How AdBlock Hurts The Creators You Love

Is there anything worse than Internet ads? They clutter up your search results, they get in your face when you're trying to check your mail, and they crowd in on the sides of the blogs you're trying to read. Worst of all, though, are the mini-commercials that play before the song you really want to listen to, or the tutorial you're trying to watch. Really, with so many businesses trying to jam their products in your face, it was a godsend when you got AdBlock installed on your computer, your tablet, your phone, and if you're old-school, on your desktop, too.

The problem is, what's good for you is actually terrible for the creators making the stuff you like.

After all, wouldn't you help us out if it didn't cost you anything?

Ads Are How Most Online Creators Get Paid

Most people never stop and ask how creative professionals on the Internet get paid. After all, if you buy an author's book, then that author gets a cut of the sale (which are called royalties). If you buy a painting, then the artist who painted it gets a piece of that (or all of it, if the painter is selling it him or herself). But what about people who create YouTube videos, who write blogs, or who design any of the dozens of other things you can get free access to on the Internet? How do they get paid?

Simple. They get part of the ad revenue generated from their pages.

Take this blog, for example. I don't charge any membership fees, and anyone can read it for free on any device. In fact, the more people who read my blog, the more money I make. Because, in addition to dispensing wisdom on the writing profession from my soapbox, this page has ads on it. The more traffic I get, and the more people who see those ads, the more money I make. That's the same for anyone who uses an ad-based platform, whether it's writers at InfoBarrel, or YouTube celebrities like Jim Sterling.

Speaking of Mr. Sterling, he did an episode of The Jimquisition last year for the Escapist covering this very topic. As such, I thought I'd share it to hammer the point home.

So, there you have it. No one likes Internet ads. However, if you have AdBlock on your devices, then you are, effectively, not counted when the end of the month rolls around and our paymasters figure out how much money our traffic earned us. And, to be honest, we need all of the numbers we can get, because it takes thousands of hits for us to earn as little as a few bucks.

That's why I'd like to ask a favor of my regular readers. If you have AdBlock installed on your devices, would you consider turning it off when you read either The Literary Mercenary or Improved Initiative?

If you'd rather keep blocking ads, but you still want me to keep creating content on a regular basis, you could visit my Patreon page to become a patron, instead. $1 an entry, or even a month, goes a long way toward helping me provide even more content for you, my readers.

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