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/r/CryptoCurrency has implemented a whitelist, blocking content from unapproved sources, singling out Dash News.

The "cryptocurrency" subreddit has been lost. Please share– the mods will have substantial influence across the crypto space now.https://t.co/Bu0juvx6I0 — Omar Bham (Crypt0) (@crypt0snews) May 1, 2019

One of the largest cryptocurrency-related communities in Reddit, the Cryptocurrency subreddit recently implemented a whitelist policy of blocking all content from sources not included on a pre-approved list of sources. In order to be included on the whitelist for approved content, publications must submit an application adhering to nine different criteria. Among them is an explicit ban on content in any way “officially” associated with cryptocurrency projects:

“We prioritize news organizations and independent researchers who are not affiliated with specific projects. This is not an approval form for community managers to share their weekly news updates.”

Prominent cryptocurrency news YouTuber Omar Bham (Crypt0’s News) sharply criticized the censorship decision, calling the forum “lost,” implicitly encouraging other cryptocurrency community members to seek alternative forums for participation and the posting and consuming of content.

In particular, Dash News (under former name Dash Force News) was explicitly singled out for exclusion from the forum by moderator and prominent Monero community member Justin Ehrenhofer, who has frequently been vocally critical about Dash in public communications over the past several years.

Dash’s issues with brigading and censorship on /r/Cryptocurrency

Prominent Dash shill that's 3 standard deviations more extreme than the rest of the community: "UNCERTAINTY IS NOT PROOF OF LACK OF CERTAINTY"https://t.co/Xi0csVIMSp@coinfairvalue I recommend making coins with high uncertainties clearer so people don't misrepresent your data — Justin Ehrenhofer (@JEhrenhofer) October 13, 2018

Dash has experienced past issues with censorship and brigading on the /r/Cryptocurrency subreddit. In addition to moderator ties to competing communities and explicitly calling out and censoring Dash content, the community has shown telling signs and evidence of a concentrated effort to block positive Dash-related content while promoting sharp and often unfounded criticisms. A cursory search of posts related to Dash reveals a majority of posts are negative with significant upvotes, while the few positive posts are downvoted at, or close to, zero. Meanwhile, the same cursory search for Monero reveals nearly all positive posts with a much higher level of voting participation and net positive votes.

Censorship’s unfortunate history in cryptocurrency

Frustrated by the white-listing, and skew toward moderator's bias' (on r/cryptocurrency), I've decided to make a fairer-access subreddit. As long as you don't spam, post referral links, or bully others, you are welcome to post as you wish. Enjoy: https://t.co/DIlrNZKCKe#l4mods — Omar Bham (Crypt0) (@crypt0snews) May 3, 2019

Censorship has had a long history with the cryptocurrency world, starting with the Bitcoin community, which largely split due to disagreements exacerbated by censorship issues. Its primary subreddit, /r/Bitcoin, has historically undergone a very well-documented censorship campaign by moderators, restricting a pro-scaling narrative while allowing off-chain scaling conversation to flourish.

In response to the move of the Cryptocurrency subreddit towards censorship, Bham created a new subreddit for the posting of cryptocurrency-related content, encouraging wide participation from the community, saying: “Post the content no one will let you elsewhere, and we welcome it with open arms.”