Time for ads on Steemit? Maybe/Maybe not

With all the talks about issues Steemit.inc is facing it was inevitable someone would mention ads.. Ads are simple, straight forward and it doesnt take someone to be a marketing expert to understand how they work and what theyre good for....

BUT!

Theres a big problem with ads in general. Theyre intrusive.
And that is true in more ways then one... First they pick your brain to see what youre interested in, then your information is sold, then you keep on seeing ads for cat food all day...

Even though one might say that ads are "smarter" now and they dont annoy you as much due to being more in touch with your interests, thats exactly what i find slightly disturbing.
Im not a fan of ads and if i could not see them ever, id be happy. Thus, i use adblock.

BUT!

A drowning man will clutch to a straw.
So, how could this be done on Steemit?

Well first i want to mention the "pinned post" addition many of you have noticed on the last steemit.inc "SMT lite announcement". They wrote a post and stuck it on top of the trending page. Easy, right?
Now ofc, this just might be a one time thing and it just might be used for big announcements but this seems like a good way for Steemit.inc to put in ads on the top of the trending page.

Would this work as a way to introduce ads to the steemit platform?

No, i dont think so. We already have promotion tools in services like @minnowbooster and in various, too numerous, bots. And those services provide not only promotion, basically for free, but they even offer a ROI.
Paying Steemit.inc to drop you on top trending position while you can top the trending page and make money from it by using bots, would be a stupid idea and its unlikely to happen.

So whats the other option? Well, @ned did say that he found the idea of "bots" interesting. (i could have understood him wrong though. haha)

A steemit.inc upvote service!

I cant emphasize enough how bad of an idea this would be. haha. There would be riots in the streets and Bernie would probably become friends with his long time adversaries just to bring down Ned. :D
Lets just move on... This wont be happening. :)

How about some side-bar action? Make Steemit into a cheap looking site with side banners on both sides advertising Viagra pills.

Could work i guess. Is it a smart move? I think a "No" would be the answer to that question....

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But lets say i was being serious for a moment and tried to come up with an idea as to how this would work. As i wrote above, old school ad placement would be a terrible idea and would anger a lot of people. But maybe another approach could work.

The only way i see for ads being introduced to the platform is through "voluntary choice of "ad" per blog post".

Maybe giving the author of the post a choice as to include in text ads, or not, in their post and then have a revenue split between Steemit.inc and the author. Setting up something like that would be a pain, though. Hello Youtube!

This ofc isnt ideal and most likely would lead to inferior user experience, but by giving the author the choice you essentially let the author decide, what they want on their post, how much of it and how much are they willing to risk in relation to reader experience.
Some readers would maybe love reading a blog post on blockchain development and see someone plug a new vacuum cleaner. Who can say?.

Reality check:

Still, if wer honest, most blog posts here cant break 10-20 readers, but if wer talking about cumulative views, this just might have some small impact on Steemit.inc earnings..

Also, important to mention is that this would greatly increase the demand for bot upvotes since a top spot on the trending page would mean more visibility, which means more income....

So in the end, if everything else is taken into account, ads, i dont thinks would do squat in any scenario if the underlying issues in content placement, aka "Steemits algo" arent fixed...

Ill see ya. ;)