[META] Are paid for, closed source projects, being advertised on this community, appropriate?

2026-06-21 17:47 UTC

A number of brand new accounts have popped up shilling their paid for applications. Is this within the rules? Is the community happy with this? Could mods clarify this in the rules? Either allowing advertising, or banning it entirely. my point is - there is a difference between an open source homegrown project that might be useful, vs closed source paid for projects from brand new accounts some replies are misunderstanding, somehow. I am against brand new accounts who: first post is a brand new project project is closed source project will cost money is asking for free testing the post is literally an advertisement

Replies (4)

@Shadow@lemmy.ca 2026-06-21 17:52

I think new accounts that show up to shil their app should be banned. They’re not actively participating in the community, it’s just spam. There’s been a huge uptick recently.

Open ##3464652
@curbstickle@anarchist.nexus 2026-06-22 03:01

LOVE the discussion folks, and @breadsmasher@lemmy.world you beat me to it, this has been bothering me all week. I would love to see a consensus come out of this, maybe do a vote on wording/requirements? Idk, still working on figuring out the best approach. Just a thanks for exactly the meta threads I hoped for. As I’m doing things right now, closed source, paid, and the only thing posted is getting removed as spam. Unfortunately a common time seems to be about 7am GMT (side note - folks who are on around that time and can help with modding then, please reach out) and I’m not on for a good few hours at a minimum. That said, I always read and check, sometimes deferring to read again and check the profile when I have more time later. What I’m looking for at the moment is: Are people asking questions to see if this is crap being peddled for a profit? Is OP answering? (And thanks again to the folks who do follow up with great questions that dig into this right away) Does it read like a post from a person? How old is the account? How many other posts have they made? Where and what about? That kind of stuff. Sometimes its super easy to spot (3 posts, same title, price and it being cloud only, etc), sometimes its not and takes more looking. I think paid products can have a place here, despite them not being my kind of thing, but more as a discussion. So if there is some degree of consensus on a good rule, I would suggest making a post about it so we can finalize, like I did for the rule 3 updates. And if anyone has an idea on a useful option for a voting style solution for things like this, I’d love for a DM so I can check it out.

Open ##3467553
@pory@lemmy.world 2026-06-22 07:14

Ban 'em

Open ##3482101
@x3lz@lemmy.zip 2026-06-22 15:44

Ban all advertising for proprietary software.

Open ##3488040