Ads on Bumbling Through Dungeons

Generally speaking, private sites don’t need justifications for their decisions. The creator has ultimate control over all aspects of the site.

That said, I just started allowing display ads on my website. And my personal opinions on digital ads cause me to want to make a statement on them. I’ll keep this as brief as I can, since this is a gaming website and should remain such.

I dislike ads. I use ad blockers on my browsers on most websites. I encourage you to do the same, including on this one.

The harsh truth, though, is that sites like this cost more money than some people realize. This site’s been live since the beginning of 2019. In that time, it’s cost me well over $1,000. Hosting alone might reach this total, and I also use a handful of paid plug-ins that allow me to do more with design and site functionality.

This is in addition to camera and filming gear when I was co-running a Youtube channel under the same name, which roughly doubles that total.

This also ignores the time and effort involved, which is far greater than 1K in opportunity costs. I designed this entire site, maintain and update it, and have written every word on it, a word count that – based on some napkin math – is nearing half a million words.

It’s never made me a penny. And that’s ok. I never expected it to, frankly.

But it also means that every year I keep it going, I’m making a decision to operate at a financial loss and a far larger loss of time and creative energy.

I have numerous creative aspirations, ones that take up lots more of my time, attention, effort and – at times – money. My time is not infinite. No one’s is. And so decisions have to be made about the viability of certain endeavors.

Other creatives online face the same challenges. And there are other avenues they can pursue. But, for example, my creative interests don’t lend themselves well to a patron model (Patreon, etc.).

I don’t want to stop running this website. It brings in more traffic than I ever expected it to, which is great! It means my writing is resonating with an audience. I have more I want to do on the site. Lots more. But that takes time and effort. Lots of it.

And for clarity, turning on display ads doesn’t mean I’m getting rich off of the site. It means, I hope, that the site will pay for itself moving forward. That’s all. Right now, based on early revenue totals, it won’t even be doing that, but at least I’ll be operating at less of a loss.

Also for clarity, I’m going to try to keep an eye on the frequency and location of ads. I can control some of that, and don’t want the experience for readers to be worsened considerably. If it is, again, I encourage you to use ad blocker plug-ins on whatever device or browser you use. Your readership isn’t worth losing over fractions of pennies.

In a world where every website seems to be monetized, this is likely overkill in terms of justification. But I feel I owe it to my readers and myself to understand exactly why I’m making the decision.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you continue to enjoy the site!