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Unfortunately for PA, their content is probably 90% games/pop culture topical. After a month it'd be completely stale and irrelevant (with exceptions of course

by Zimahl 14y ago

Unfortunately for PA, their content is probably 90% games/pop culture topical. After a month it'd be completely stale and irrelevant (with exceptions of course). I think the better move would be to have pay users not have to see any ads. Simple web re-design to remove that for pay users, otherwise free users still have to look at the ads. There are a ton of sites that do this and are quite successful.

gilrain 14y ago
Their goal is to redirect the people they have handling advertisers into projects for creating new content. Also, Mike tweeted (http://twitter.com/cwgabriel/status/222718794798350336 http://twitter.com/cwgabriel/status/222718794798350336) "I don't want to spoil some of the un-lockables but if we aren't making projects for advertisers we are free to make projects for you." They clearly want to stop spending effort on ads altogether and spend it on new content for their readers, instead.
scott_s 14y ago
I recently went through the comics archive from about 2004 until now. The comics still resonated, and I found myself frequently checking the blog posts to see what Tycho had said that day. While it was often about old events, it certainly wasn't stale or irrelevant to me.
Jach 14y ago
What's a site that only offers "no ads" as their paid-upgrade benefit? I haven't seen one offer just that, it usually comes with a grab-bag of other features that can't be replaced with a client-side script/extension. (DeviantArt's premium account is the upgrade I thought of. (http://sta.sh/047k5sokcr2 http://sta.sh/047k5sokcr2) The two major client-side features of no ads and more thumbnails are solved with NoScript and AutoPager respectively.)
- Zimahl 14y ago
  Off the top of my head, Wowhead offers an ad-free version for premium customers. I guess you also get custom forum avatars for being a premium customer. The point is, free site that is ad-supported but those go away with a membership - whether you get extras or not.
- lazerwalker 14y ago
  The Facebook version of Words With Friends sells a 'no-ads' premium pack, but admittedly that's a bit of a different scenario as the ads are in-game modal dialogs that can only be dismissed after X seconds.
- pyre 14y ago
  They are insinuating that there will be more content/side-projects when they don't have to worry about the commercial side of their business.

by Zimahl 14y ago

gilrain 14y ago

Their goal is to redirect the people they have handling advertisers into projects for creating new content. Also, Mike tweeted (http://twitter.com/cwgabriel/status/222718794798350336 http://twitter.com/cwgabriel/status/222718794798350336) "I don't want to spoil some of the un-lockables but if we aren't making projects for advertisers we are free to make projects for you." They clearly want to stop spending effort on ads altogether and spend it on new content for their readers, instead.

scott_s 14y ago

I recently went through the comics archive from about 2004 until now. The comics still resonated, and I found myself frequently checking the blog posts to see what Tycho had said that day. While it was often about old events, it certainly wasn't stale or irrelevant to me.

Jach 14y ago

What's a site that only offers "no ads" as their paid-upgrade benefit? I haven't seen one offer just that, it usually comes with a grab-bag of other features that can't be replaced with a client-side script/extension. (DeviantArt's premium account is the upgrade I thought of. (http://sta.sh/047k5sokcr2 http://sta.sh/047k5sokcr2) The two major client-side features of no ads and more thumbnails are solved with NoScript and AutoPager respectively.)

Zimahl 14y ago
Off the top of my head, Wowhead offers an ad-free version for premium customers. I guess you also get custom forum avatars for being a premium customer. The point is, free site that is ad-supported but those go away with a membership - whether you get extras or not.
lazerwalker 14y ago
The Facebook version of Words With Friends sells a 'no-ads' premium pack, but admittedly that's a bit of a different scenario as the ads are in-game modal dialogs that can only be dismissed after X seconds.
pyre 14y ago
They are insinuating that there will be more content/side-projects when they don't have to worry about the commercial side of their business.