Make Money Fast With LiveJournal!

[jducoeur]

It's interesting to notice my own knee-jerk reactions sometimes.

Just got up to the announcement of the new LJ feature letting you put ads on your journal. (Basically, you can associate your journal with Google AdSense.) Intellectually, I don't have a problem with the way they're doing it -- it's strictly opt-in, and they're passing on 100% of the proceeds to you. In principle, it lets people make a little money, in a way that is very normal these days. (What's in it for LJ? It's a paid-members feature, so presumably they are hoping that bloggers who have lots of readers will find it worthwhile to pay for an account in order to make money off of Google.)

And yet, my gut reaction was quite negative: it somehow felt like it was intruding crass commercial reality yet further into the space of me and my friends. That actually surprises me -- I hadn't realized that button was there. Too many years of spam and popup ads have clearly made me resentful of them, to a degree that I find just a little irrational.

How about you? Positive, negative, indifferent?

ETA, since several people have asked in one way or another: I *believe* the scheme is that the ads won't show up when you read your friends page normally, only if you actually look at the person's journal. The reason I believe this is that they've also added a new option that lets you deliberately opt *in* to reading the ads from your friends view, apparently on the theory that it's a way to put a little money into your friends' pockets. I confess, I'm skeptical about the idea; it'll be interesting to see how many people turn that on...

Comments

really really selfish perspective.

[selkiechick]

I will have to see how the execution of it goes, but in general, I feel a bit negative. It's not that I don't think people should be able to profit from their journals, but part of the reason I paid for a membership was so that I would have an ad-free space in my life. If the new Ad-Sense program means that there is advertising in my future here on LJ, I am... not ok with that.

Re: really really selfish perspective.

[tashabear.livejournal.com]

You can set your journal so everything displays in your chosen style -- I presume (perhaps erroneously) that that would include blocking the ads.

I have a permanent account, so I'm hopeful that I am immune from them, because they would annoy me greatly.

Re: really really selfish perspective.

[qarylla.livejournal.com]

I hope that the style=mine includes blocking ads, though the main purpose I have in using it is to prevent my eyes from bleeding out with a friend's very bright pink journal.

That said, we have ad blocking at work and it seems to work on Adsense ads, so I likely won't see the ads while I check in over lunch. Just the rest of the time.

Re: really really selfish perspective.

[tashabear.livejournal.com]

If you're using Firefox, there's an extension called AdBlock that will do the same thing. You have to do the settings yourself, but once it's set, you should be fine.

Re: really really selfish perspective.

[jducoeur]

See my edited post. I don't think the ads will show up when you're reading your flist. Don't know what happens if you click through to an entry from a friend who has ads turned on.

(Mind, I don't really expect any of my friends to turn this on: I suspect there's going to be a lot of cultural pressure against it. But I'm not sure I would see the ads even if they did.)

[goldsquare.livejournal.com]

It sickens me.

My purpose in using LJ is as an extension or substitute for in-person communication.

I would object horribly if you interrupted a conversation with me to recite a commercial for Pepsi. It would bother me if I began to feel that the purpose of our conversations was to hawk Pepsi.

The subversion of motivations for human conversation into a monetary purpose, is disgusting.

We have a "friend" in common (who I no longer really like), who once convinced me that it would be really nice if a bunch of us "friends" booked some space together at a B&B for an event. Later, I found that his motivations were to get a free room, and that he was acting as a booking agent for the B&B. (He, of course, didn't mention it: the B&B proprietor mentioned it to me, because of COURSE I would know.)

It was at that moment that I decided this pseudo-friend had little worth as a person, to me.

We have reached a cynical age, and I despise things that increase our mutual cynicism of one another. The profiting from friendships is surely the height of that cynicism.

[cvirtue.livejournal.com]

I feel like it would be renting out ad space in my living room, or charging my friends for snacks at my house.

[fitzw.livejournal.com]

My response was somewhat in the negative, even though I've pretty much developed the ability to mentally blank out advertising on most websites (although those are effectively cutting into my daily download quota).

[If I ever find a way to completely block pulse360.com, I'll be happy...]

[lady-guenievre.livejournal.com]

I get the impression that this program is aimed at people using livejournal very differently than most of the (scadian/fanfiction/other "archipelago of the weird" communities). If you think of it as trying to break into the space that wordpress.com or one of the other more "professionally oriented" blogging platforms currently occupy, then it makes sense that you would want to have adsense avilable.

Likewise, my reaction to someone using it would depend on what the journal/blog in question was - if it was a journal that was otherwise a basically personal journal, I would have that general negative reaction you describe. (One that I don't, by the by, have to facebook ads, probably because it's a free platform). On the other hand, if it was more commercial / topic oriented, it wouldn't bother me. Though I might then read it through rss vs. livejournal, because I divide my content that way.

[jducoeur]

I concur -- that's a large part of why, intellectually, the idea doesn't bother me...

[herooftheage.livejournal.com]

Quite indifferent. If it turns out that I can't block the ads because I have a paid account, I'll just unfriend anyone in the unlikely event that they decide to put the ads on their accounts. We're both free agents here - they're free to offer the ads, and I'm free to not read 'em if they do. :)

[antoniseb.livejournal.com]

I'm starting off against it. I could imagine kids in the post-privacy era figuring that a few extra dollars wouldn't hurt.

[dragonazure.livejournal.com]

Isn't one of the fringe benefits of being a paid member of LJ actually the lack of advertisements? Allowing paid members to proactively put advertisements into their journals seems counter-intuitive to me.

[rickthefightguy.livejournal.com]

I don't have a paid account, and I don't think I ever see any ads. Where are they? Of course, I only ever go directly to my friends page - there might be ads on my home page or something?

Anyway, obviously, I don't care.

[rickthefightguy.livejournal.com]

Wait, I found them. They are right at the top of the page! I never noticed them before, and in fact had to look a third time, but now I see the banner across the top! Huh, that's a deal? Let a lone a big one?

BTW, I know that in theory I could have edited my previous comment, but I don't know how.

[kiya]

Comment editing is a feature of paid accounts.

[rickthefightguy.livejournal.com]

Aha! I guess I will stick with commenting on my own comments. And next time someone tells me I could have edited my comment I will not take it to heart that I couldn't figure out how.

[fosveny.livejournal.com]

Ads? Livejournal has ads? The web has ads?

(Another happy user of Firefox with NoScript, Flashblock, and AdBlock Plus. I very occasionally see ads, but it's notable enough when I do that I remark on it. It's been months since the last)

[mneme]

Not a big deal to me, if mostly in the "and this is how I can filter out assholes" way.

If someone I watch puts up ads, one of a number of things is true:
I block the ads. No problem.
I decide they have a different purpose to their journal than I do to reading it. Unfriend.
I decide that their content is worth reading even with the ads, just as I do for webcomics and other ad or semi-ad supported media.

[its-just-me.livejournal.com]

it depends on what it is for me. I'd never put an ad for McD's but a I might for NYA Joe's. It would have to be something I believed in.