Web monetization has proven to be elusive. Yes, there are success stories, like Facebook, for instance. Some of us believe that FB has jumped the shark but that is another story for another time. Let's talk about website advertising and its obvious shortcomings.
"American Thinker" was once my favorite website. I stopped going there because of the oppressive advertisements that make reading a challenge. It takes a long time to load the page and the simple actions of scrolling and reading become burdensome. Once the page is loaded, we don't just see pages on the right hand column, we also see ads that block the text.
"American Thinker" offers solutions. For $6.79/month we can get ad-free content. This reminds one of cable television and premium channels. Yes you have some good products but it is a big world with oodles of free content. I search dozens of sites every day and I cannot afford to pay for ad-free reading at every (or any) address.
Earlier today I got linked to "American Spectator." A brief article became impossible to read. In a different way, sites like "Forbes" are also a challenge to navigate. I discontinued a couple of email newsletters because the newsletter itself was bogged down with ads that made reading next to impossible.
On a slightly tangential note, why do all the second and third tier sites display the same crappy ads? "You won't believe what this forgotten starlet looks like forty years later!" Nor do we care to know. Maybe if she were not truly forgotten, we might muster some curiosity. I bet she looks older. What do you think?
We might click on a swimwear malfunction link but even then we are misdirected to a slideshow that takes forever to load. Anyone want to clue me in on the dark secret of Tiffany Trump because I do not care enough to wade through the spammage.
A variant of Gresham's Law might be at play where the bad readers chase out the good. Or chase out the many. I don't have a solution at hand. Let's put our thinking caps on. This status quo is not acceptable.
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