I support my favorite blogs and I have no problem with authors trying to get paid for them. At the same time, being a specialist in your field doesn't mean blogging is the financial answer either.

Do National Geographic's writers not earn money when they write? Do newspaper journalists not earn a salary? Doesn't a novelist earn royalties? I enjoy writing, but I don't see why I shouldn't be able to make a living writing just because my content is published on the internet. And I would never write "advertorials." (Not to mention the fact that the Federal Trade Commission is cracking down on that kind of thing…)

"It is up to you to provide content that is worthy of your consumers, and for them to decide whether it is worth them sacrificing their browsing experience and being able to focus holistically on what they came here to read: your content."

I take great pains to not sacrifice my readers' browsing experience. A few small banners off to the side is *nothing* compared to what larger publishers (e.g. Forbes.com) have. I could join a network like Casale Media or DoubleClick and put a big leaderboard at the top, and a skyscraper format banner in the sidebar. I'd probably make some decent money from it. But I chose not to. If you had read the bullet points in the article a little more carefully you might understand that.

"By standards of your argument, would you also agree then that the 584 subscribers to your RSS feed are also cheating and robbing you of your hard earned fruits? It would seem logical then that you would not offer RSS as an option in order to profit from your content."

No, I would not agree. If I thought they were "cheating and robbing" me, I wouldn't provide the feed now, would I? RSS feeds are a great convenience, and one that I make use of daily. And I certainly could push some lightweight advertising through my feed. I haven't yet, but I certainly could. I simply haven't made a conscious decision to monetize the medium yet.

"Don't fall by the way of huge media giants and fail to understand your audience. Try different things, like perhaps the ability for users to 'donate' to your PayPal account if they like your article."

I maintain several WordPress plugins, which takes a significant amount of my time up. They all have easy PayPal buttons for donations. Despite the tens of thousands of plugin downloads, I still don't get that much money in donations. A very small percentage of the users donate, despite the fact that 50%-75% of them send me support emails every day. (Which has prompted me to start fleshing-out plans for paid support plans…) Someone simply reading some articles isn't going to be bothered to leave a tip.

"I think it would be sage advice for you to not exploit your users with advertising they don't want to see."

Give a little, get a little. Nobody can have their way all the time; there will always be compromises. I try to keep things fair by keeping ads to a minimum. I get a small salary, readers get free content.

I don't understand your position at all. Are you trying to say that he doesn't have the right to provide value for his advertisers because a third party that isn't at all related to this website, the reader of this website, or the advertiser on this website has a personal beef with the site?

Are you saying that his work is worth reading (acknowledged by the fact that you read it and felt compelled to comment on it), but not worth enough for him to be able to earn compensation for what he wrote?

Why does his offering a convenience to his regular readers in the form of an RSS feed seem to be a problem? Is your worldview so narrow that somebody that wants a little compensation at little to no cost to the person consuming the efforts of his labor is some sort of evil twit?

Are you honestly offended that his website has a couple of advertisements in the sidebar and a strip of google adsense _after_ his article? I've certainly seen people that load their sites down with far more in the way of advertisements than this one and only provide a fraction of the value.

I think that your stance seems more laughable than an article calling out the questionable practices of a third party seems to be. But then, I sometimes insist that people pay me for my knowledge, and I'll even go as far as requiring a credit card before I let them read or listen to what I have to say or benefit from my experience and coaching, so I guess that puts me even further down the ladder.

To me this entire post makes it quite apparent that the only reason you write is to benefit financially, so you might as well be writing advertorials and just save yourself the time.

There are more ways than traditional media formats to monetise your blog, and ultimately it seems that consumers (who in this case are your readers) are empowering themselves to avoid most common advertising formats. It is why Newspapers and Magazines are falling off shelves at an astounding rate.

It is up to you to provide content that is worthy of your consumers, and for them to decide whether it is worth them sacrificing their browsing experience and being able to focus holistically on what they came here to read: your content.

By standards of your argument, would you also agree then that the 584 subscribers to your RSS feed are also cheating and robbing you of your hard earned fruits? It would seem logical then that you would not offer RSS as an option in order to profit from your content.

Don't fall by the way of huge media giants and fail to understand your audience. Try different things, like perhaps the ability for users to 'donate' to your PayPal account if they like your article. I think it would be sage advice for you to not exploit your users with advertising they don't want to see.

Grant

These posts already exist, and I avoid them like the plague. It isn't quality content, and it isn't something I want to do to my readers. I think instead we will see many good bloggers quit in frustration, because they can't get compensation for their hours spent. Do you want an internet full of ad posts, instead of unobtrusive ads on the side? I don't.

How can you not want to support a favorite blog when it costs you nothing? Think people. You wouldn't expect to open a magazine and not see any ads. You can't watch a trailer on IMDB without viewing an ad first. EasyList is sabotaging businesses, and your favorites may disappear as a result.

Its time for bloggers across the board to find new ways to generate revenue and stop trying to keep the old way alive. I think we will soon see a fuzzy line between blog posts and posts that are just ads. There will be some idea for creating revenue that will make as many people mad as it makes happy, just like product placement.

Stay tuned.

How the EasyList AdBlock filter can destroy a website’s ad revenue, and how they added insult to injury….

Yeah, I've blocked a few networks too, such as TribalFusion, Kontera, and the other major ones that highlight random words throughout the text.

"What did you do to piss them off so much? Was it just that you made it so that their filter didn't work on your site?"

That and I've written several posts that show my dislike for the EasyList filter…

"Perhaps you can use a rotating CSS class for your ad blocks which would make it more difficult to block? "

I already have, but ssshhh…