Promotion of apps you created is considered an ad, therefore it’s not allowed in this community. Rule 3 has been clarified with 3.1 to specify this. We will not remove existing posts but will do so for future posts.
However, we will start a monthly self promo threads starting August, and this will be only place where self promo is allowed. This thread will be for apps that are created by people in the community, so ads for other apps are still not allowed.
EDIT: Based on feedback, the community has found it helpful to discover new Lemmy apps for alternatives. Therefore, we will allow ONE post for a new Lemmy app, provided that they link to their own community for future posts. We will not allow additional posts/updates on the specific apps.
I don’t use kbin so I’m not following apps they build there. If you want to create the post and keep track of them, I’m happy to pin it to the community. I just can’t commit to keeping it updated even if I do create the post.
So, to be clear - if the author posts about a new app here - self promotion. If someone else does - that’s all good?
No, technically it’s still not allowed since that’s an ad. The post was originally made to stop all the other posts talking about the various apps. I’m not sure about kbin apps. Do you want it included in the current pinned post or should it be a separate post? Or I guess kbin might have their own community that lists it?
Wait what?
How is it an ad if it wasn’t posted by the developer?
The developer can just ask someone else to post it. That’s mostly what an ad is, creator paying someone/an agency to promote their creation.
Please don’t take this as criticism, I’m just trying to understand the policy. Because as currently written the policy doesn’t match up with what you’ve said in this thread.
I think most people would read the rules and assume “Hey checkout this cool app I just discovered” by a regular user of the app as perfectly fine and allowed, and they’d be pretty upset if their post was deleted or account banned for that. If you’re saying those posts are against the rules then it needs to be clearly written in the policy.
Also - if someone asks “What password manager do you use?” is every single response in that thread also against the rules? Could I be banned for replying? Disreputable marketing companies absolutely will post (and respond) to threads like that. If the policy is to block those, then asking for product advice really needs to be against the rules too.
Instead of a pinned post, I think it’d be better to create another community where people can share apps they’ve discovered. I’d subscribe to that.
No, it’s still not allowed as we consider it an ad. This post specifically is to clarify that self promotion is ALSO an ad, not that other posts aren’t.
Also, to be clear, we haven’t said anything regarding banning anyone. We’ll just remove posts. We’d probably only ban for multiple offenses/spam.
No, that’s allowed. And yes, we know that this can be a workaround for someone posting an ad. But at least the community has a chance to respond with other apps rather than specifically pointing out one app in particular.
We’re still pretty small and new as a community so the rules are still changing. I don’t see the need to be very specific about this for now unless it becomes a problem.
From earlier in this thread:
I’m referring to that specifically. If someone recommends an app, that they are in no way affiliated with, is that against the rules?
Two hours ago you said it is, but I don’t see that in the policy. So… like HeartyBeast, I’d like some clarity. The original post was clear, but some of the the stuff you’ve said in replies have been unclear.
“Probably” isn’t comforting to be honest. I’ve been banned in the past (not on Lemmy) for failing to fully understand community rules. Rules need to be clear, not vague.
We haven’t had a reason to ban anyone so we haven’t had a discussion around banning. But as of now, we’re only going to remove posts that we see as an ad or spam. I guess I shouldn’t have said “probably” but again, we haven’t mentioned banning anyone at all on this.
It is in the policy as “no ads”. I don’t want to be too granular on this because then people will find edge cases and workaround that’s technically not within the very specific rule. I prefer keeping it broader and only tighten up when it becomes an issue. The reason this post was made was because of a couple self promoted apps that popped up the last few days, so we decided to clarify on that specific point. I’d rather not go into details with every single topic unless we need to.