I think that that is true of video on youtube now. Correct me if I am wrong, but could a user simply set up many computers to continuously watch their content and boost the views? Youtube pays on C2C and viewing ads, so I think that could be implemented some way to give another option especially for new people to see ads of their choosing and generate a small amount of reward. This could also be capped per day at a certain dollar amount and as long as the capchas were entered (how many people actually even watch through the commercials on YouTube) the advertisers would give the benefit of the doubt and some users would actually do this themselves.

YouTube is fighting the YouTube Ad Blocker right now because people hate that they have to watch ads.

Bringing optional ads would allow steemit to not be controlled by the companies that advertise with them and still allow large companies to invest and bring revenue.

I'm not any sort of advertising genius, and you have much more knowledge than I @intelliguy, but I am alwas looking for ways for people to engage here without necessarily having to blog.

I'd be happpy to discuss ways to expand upon my idea and create a way to limit the amount of bots and hacking to prvide users with unique experience.