[RacinNinja]

Originally Posted by Alex

There's nothing fundamentally changing in the site software, server, etc. over days/weeks/months. So ads are really the only variable. Every once in awhile Google doesn't vet thoroughly enough and an ad slows some of the page load down. The way the ads are coded, they are supposed to load last. So even if an ad hangs forever, the whole site page is painted and usable, but the top left thingee will be spinning forever (never completing), because it is still waiting on that ad code. Annoying, but not supposed to be debilitating. Google has pretty strict parameters for how quickly ads are supposed to load, so as they start seeing issues they should be yanking the ads from their networks themselves. But it's not perfect.

I understand why people use adblockers, but folks also need to understand that if the ad revenue dipped below the direct costs to run the site, I'd have to shut it down (the site, not the ads). Fortunately, it's nowhere close at the moment so I don't run any of those annoy-bots reminding people to turn off ad-blockers on the site. Those that are blocking ads are betting on enough users to not use those tools, and so far it's a good bet (it's not even close, I'm not really worried about it).

I never want to collect direct payment from any users here, I don't like the model where people pay extra for additional features. So ads are pretty much the only other option to make this sustainable. If people are blocking ads because of a particularly annoying one, just let me know and I can block the entire domain right away.

Out of respect for you and the totally awesome thing you've got going here, lemme test whitelisting this site in my AdBlocker.

To be honest, the reason I run one is that I've had some bad ads get through and the only thing that saved my ass from an auto-loading virus was my kick ass anti-virus.