This website and all the websites that I run are going to be advertisement free too. All I ask in return is that people support me with donations. The reason I am doing this is simple. Having advertisements doesn’t pay for me and annoy my readers, slow down the loading time of my website. I still need to make income and that is why I am going to ask for donation. In return, people get me work on earthquakes in Iceland, Europe, Canary Islands and other sites that I now maintain. I rather want to have 50 or 100 people donating 10€ a month rather than having advertisement on by websites. Removal of advertisements from my geophone website is going to take few more days, since I can’t edit the websites at the moment.
If I wanted to have my living off advertisement I needed to have the traffic levels of BBC News. Possibly double that in reality. I did also see this post from SMBC Theater Facebook page that explains this with advertisement quite well.
A number of folks like to say “I like ads because it means you get money!” The problem is it’s a lie. Even making $200 sketches we never off-set costs from ads. Even with hundreds of thousands of views in a week. Literally never.
The only reason we were able to make SMBC Theater was DVD sales, Crowdfunding, Zach kicking in from the comic’s revenue, and some old prize money I had from screenwriting. Also, everyone worked as a volunteer. For four years. That’s thousands of man hours unpaid. That’s how SMBC Theater sketches AND Starpocalypse got made. We never did this for the cash.
People have a conception that online ads = big bucks. It’s bullshit. Online ads can support kids shouting into webcams, tiny groups of kids making things in their apartments, and companies that abuse the folks that work for them. Even Freddie Wong had to go outside advertising to fund VGHS and he rakes in millions of views a week. Why do you think there’s not a “It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia” (notoriously the cheapest professional-level show in the last decade) supported by ads online? You’d need 5 times the traffic Gangnam Style got to support it.
Ads make viewing our stuff less pleasant for our audience while fooling them into thinking they’re supporting us. At the same time it forces us to filter ourselves to be more attractive to giant corporations instead of making the most interesting stuff possible for you guys.
Love an artist? Buy their merch. Donate to a Kickstarter. Go see them in person. Or just tell all your friends about them – most indie artists don’t have a marketing budget. Watching ads supports companies – not artists.
AND THAT’S THE END OF OUR ANTI-ADVERTISING SUNDAY PROGRAMMING! Back to dick jokes tomorrow I promise!
SMBC Theater Facebook post.
In my view this says it all. I don’t need advertisement, but I do need income from donations. Thanks for the support!