RE: Who Owns and Controls Social Media? They Do. That’s Why Steemit Matters.
Both Facebook and Twitter are owned by large shareholders, including J.P. Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, BlackRock, Morgan Stanley, Clearbridge, Vanguard, and T. Rowe Price, each of whom own around one percent or more of one of these companies.
I get the sentiment but I think one needs to be careful when making such definite statements. It's obvious that Steem's shares can be purchased by anyone, including the entities you listed above, and the only reason this has not happened yet is because the whole blockchain industry is so young and we are tiny.
So for me it's not the case who the shareholders are but rather what kind of power and influence they can have. In this respect Steem can be quite resilient. Actually, it could be quite interesting if Goldman Sachs had one percent of Steem shares and at the same time could not have any control over Steem's content.
Everything is for sale, including a stake in Steemit. The difference here is that every user has the power to earn more STEEM Power, which is analogous to being a shareholder, both in terms of potential payment and potential influence. Blog posting and voting is rewarded here, 50% of it with STEEM Power and the rest may be converted to such a stake if one so chooses. Over time, that power can grow proportionately. Anyone can be a factor here.
With Facebook, Twitter, and Reddit, the only ticket to ownership and control is money. That provides the potential of enormous control. I am not saying such abuse of control is par for the course on a daily basis, but we have seen several prominent examples of that control being used/abused. It is only fair to speculate that the ownership has some influence. After all, the CEO and day-to-day management of each of these social media sites hold their jobs only as long as their efforts reward their real bosses, the shareholders.