The Flying Cloud began as a pastime. And it remains a pastime in the all-important sense that it’s written for the enjoyment of my friends. But as the months passed, it occurred to me that it also might be fun to include a few ads. One consideration was practical, for web hosting is not free (though if I became World Emperor, I’d make sure that airship fiction was supported as public service!). Another was educational, for it’s always fun to learn new things, and as a child of an earlier and more primitive era (grunt snort), this whole business of Affiliate Programs, Pay Per Click, and the like was new to me. Then there was the technical challenge of integrating ads into a site that had not originally been intended to support them. This has came off better than I expected, and I may write a post about the experience if I can think of a sufficiently entertaining way to do this.
But as the Great Revision progressed, I realized that one of the most important considerations was cultural. After all, we expect to see ads in graphical media. Without them, a site seems strangely naked, like an aircraft without insignia, or a race car without sponsors’ decals. One doesn’t want to overdo things, of course. I’m sure we’ve all seen sites where one’s first response is, “Well, yes, this is all very well, but where’s the frigging content?” It’s also important to steer clear of the Gross Photo-shopped Weight Loss Ads – you all know the ones I mean. And the folk who overuse that ‘cover part of the page with a fake window and blank the rest’ Javascript should be sold as food animals to creatures that like to toy with their prey. But there’s some great art out there – material that can ad variety to a site – and I’ve made some great discoveries among the webcomics that show up on Project Wonderful.
So what do you all think? Do a few ads in the leaderboard and sidebars make this look more like a for-real web site? Or should I abandon my career in web marketing and return to my nefarious plans for world conquest?
I prefer my entire Internet experience to be devoid of ads of any kind, and I prefer a perfect world. OTOH, I would not have found “Flying Cloud” if you hadn’t caught my interest in a Project Wonderful ad. I have increased the length of my bookmark list by yards, and my daily website viewing by hours, because of PW. So as long as they continue to feature quality web sites, and steer clear of teeth whitening and adult friendfinder ads, I would say by all means make use of that kind of revenue. I realize nothing is free in this world, and ads are the payment we make for supporting the Internet.
I’m with you on the obnoxious flash ads. I have contacted a few sites those took over, and invariably, the owners did not give permission for those and were unaware of them. What happens is, a cash-strapped site owner gets a good offer for hosting, and clicks OK on a 10,000 word TOS, in which is buried obscure language that gives the host permission to basically obliterate his content with ads. So watch out for those!
Does that mean swimwear and lingerie ads are out? Darn! And I’d just found some good ones
Thanks for the warning about flash ads, Kona. I’d been pasting in these little bits of adbox code without ever stopping to think, “Gosh, this is a link to someone else’s Javascript. It could do anything!” The moral may be to stick with reliable outfits like Project Wonderful… which has better art anyway, so this is hardly a tragedy.
After looking at any number of sites, some good, some bad, I think the keys are 1) to exercise restraint and 2) to show respect for one’s readers by making a clear distinction between ads and content, and making sure that the former does not intrude on the latter. I hope this leaderboard/sidebar/footer scheme will satisfy those conditions. I may include one more Project Wonderful ad box to fill some of the yawning void in the sidebar, but to tell the truth… I’ve monkeyed around with this stuff long enough. Now it’s time to draw more graphics! And do a bit more work on… Season Two…