Google AdSense - A Proposition

[Joyrex]

Through your subscriptions and donations, WATMM's monthly hosting and software costs are covered each month for those who have chosen to subscribe/renew.

However, a large portion of WATMM members are just that - Members. Beyond the value they bring by participating, the burden of the costs of running the site are shouldered by the subscribers and myself.

I'm considering implementing Google AdSense for non-subscribing members/visitors as a way to balance out everyone's contributions and ensure the forum continues being funded in the future.

One benefit of doing so would be to open registrations without requiring a subscription to join - this would bring in more users, keep the community growing, and ensure the community remains active and lively.

What are your thoughts? Any suggestions?

[Limo]

How much would AdSense bring in? It can’t be much?

And how much are you paying out of your own pocket? Could that be offset some other way?

I’m not a big fan of ads, as you can probably tell, but I also don’t think you should be paying to run this.

[Joyrex]

5 minutes ago, rhmilo said:

How much would AdSense bring in? It can’t be much?

And how much are you paying out of your own pocket? Could that be offset some other way?

I’m not a big fan of ads, as you can probably tell, but I also don’t think you should be paying to run this.

I'm not a fan of ads either, which is why I've resisted this up until now.

Between donations and subscriptions as I said, we cover our hosting and software costs, and thankfully it's been rare since I last had to pay out of pocket myself. I paid entirely out of pocket for the first 10 years of joyrex.com/watmm.com's life until @Fred McGriff suggested I start taking donations when our hosting at the time was 100 USD per month because we had to move quickly to a dedicated server due to our growth back then.

I was thinking incorporating ads would have two beneficial effects:

1. We can open registrations up to not requiring a subscription, which should bring in more users, which means more discussions, etc.
2. It would encourage people to subscribe (yes most people use AdBlock these days), but we could have a dynamic message to whitelist WATMM as their way to support the site in lieu of a subscription
3. Bonus benefit - more money (if AdSense/subscriptions increase revenue) would mean we could expand resources (I really want to get WATMM Radio going again) and add a lot of fun stuff to the site.

[Braintree]

Seeing as we have many threads that are basically advertisements for gear/companies, and we'll end up being targeted for the same stuff, I don't think it's a big deal.

[Kennylogg Bubblebath]

i'll go with yes, providing there's a good balance of non-intrusion and relevancy.

a banner at the top of the page and maybe an occasional ad between forum posts would likely be fine for most folks. and maybe if the ad content was tailored to us (gear, music, etc.) people would be more lenient towards them.

[Joyrex]

2 minutes ago, Kennylogg Bubblebath said:

i'll go with yes, providing there's a good balance of non-intrusion and relevancy.

a banner at the top of the page and maybe an occasional ad between forum posts would likely be fine for most folks. and maybe if the ad content was tailored to us (gear, music, etc.) people would be more lenient towards them.

I totally agree - I remember long ago I tried some advertising thing and it was putting ads that not only were not targeted, but in some cases entirely inappropriate (some adult content) so we quickly abandoned that. I think AdSense would be more targeted and focused based on what we post.

[Scaramouche]

13 minutes ago, Joyrex said:

I totally agree - I remember long ago I tried some advertising thing and it was putting ads that not only were not targeted, but in some cases entirely inappropriate (some adult content) so we quickly abandoned that. I think AdSense would be more targeted and focused based on what we post.

Out of interest, what ad vendors/network partners did you try to work with before? 

[Joyrex]

4 minutes ago, Shimon_Shimon said:

Out of interest, what ad vendors/network partners did you try to work with before? 

Well, the one that had the inappropriate ads I don't remember (it was easily 10+ years ago), and for a long time I used VigLink (not advertising, but if a link posted say to Amazon or Ebay gets posted, it would append an affiliate link and pay a percentage of the sale if the item was purchased via that link) - I liked them because it was transparent and didn't plaster ads all over the site. However, for the past 8+ months, no revenue has come in and they don't answer support emails so I think it is dead (they were bought by another company).

[Limo]

1 hour ago, Joyrex said:

We can open registrations up to not requiring a subscription, which should bring in more users, which means more discussions, etc.

Was gonna write something about this lowering the quality of the content, but then remembered some of the highlights of this forum ...

If there’s an alternative to AdSense, that would be preferable, but that might be hard to organize. Like  maybe give Boomkat a sidebar where they can showcase heir latest releases or something.

(Warp is probably not going to spend a penny on this site because we do all their advertising for them for free).

 

Anyway, you’re in charge, so good luck with whatever you decide to do.

 

 

[dingformung]

Since you have been able to cover the costs for so long without ads I don't see the point in introducing them.

[IDEM]

1 hour ago, Joyrex said:

I tried some advertising thing and it was putting ads that not only were not targeted, but in some cases entirely inappropriate (some adult content)

Maybe it was targeted after all ... 

 

1 hour ago, Joyrex said:

I'm not a fan of ads either, which is why I've resisted this up until now.

Between donations and subscriptions as I said, we cover our hosting and software costs, and thankfully it's been rare since I last had to pay out of pocket myself. I paid entirely out of pocket for the first 10 years of joyrex.com/watmm.com's life until @Fred McGriff suggested I start taking donations when our hosting at the time was 100 USD per month because we had to move quickly to a dedicated server due to our growth back then.

I was thinking incorporating ads would have two beneficial effects:

1. We can open registrations up to not requiring a subscription, which should bring in more users, which means more discussions, etc.
2. It would encourage people to subscribe (yes most people use AdBlock these days), but we could have a dynamic message to whitelist WATMM as their way to support the site in lieu of a subscription
3. Bonus benefit - more money (if AdSense/subscriptions increase revenue) would mean we could expand resources (I really want to get WATMM Radio going again) and add a lot of fun stuff to the site.

Anything that generates more users would be welcome. I love this platform, and I always wish there was more traffic/participation. The question is how many potential users are out there for this cosy little niche. But that notwithstanding, we should try to get every single one of those nerds to post here.

What I don't get is why there are members who are not subscribers? Or has the requirement to have a subscription to register only been introduced in recent years?

11 minutes ago, rhmilo said:

Was gonna write something about this lowering the quality of the content, but then remembered some of the highlights of this forum ...

I was also thinking about that, but I think it's pretty self-regulatory.

[Scaramouche]

29 minutes ago, Joyrex said:

Well, the one that had the inappropriate ads I don't remember (it was easily 10+ years ago), and for a long time I used VigLink (not advertising, but if a link posted say to Amazon or Ebay gets posted, it would append an affiliate link and pay a percentage of the sale if the item was purchased via that link) - I liked them because it was transparent and didn't plaster ads all over the site. However, for the past 8+ months, no revenue has come in and they don't answer support emails so I think it is dead (they were bought by another company).

Porn/Brand safety breaches will always be an issue, even with Google's ad network on occasion. 

I know of VigLink, never worked with them directly, but they were bought by Sorvn, an SSP/Programmatic platform. 

Are you quite opposed to banner ads, page skins and video ads? I guess you would be, as they are pretty annoying. 

The industry is under a lot of scrutiny at the moment from a privacy perspective, and quite rightly too. GDPR in Europe is raising a lot of questions on how some of the key protocols for ad buying aren't particularly compliant. And the CCPA is shaping conversations in the States. The impending death of the 3rd party cookie will make things harder for everyone reliant on them for targeting are scrambling to best understand how they'll be able to find their "users". Ads don't have to be bad, but it's hard to do them well, especially on forums. 

Adsense will probably be painless for you, and won't require much effort. 

[Joyrex]

18 minutes ago, rhmilo said:

Was gonna write something about this lowering the quality of the content, but then remembered some of the highlights of this forum ...

If there’s an alternative to AdSense, that would be preferable, but that might be hard to organize. Like  maybe give Boomkat a sidebar where they can showcase heir latest releases or something.

(Warp is probably not going to spend a penny on this site because we do all their advertising for them for free).

 

Anyway, you’re in charge, so good luck with whatever you decide to do.

 

 

True - but this is why I am asking everyone, as I believe this is something that the community should weigh in on since ultimately (good or bad) it will affect them.

15 minutes ago, dingformung said:

Since you have been able to cover the costs for so long without ads I don't see the point in introducing them.

That's a valid point, but did you read the other reasons why implementing this might be possible?

8 minutes ago, IDEM said:

Maybe it was targeted after all ... 

 

Anything that generates more users would be welcome. I love this platform, and I always wish there was more traffic/participation. The question is how many potential users are out there for this cosy little niche. But that notwithstanding, we should try to get every single one of those nerds to post here.

What I don't get is why there are members who are not subscribers? Or has the requirement to have a subscription to register only been introduced in recent years?

I was also thinking about that, but I think it's pretty self-regulatory.

The requirement for paid memberships was implemented in August 2013. One thing that happened (that I have not corrected to this date) is after a person's subscription lapses, they go back to being a Member. They lose any abilities that was given with the subscription, but they don't need to pay to continue posting. I've left it that way on a honour system, same as how I have not forced any pre-2013 Members to subscribe, again working on honour more than imposing something some may not agree with who didn't have to make that choice when they first joined.

2 minutes ago, Shimon_Shimon said:

Porn/Brand safety breaches will always be an issue, even with Google's ad network on occasion. 

I know of VigLink, never worked with them directly, but they were bought by Sorvn, an SSP/Programmatic platform. 

Are you quite opposed to banner ads, page skins and video ads? I guess you would be, as they are pretty annoying. 

The industry is under a lot of scrutiny at the moment from a privacy perspective, and quite rightly too. GDPR in Europe is raising a lot of questions on how some of the key protocols for ad buying aren't particularly compliant. And the CCPA is shaping conversations in the States. The impending death of the 3rd party cookie will make things harder for everyone reliant on them for targeting are scrambling to best understand how they'll be able to find their "users". Ads don't have to be bad, but it's hard to do them well, especially on forums. 

Adsense will probably be painless for you, and won't require much effort. 

I would like any advertising to be as unobtrusive as possible - thankfully the forum software does give me tools for where ads are placed, how and when they appear, etc. This will mean more overhead for me to maintain and monitor ads if they are implemented. Adsense seems to be the easiest to try (and back out of if it turns out to be a shitshow).

I may consider more persistent reminders to support the site by subscribing to non-subscribers/guests if I can manage a way to do this using the features the forum provides.

[IDEM]

2 minutes ago, Joyrex said:

True - but this is why I am asking everyone, as I believe this is something that the community should weigh in on since ultimately (good or bad) it will affect them.

That's a valid point, but did you read the other reasons why implementing this might be possible?

The requirement for paid memberships was implemented in August 2013. One thing that happened (that I have not corrected to this date) is after a person's subscription lapses, they go back to being a Member. They lose any abilities that was given with the subscription, but they don't need to pay to continue posting. I've left it that way on a honour system, same as how I have not forced any pre-2013 Members to subscribe, again working on honour more than imposing something some may not agree with who didn't have to make that choice when they first joined.

I would like any advertising to be as unobtrusive as possible - thankfully the forum software does give me tools for where ads are placed, how and when they appear, etc. This will mean more overhead for me to maintain and monitor ads if they are implemented. Adsense seems to be the easiest to try (and back out of if it turns out to be a shitshow).

I may consider more persistent reminders to support the site by subscribing to non-subscribers/guests if I can manage a way to do this using the features the forum provides.

That makes AdSense.

 

 

 

I'll get my coat.

[zlemflolia]

no fuck google

[Silent Member]

As long as paying members aren't overrun by single women in our area I say go for it.

[dingformung]

15 minutes ago, Joyrex said:

That's a valid point, but did you read the other reasons why implementing this might be possible?

I think ads would rather repel new users than attract them. One of the good things about WATMM is that it seems to be one of the last places in the web that doesn't have annoying ads. Also, it's not clear how much of a barrier that 3 dollar pay wall really is for new users.

I think as long as you are able to sustain the site without ads (as you said you are), you should do that to offer a better user experience.

Edited October 29, 2020 by dingformung

[diatoms]

                                                                                 get a bitcoin address for donations to be used for watmm upkeep

                                                                                           sit on it and  in a few years time there will be no worries

[Joyrex]

6 minutes ago, dingformung said:

I think ads would rather repel new users than attract them. One of the good things about WATMM is that it seems to be one of the last places in the web that doesn't have annoying ads. Also, it's not clear how much of a barrier that 3 dollar pay wall really is for new users.

I think as long as you are able to sustain the site without ads (as you said you are), you should do that to offer a better user experience.

Well, I am glad you appreciate that - the main driver of this is this constant reminder on the forum index:

256 Guests vs 61 Members - and I do believe I have crawlers/bots identified as such, so that means there are easily 200+ people right now that could sign up, but for whatever reason are not. Google Analytics bears out the same kind of stats, but I do need to make some adjustments so actual memberIDs are recorded so the analytics is more accurate.

[drillkicker]

Google is a dangerous monopoly and I have devoted extensive time and money to avoid them as much as possible, so it would be very upsetting for me to see it here.  I would rather pay a higher subscription fee than see (and be seen by) Google ads.  No thank you.

[Joyrex]

1 minute ago, drillkicker said:

Google is a dangerous monopoly and I have devoted extensive time and money to avoid them as much as possible, so it would be very upsetting for me to see it here.  I would rather pay a higher subscription fee than see (and be seen by) Google ads.  No thank you.

As proposed, subscribing members would not see anything related to Google AdSense.

[Silent Member]

Maybe we can finally get some decent spambots and eastern European disinformation operations going in here. Want to make $20.000 an hour working from home? Go to investors.google@bitclik.ru to learn more.

[dingformung]

3 minutes ago, drillkicker said:

Google is a dangerous monopoly and I have devoted extensive time and money to avoid them as much as possible, so it would be very upsetting for me to see it here.  I would rather pay a higher subscription fee than see (and be seen by) Google ads.  No thank you.

Joyrex mentioned Google analytics, so this site isn't Google free anyway, I guess.

[Joyrex]

1 minute ago, dingformung said:

Joyrex mentioned Google analytics, so this site isn't Google free anyway, I guess.

Yes, I do use Google Analytics for tracking site activity, but no PII (personally identifiable information) is passed to GA. I would, at a minimum pass an identifying memberID to GA so I can more accurately track visitors vs members, but that would be the extent of how much I would provide Google (or any other third-party) without prior consent.

[Amen Warrior]

I would probably subscribe if ads were introduced. I probably should anyway but I'm extremely cheap