That is interesting indeed. If this little project survives it could have some pretty crazy implications.

Seems like a big development flying under the radar. kapow

Also being discussed in the Google AdSense forum [webmasterworld.com...]

An ad blocker is cheaper.

When you visit a participating website, part of your contribution goes to the creators of that site. As a reminder of your support, you’ll see a thank you message - often accompanied by a pixel pattern - where you might normally see an ad.

They don't say anywhere that this stops tracking, just that it replaces ads with a "pixel pattern". Could it be that they are actually getting people to pay them to track their browsing habits? If so, LOL.

They don't say anywhere that this stops tracking, just that it replaces ads with a "pixel pattern".

Yep. And who wants to look at pixel patterns? I'd rather see a cleanly designed site with no clutter. And why should I pay Google? What about paying all the other companies that produce ads too? How do I know which sites have no ads on them? And would it really make any difference, if I could tell? Why, as a searcher, should I give Google all my details including my credit card number, secure in the knowledge that they would know exactly who I was as well as all the other data they'd hold on me?

It stinks IMO. I wonder how much the genius who dreamed this up was paid for it.

don't pay us and we will plaster ads all over everything.

pay us and we will take some of those ads away.


wow, google gets paid to put graffiti all over the web..and they get paid to clean up the graffiti, talk about a WIN WIN!

just wait till they move in and become an ISP...win win win! 10 years or so goog will just send a bill to everyones house for 10 bux or something, and they'll have to pay it to function online.

Micropayments/subscription is an advertising-alternative for digital publishers that I've been waiting for, for a decade now.

So I'm pretty happy about this.

In general, I feel visitors should have a clear choice between:

1) their visit being sponsored by commercial advertisers; or else

2) paying a micro-payment themselves for their visit which then liberates them from the onslaught of commercial messages

If nothing else, this choice, clearly presented, will unmask Ad-Blockers for what they are - just unscrupulous ways of taking advantage of other people's efforts.

This is Google trying to head off Bitcoin-powered micropayment disruption of their business model. They are really fast.

The stink of desperation is getting strong

How does Google assign a value to each individual pageview? Surely a pageview on a content-rich niche website is more valuable and collects a higher contribution than say, a hyper-paginated list of cat pics?

I don't get it. Why would users pay for a subscription service when they can get an ad blocker for free?

I don't get it. Why would users pay for a subscription service when they can get an ad blocker for free?

I guess because many people (myself included) do visit sites and get a lot of benefit from them, but we ignore the ads, and let's face it, many of us rely in income from ads to run the site. So, if it's a regular site we visit (let's just use Webmasterworld as an example of a site we all visit frequently and benefit from), instead of seeing Adsense ads, we pay the $3 per month to 'support' the site, and not see ads.

So it's an option to block ads but still support a useful site.

It would be great if more sites could offer an 'ad free' option/subscription, and cut Google out of it.

The stink of desperation is getting strong

My husband works in a shop and Google paid them a visit to offer them the choice of a view inside the shop, for a fee of course. I accept they'd want a fee, because they'd be going into the premises to take images, but if many people are like me, they wonder how Google will squeeze more money out of people. And they just keep on coming up with more ideas.