- Mailchimp has again suspended those accounts that created content related to cryptocurrencies.
- Since 2018, Mailchimp has prohibited companies related to the crypto ecosystem from using its marketing platform.
- Since the beginning of August, several users have reported on Twitter that their accounts on the platform have been suspended, citing that “content associated with your industry conflicts with its Usage Policies.”
mailchimpemail marketing platform, has again suspended those accounts that created content related to cryptocurrencies. However, censorship is not something new since since 2018 the platform has prohibited crypto companies from using its services.
Specifically in March 2018, Mailchimp explained on Twitter that “information related to cryptocurrencies is not necessarily prohibited”. The important thing is that the sender “is not involved in the production, sale, exchange, storage or marketing of cryptocurrencies”. A somewhat ambiguous rule, obviously.
So what is happening now? Well, it seems that the platform has begun to suspend even those creators who comply with Mailchimp’s terms of services.
Crypto businesses and users banned from Mailchimp
Since the beginning of August of this year, several users have reported on Twitter that their accounts on the platform have been suspended, citing that “Content associated with your industry conflicts with their Usage Policies”.
Thus, day after day, complaints have been accumulating on Twitter against Mailchimp. Particularly the situation became known on a larger scale last week when the big names in the crypto industries issued the same type of complaint.
Messari founder Ryan Selkis wrote on Twitter “thanks for taking down some of the most reputable brands in crypto in the last 48 hours“.”They are proving our point. Mailchimp – and all censors – must be destroyedSelkis declared.
Other affected clients include crypto custody service provider Edge, the Ethereum Foundation Ecosystem Support Program, Cointelegraph, and Decrypt.
Daniel Robets, Editor-in-Chief of Decrypt, explained on August 9 that Mailchimp, a service they had been using for over 4 years, deactivated Decrypt’s account without warning or explanation.
A reminder of why Web3 exists
Many of the customers affected by the Mailchimp censorship were reminded of the problems with Web2 and why they are so eager to develop Web3. Censorship is a problem that has existed since unimaginable times and, contrary to what one might think, the wide variety of communication tools have not been able to avoid it.
Mailchimp is owned by Intuit, a software company, and despite its relative ban on certain types of cryptocurrency content in 2018, it has remained largely silent on the industry.
Nevertheless, The current censorship comes just a few months after Mailchimp experienced a security breach that ended phishing attacks against users of the crypto ecosystem.a. In fact, the attackers made off with thousands of US dollars worth of cryptocurrencies.
Evidently Mailchimp assured they were working on addressing the incident.
“Our findings show that this was an incident targeting users from industries related to cryptocurrencies and finance. All owners of the affected accounts have been notified.”announced on its website.
This is how it seems that there is an anti-crypto movement, even beyond the actions of private companies such as Mailchimp. The reality is that, like any innovation, the crypto ecosystem faces frictions imposed by governments and companies, as Daniel Roberts argues in his op-ed on Decrypt.
In general, it is easier to stay in the status quo because this avoids the effort of understanding the crypto ecosystem and building to improve it. Many companies belonging to Web2 face rejection against Web3 because it questions who they will be in this new world.
The question is: How far will censorship go towards the crypto ecosystem?