the rest of the conspiracy crew.
Instead they want nice videos that do not stir controversy, because they don't want their products to be associated with negative emotions.
Plain.
And.
Simple.
Tick-Tock
So how long till Google pulls the plug on Steemit?
Pff, no idea. However I do know that they will pull the plug at some point, because Steemit is a hot mess, the code is constantly changing and is inherently complex, and a fair percentage of the content is poor to say the least.
The questions is though, how much will this effect Steemit when it happens?
WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT STEEMIT'S USE OF GOOGLE ADS? DO YOU EVEN SEE THEM? DO THEY BOTHER YOU? ARE THEY BLOCKING SOME OF YOUR CONTENT? OR MAYBE YOU DISAGREE AND THINK THEY'RE GREAT AND HERE TO STAY?
AS EVER, LET ME KNOW BELOW!