[quote=“waetherman, post:8, topic:93836”]
My problem with the ads on BB is that they are like all those around today - fake headlines, ads disguised as news, clickbait.[/quote]
The fact is that clickbait headlines win because they drive traffic. I mean, as much as people claim to hate them, they seem to really work! It really is One Weird Trick that gets you clicks. When you’re running a business and have web hosting bills to pay or servers to maintain, you have to do what you know works. Cory has written about the unhealthy relationship between ads and Internet content, and you have to compete with everyone else’s ad contracts at the same time. If Mental Floss is doing Amazon Affiliate links, and paid content (or at least what seems to be thinly veiled paid content) I have a hard time seeing how BB is supposed to keep up.
There will eventually be some kind of crash and singularity with the online ad market, but in the meantime, to put it presidentially, the staff have to put food on their families. Saying “you can find some other revenue source” is a lot easier than actually finding it. No revenue, no BoingBoing.
It’s a love it or lose it, situation. Now, if you want to talk about something like paying membership dues… I’m increasingly down with that. My local paper does it because they can’t have a free online version with their limited circulation or they’d go out of business and it seems to work. But that’s going to call for more people being down with that than just me. And I know some regulars here can’t afford it, and we’re going to have to set up a scholarship program.
All of that being said, I’m going to agree with you in a way: BB does have to figure something out before they turn into the online equivalent of one of those magazines which consist 90% of ads. But that’s more about balance than categorical avoidance of current online ad-based strategies.
