Editing explain xkcd talk:Advertise Here

==The link to buy ad space is BROKEN==
You guys might be able to get more advertisers if the link to buy ad space wasn't broken.

: Agreed. The [[wikipedia:Project Wonderful|Project Wonderful]] ad network shutdown in 2018. Three years later, this page still points there. Admins, please update with details about the new advertising scheme and what guardrails, if any, are in place to insure ads are useful and acceptable to the community here. Thanks! [[User:Mwarren|Mwarren]] ([[User talk:Mwarren|talk]]) 14:35, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

==Whitelisting==
I did this WHITE HAT listing, and I just see this picture at the left side: [http://www.projectwonderful.com/img/uploads/pics/91967-1378268302.png Your Ad...] But do I know if "www.projectwonderful.com" is just Black HAT? I do whitelist this page (expainxkcd), not more. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 21:17, 27 September 2013 (UTC)
:Whitelisting isn't short form for anything, it just means that you allow certain sites to pass through your adblocker. That image that you're seeing means that we don't have any advertisers running ads in your region currently, and clicking it will just tell you how you can advertise with us. If you can see that image, you're doing it right. EU tends to be less popular than our global traffic, despite EU being second in ad impressions only to our US traffic. An awful lot of our advertisers don't seem to be savvy enough to target EU manually, but if you have a business that you represent that you would like to promote through us, click on the bit of text that says "Your ad here, right now: $3.90" and try making an account and bid yourself on our EU/US space. '''[[User:Davidy22|<u>{{Color|#707|David}}<font color=#070 size=3>y</font></u><font color=#508 size=4>²²</font>]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 22:50, 27 September 2013 (UTC)


==Miscellaneous observations==
Looking at the ad stats, the ads with the highest click rates (value for money) are grayscale. Moving ads tend to have similar click rates to ordinary, colored ads, and our ad provider seems to have had a recent shoot in popularity with kickstarter projects. Just a few curiosities that I've noticed recently. '''[[User:Davidy22|<u>{{Color|#707|David}}<font color=#070 size=3>y</font></u><font color=#508 size=4>²²</font>]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 08:26, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

==Full Disclosure on Lunarpages Ads==
We should probably explain the Lunarpages ad, because an awful lot of our users really hate ads. Lunarpages is our new host, and they offered to give us dedicated scalable server space with unlimited bandwidth for free in return for a .jpg banner ad on our sidebar. That's a pretty big deal, because it shaves off about $700 of yearly fees, plus potentially unlimited overage charges with their standard bandwidth limit. If comic number [[1190]] had happened and we were on that bandwidth cap, we would have had to fork out up to $600 per month, which would make this wiki very costly to maintain indeed. By going with this ad deal, we can eliminate all unpredictable costs, allowing us to use our Project Wonderful ad money to pay for webpage caching/CDN services and buy ad space on other websites to spread the joy. With no ads, all of the above would put a ~$2000-3000 dent in our pockets per year. With ads earning at their current rate, we can very comfortably pursue things like our current dedicated hosting or cloudflare to make the site faster without actually having to pay out our own money or beg users for donations. Our ads are small in terms of file size, and they only take up space in the sidebar that Mediawiki would have otherwise left blank. That's not much to pay for substantially faster server hardware and essentially free advertising. '''[[User:Davidy22|<u>{{Color|#707|David}}<font color=#070 size=3>y</font></u><font color=#508 size=4>²²</font>]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 16:50, 31 October 2013 (UTC)
: Updated this a bit. --[[User:Jeff|<b><font color="orange">Jeff</font></b>]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 02:09, 20 November 2013 (UTC)
:: We at Trusted Hosting could offer a similar solution without requiring exclusive access to that area of the sidebar. We can do this because everything about our setup is optimised from mail-server to nginx instance by industry certified experts. Perhaps a tendering process would make sense. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.158.103|162.158.158.103]] 21:11, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

== Donations ==

Can we make donations instead of looking at ads?  If so, add a link in the adblock message. {{unsigned ip|108.162.219.74}}
:We can probably put that in our adblock message, I'll get the donation link. Donations in the past haven't been enough to pay for what we have now, but you can totally donate and keep adblock on if you want. If donations start performing well enough in the future, we might even be able to drop the ads entirely. That's pretty far off at the moment though. '''[[User:Davidy22|<u>{{Color|#707|David}}<font color=#070 size=3>y</font></u><font color=#508 size=4>²²</font>]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 20:43, 12 November 2013 (UTC)
:: Well, how much do you make from ads, per viewer?  I would guess that a typical donation would be larger?  I don't see any donation links, though. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.52.211|173.245.52.211]] 16:48, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
::: You can donate via [https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_donations&business=E646N7XZDZYRQ&lc=US&item_name=Explain%20XKCD&currency_code=USD&bn=PP%2dDonationsBF%3abtn_donate_LG%2egif%3aNonHosted in dollars via Paypal] or via [https://coinbase.com/checkouts/01a21cdc2c8cd33da6b32da887630d7f Bitcoin].  We will make these more prevalent shortly. --[[User:Jeff|<b><font color="orange">Jeff</font></b>]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 15:02, 24 December 2013 (UTC)
::::If you sell a product, you may also consider [[explain xkcd:Advertise Here|advertising with us]]. Clicking on the "Your ad here" message on the side of the page should take you to our advertiser page, and you can use the money you were gonna donate to get some publicity for your stuff at the same time. '''[[User:Davidy22|<u>{{Color|#707|David}}<font color=#070 size=3>y</font></u><font color=#508 size=4>²²</font>]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 07:22, 25 December 2013 (UTC)

== Animated ads ==

Hello, I just wanted to say that [http://www.projectwonderful.com/img/uploads/pics/99067-1399070236.gif the current ad banner displayed in Europe] would be somewhat annoying enough for me to reactivate my ad blocker. Now I gave it a bit of extra tolerance because of its hyper-relevant topic (and in a way I was happy to be informed of [http://bobcatinabox.com/ the Bobcatinabox project]), but I think this banner is getting too animated and distracts too much when reading the website's content. The first form this ad took was [http://www.projectwonderful.com/img/uploads/pics/99067-1399069286.jpg that static image], which I prefer a lot and by the way got my interest enough to click on.

I find the message displayed when using an ad blocker (''"It seems you are using noscript,..."'') sincerely convincing, especially the part saying ''"our ads are restricted to unobtrusive images and slow animated GIFs."'' It made me immediately disable mine when that message appeared some time ago, and since then I've been okay with static or quietly animated banners; but basically my point is that '''animated ads like this one could drive users, frustrated from the distracting effect, to activate their ad blocker'''.

So maybe the ad banners moderation should require less animation? I'm of course interested in any other view on the matter.

[[User:Cos|Cos]] ([[User talk:Cos|talk]]) 12:59, 15 May 2014 (UTC)
:Unfortunately, we can't specify a maximum speed for ads; the checkbox only lets us allow or disallow animated GIFs. We accept ads on a per-advertiser basis, so when we accept an advertiser, they're clear to change and put up new ads whenever they want, so they can vary the images they show without us having to say yes every time a change is made. That particular guy had actually been rejected before and told to slow down the animation, which he did initially. I'll talk to the advertiser about it. '''[[User:Davidy22|<u>{{Color|#707|David}}<font color=#070 size=3>y</font></u><font color=#508 size=4>²²</font>]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 17:24, 15 May 2014 (UTC)
:
::Well, thanks for this reply <small>(and sorry for the delay of mine)</small>, that explains and addresses pretty much everything about that issue. [[File:Face-smile.svg|20px|Smile|link=]] - [[User:Cos|Cos]] ([[User talk:Cos|talk]]) 14:27, 21 May 2014 (UTC)

I've disabled adblock for the site but this projectwonderful banner is extremely annoying, so I have no recourse but to enable it back. Things jumping around on the periphery of your viewing field are '''extremely''' annoying. I already hate the advertiser company, but I don't want to hate explainxkcd too - I actually like the site. That's why I am disabling the ads. {{unsigned ip|108.162.215.10}}
:Huh. Which site was it, in particular? We can get that dealt with in short order. '''[[User:Davidy22|<u>{{Color|#707|David}}<font color=#070 size=3>y</font></u><font color=#508 size=4>²²</font>]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 03:48, 5 July 2015 (UTC)
:: The image is http://www.projectwonderful.com/img/uploads/pics/22694-1385223182.gif and the link leads to http://theworstthingsforsale.com/tag/safe-for-work/. Still can see it right now. --[[Special:Contributions/108.162.215.10|108.162.215.10]] 20:13, 10 July 2015 (UTC)
:::Not sure what's happening here. That guy's ads shouldn't be getting auto-approved. Dealt with it for now. '''[[User:Davidy22|<u>{{Color|#707|David}}<font color=#070 size=3>y</font></u><font color=#508 size=4>²²</font>]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 05:45, 11 July 2015 (UTC)
Again, [http://www.projectwonderful.com/img/uploads/pics/22694-1385223182.gif this ad] features WAY to much obnoxious animation. Enough to make me re-enable adblock. I usually enjoy the explain xkcd ads, but this ad fits my description for the most obnoxious kind of ad there can be: a weird, inexplicable animated gif. [[User:Suspender guy|Suspender guy]] ([[User talk:Suspender guy|talk]]) 14:57, 10 July 2015 (UTC)
:Huh. We allow ads on a per-advertiser basis, and that guy had a static ad in his initial submission. Ads from that site have been disabled for the time being. '''[[User:Davidy22|<u>{{Color|#707|David}}<font color=#070 size=3>y</font></u><font color=#508 size=4>²²</font>]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 16:13, 10 July 2015 (UTC)
::Augh! It's back again! [[User:Suspender guy|Suspender guy]] ([[User talk:Suspender guy|talk]]) 15:01, 13 July 2015 (UTC)
:::Welp, changed to an actual block this time. Hate doing that to a guy who's been with us for a while. '''[[User:Davidy22|<u>{{Color|#707|David}}<font color=#070 size=3>y</font></u><font color=#508 size=4>²²</font>]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 02:58, 14 July 2015 (UTC)

Hello, same thing again with [https://www.projectwonderful.com/img/uploads/pics/72361-1378956237.gif this animated ad for "Epic Escape"]. My earlier message two years ago (the one that started this section) applies in every bit: I like the site and I'm happy to whitelist it, especially when it promises ads ''"restricted to unobtrusive images and slow animated GIFs"'', but for me that one goes against that. I usually give a friendly look to the explain xkcd ads, but when one gets ''distracting'' even after you've looked at it, that's when friendliness becomes frustration and I reach for the adblocker. [[User:Cos|Cos]] ([[User talk:Cos|talk]]) 09:06, 24 March 2016 (UTC)
:If there's ever an ad that annoys you, you can just report it and we'll deal with it. I approved that guy's ad when it was different, and we have our approval system set up so that if their initial ad image gets approved and they change it, their changes are automatically approved. It's to make things more convenient for us and them, but sometimes they switch to something like what you're seeing after they're approved. I might consider just barring animated gifs entirely, advertisers seem to be misusing it more often than not. The guy's blocked now. '''[[User:Davidy22|<u>{{Color|#707|David}}<font color=#070 size=3>y</font></u><font color=#508 size=4>²²</font>]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 05:22, 26 March 2016 (UTC)
Annoying animated ad with Sailormoon is here again :( Looks like trusting the advertizers is always a mistake. I'm reenabling my adblocker.

==Spelling/Grammar==
It says "ads than masquerade as operating system dialog boxes", using "than" instead of "that" (Can be fixed quick) —[[User:Artyer|Artyer]] ([[User talk:Artyer|talk]]) 17:44, 8 September 2014 (UTC)
:Done. '''[[User:Davidy22|<u>{{Color|#707|David}}<font color=#070 size=3>y</font></u><font color=#508 size=4>²²</font>]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 17:46, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

== Maybe link to PW? ==

Greets:  Just a quick suggestion that maybe the "It seems you are using noscript," text in the sidebar should include a link to the PW page?  I suggest that since the [[Advertise Here]] page has its link hidden under a "here" link. (In other words, let's make the PW link a little more visible.) --[[Special:Contributions/173.245.55.126|173.245.55.126]] 14:20, 27 July 2015 (UTC)
:Oh, I guess I didn't do it because you can already get there from the bottom of the ad box, the little message at the bottom of the sidebar and the ad description page itself. I guess it'd be useful, I'll do it in a bit. '''[[User:Davidy22|<u>{{Color|#707|David}}<font color=#070 size=3>y</font></u><font color=#508 size=4>²²</font>]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 06:52, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

== [http://i.imgur.com/tpnxtY3.png It seems you are ignoring my DNT header] ==
which is stopping me from considering whitelisting your site. Users use the DNT header to express to a web server that they do not want to be tracked intrusively by third party companies (or you). If you think you would find revenue helpful, please consider honouring [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Do_Not_Track DNT headers]. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.152.185|162.158.152.185]] 12:50, 4 November 2015 (UTC)

== False Positive NoScript detection ==
I'm getting the message in the sidebar that I'm using noscript... right above a banner for Lunarpages.  Trick is, I'm not using NoScript, or in fact any Ad-Blocking at all.  The closest thing I have to an Ad-Blocker is Flashblock, which merely prevents Flash objects from loading until clicked on, (Functionality which is now built in to Chrome and enabled by default, I might add) and Firefox's built-in Pop-up Blocker. Using Firefox 43.0.4 -Graptor --[[Special:Contributions/173.245.54.23|173.245.54.23]] 12:33, 25 January 2016 (UTC)
:The lunarpages is a static image that uses zero javascript. The ad just above that is loaded with a little bit of javascript by an ad provider called Project Wonderful, and their code seems to not be rendering correctly on some builds of firefox. The noscript message is also static text, which the ad is supposed to render over and becomes visible when the ad fails to load. I'll report this as a bug and see what I can do about it. '''[[User:Davidy22|<u>{{Color|#707|David}}<font color=#070 size=3>y</font></u><font color=#508 size=4>²²</font>]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 05:22, 26 March 2016 (UTC)
::Firefox issue is still ongoing. It seems to have a non-js fallback of some sort which doesn't work. On the plus side, the banner looked interesting enough to want to enable JS to click it (which was a strange experience). [[Special:Contributions/108.162.246.191|108.162.246.191]] 20:17, 25 August 2017 (UTC)
:::A "strange experience" is an error message meaningless like "it doesn't work". NoScript is a sophisticated AddOn to Firefox and I recommend this only for advanced users. Broken or blocked links inside a page can always cause strange looking pages, mostly when a style sheet is missing because it's not loaded from a blocked part. This is a little bit like: Don't try it at home unless you really know what you are doing. But clicking "Allow all this page" in the preferences, waiting for the reload, checking again if there is something more to allow which wasn't visible before, finally it has to work. If not, YOUR NoScript is broken and reinstalling may still not work because there is too much chaos left at your installation folders. But that's a ticket for the NoScript people, this site works fine (for me with that AddOn). --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 20:52, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

I'm also getting a message in the sidebar that I'm using noscript, when I'm not intentionally using any kind of ad-blocker. I am using Chrome, so assuming the previous comment about how Flashblock is built into Chrome is correct, this could be a Flashblock issue. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.62.225|162.158.62.225]] 17:27, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

I'm also getting the message in the sidebar that I'm using noscript, but I'm not. I am using Privacy Badger in an older Firefox -- it triggers Red on staticxx.facebook.com and www.projectwonderful.com , and Yellow on several other sites, totaling 10 trackers.

This is still an issue, I *am* using noscript but have whitelisted this site and project wonderful, and refreshed the page. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.88.116|162.158.88.116]] 09:26, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

== Clarification on advertising rates ==
Regarding the bid amounts on the [https://www.projectwonderful.com/advertisehere.php?id=70571 project wonderful page], is the number the amount per day? For example, the graph at the moment shows a bidding amount that varies between about $4 to $9. Does that mean the earnings of this site are about $4 to $9 per day? [[User:Nev|Nev]] ([[User talk:Nev|talk]]) 11:22, 15 October 2016 (UTC)
:The prices are per day, yes. There are four different regions that project wonderful lets people bid on, US, Europe, Canada and the rest of the world. Bids for the US tend to be high, and the starting price is also slightly higher. Earnings can vary day on day as advertisers don't always want to advertise on Project Wonderful. If we're looking at averages, income from the last few months has been about $4 a day. '''[[User:Davidy22|<u>{{Color|#707|David}}<font color=#070 size=3>y</font></u><font color=#508 size=4>²²</font>]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 21:14, 15 October 2016 (UTC)

== Hacking themed/related sites not encouraging damaging activity ==

I am considering taking out an advert for my hacking themed site, Haaksploits, which I hope to have up and running in a MVP state within a month. The focus is on using computers in new and exciting ways, which includes some focus on traditional penetration testing techniques such as cross-site scripting, password brute forcing, port scanning and SQL injection -- which of course do have legitimate commercial outlets; far more, indeed, than ever was the case previously --, as well as information on security and general data-gathering, and basic tutorials on things like Linux, C++ and similar. Some reference to Mr Robot may also exist here and there :op. To this end would it be possible to get further definition on what would be considered an 'exploit' etc or if there may be some leeway on this, if the site can be proven to be trustworthy and responsible in its disclosures? To be clear there will be nothing mentioned on the site that doesn't a) have a legitimate use b) encourages illegal activity.

With these things in mind, would the site likely be accepted as valid, would the name potentially need to be changed, or would there be any other stipulations, including removal of some of the previously outlined content (perhaps 'walling some of it off' with a different site name and alternative branding)?  At this stage of development a full rebrand wouldn't be *too* difficult, and the main pain points of re-registering the SSL with the domain name might even fix some minor issues I've been having with the cert chain.

I am very keen to have an advert on this site as it seems potentially close to the perfect audience I want once my website is properly up and running, so any clarification on this would be very welcome.

If the site goes on to generate significant revenue I would also be more than willing to increase the price paid for the ad above the ticket price, as I believe in giving back to the community and have got a lot of enjoyment from this resource.

While the site is live on a production server, I don't want to link directly to it, as it is not in a complete state at present, and the majority of content requires further infrastructure work to implement. However, I would be willing to provide a sample if it will help getting an advertisement on this site accepted. [[User:Peterdcarter|Peterdcarter]] ([[User talk:Peterdcarter|talk]])


Although the "Advertise Here" page says ads will only appear on the sidebar, ads are appearing in the middle of explanations. This is incredibly disruptive. Please stop. [[User:Unpopular Opinions|Unpopular Opinions]] ([[User talk:Unpopular Opinions|talk]]) 17:29, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

== Ads in the middle of explanations + sexual content ==

This page says that you only sell ads for the side bar, but I get a very large number of ads in the middle of the text, interrupting the explanation. There are also sexually explicit ads quite regularly... See https://ibb.co/wsrGm99 https://ibb.co/pJTzC7K https://ibb.co/Vqkqy2w https://ibb.co/qM8W4wT https://ibb.co/bzYDxmV
Please do something about it…
[[User:Fractal|Fractal]] ([[User talk:Fractal|talk]]) 07:18, 27 July 2020 (UTC)
:I'm wondering about this as well. I haven't seen any sexual content, but there are definitely multiple ads in explanations, instead of just the 160x600 "skyscraper" ads you claim to exclusively sell. [[User:Bischoff|Bischoff]] ([[User talk:Bischoff|talk]]) 10:58, 15 October 2020 (UTC)