Yeah I can understand the frustration with ads. Seems like today companies are getting a bit desperate trying to monetize with ads, but I think it's more a struggle with web properties to survive in the Internet where the trend is toward perfect competition and no profit. Yahoo is one example. Even Drudge I recently noticed obtrusive video ads. There is also a trend with ad-blocking software so monetization becomes more difficult. However I think ads are going to be a natural part of the ecosystem. It can be argued ad revenue sustains the Internet otherwise Google/Facebook/Twitter would have no revenue model... most news/media sites wouldn't exist. I agree it would be better for companies/advertisers to buy influence. I don't mind as much about standard Google/reddit banner ads as much as the obtrusive video ads. Also I think you can censor ads on the frontend so the STEEM blockchain can have some frontends that allow ads and some that don't.