what does the future hold for free word press users
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http://www.sotsil.wordpress.com.
I am aware that:
a) ads are not allowed on wordpress.com blogs
b) we are using a free platform and should be grateful that we’re not paying a single cent to publish content
c) there is wordpress.org if bloggers want more freedom of choice and freedom of movement
I respect this policy 100%,
BUT:
is there perhaps a chance that wordpress com will allow some kind of passive income arrangements in the future? I know I’m comparing apples and oranges when I say that squidoo and hub pages offer split income possibilities. do you think wordpress would consider such a scheme down the road, or am I really barking at the wrong tree?
There are passionate bloggers here who want to share information/opinion, they’re really not just into money-making, but it really would be nice if we could say, make 7 cents a day, no?
Thanks. Please don’t tell me to go somewhere else. I happen to be in love with wordpress…The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)
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WordPress.com has been say since I got here nearly 3 years ago that blogger generated ads of some sort might be an option in the future. Will it happen or when staff won’t say for sure. I will bet almost anything though that if they do it will be a paid upgrade and will likely be about the same cost as the “no-ads” upgrade ($30) or perhaps more, and I’m certain there will be a limit as to what you can use.
This from the bottom of the features page (my emphasis):
Advertising
To support the service we may occasionally show Google text ads on your blog, however we do this very rarely. You can remove ads from your blog for a low yearly fee. In the future you’ll be able to show your own ads and make money from your blog. -
I love wordpress.com, too, and I have absolutely no problem with a), b) and c)
wordpress.com is for blogging, not for making money. As with any ‘free’ service there is always some catch to it. You get what you (don’t) pay for. The ‘catch’ on wordpress.com happens to be no-ads and an at times frustrating limitation as to what kind of widgets that are possible. For pure blogging, however, wordpress.com is an excellent platform, and I would not want to change it into some ad-laden Splogspot lookalike…I don’t want wordpress.com to become splogpress.com, because that is what will happen. It is already happening, counting by the number of spammy get-rich-quick-and-such blogs already present on wordpress.com.
That said, I have moved to .org, not because I wanted to have ads – which I do – but because for my kind of blog, wordpres.com was not enough.
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Thanks sacredpath and husdal for your comments. I’ll cross my fingers that sometime, somewhere, somehow, wordpress.com will go with the flow. If it doesn’t, that’s ok too. I won’t run away and go elsewhere, although if I should open a third blog (my other blog about translation is in blogspot and there are ads that google put there but because of zero traffic (i don’t really aggressively ask the whole world to visit my blog), I really have zilch. That trend will contine indefinitely. I don’t even want to ask my sister to visit my blogs. I’m sure she has other better things to do.
Sigh… -
It is really not that hard to start an independently-hosted WordPress blog and put ads on it. What’s really hard is making money with that. I make my living off advertising on independently-hosted WordPress blogs, and our earnings are down by 70% this year.
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I must have gotten a very lucky start. After moving to .org, one year of hosting was paid off in two weeks, thanks to ad revenue. Even if I multiply that by 25 (for a whole year), it’s not going to make me rich, but it pays for itself and adds some extra petty cash to my account every now and then.
Using self-hosted WordPress is basically just the same as wordpress.com, the dashboard is exactly the same, it’s just that all but few of the widgets and other bells and whistles come as ‘plugins’ that must be installed and activated first, but it’s a very stratightforward process. If you know wordpress.com, you also know wordpress.org.
I don’t think wordpress.com should ‘go with the flow’, but continue to set itself apart from the rest of the Blogosphere. No ads (yeah, right…) and no scripts is actually one of wordpress.com’s strengths the way I see it.
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OK, husdal and raincoaster. Points well taken. I shall consider wordpress.org in the future. I’m still having fun with wordpress com and have no major complaints. Of course LiveWriter makes it so easy for me.
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