
Google Contributor: Buy an ad removal pass for the web - sohkamyung
https://contributor.google.com/v/marketing
======
cptskippy
I've been participating in Google Contributor since it's inception, this is
like the 3rd relaunch of the service. I have no doubt it will fail just like
the past iterations because the fundamental flaw is that Google is the heart
of the system and they're unwilling to extricate themselves from it. I don't
think this type of service is the way forward and the solution will not come
from Google or any other ad provider for a number of reasons. The first is
that Google is not the only ad network and no one wants to be cut out. The
second is that this does nothing to address the privacy or security issues
people have today that drive them to ad blockers.

There aren't just a handful of Ad networks, there are thousands if not
millions out there. On top of that, they utilize each other to push out ads in
a horrid rat king like incestuous jumble. Any payments to avoid ads served by
these companies would require compensating all of these companies, the end
result predictably would be movie studio accounting that leaves the content
provider with nothing in the end.

This setup does nothing to address the privacy issues people have with
companies like Google tracking their comings and goings. Google is still at
the heart of this system and still knows everything about you. To get any
benefit from this system actually requires you to embrace Google. People want
to maintain their privacy, they don't want to login to Google to get rid of
ads.

It's easy to envision a system utilizing a crypto currency and a digital
wallet held by your browser that you fill occasionally and that prompts you to
pay a site similar to the manner in which Location Services work simply based
on a meta tag a site provider puts in their page head containing their wallet
and request pay amount and schedule. It's impossible to imagine Google, Apple,
Facebook, or anyone who wants in your pants to allow themselves to be cut out
of a revenue stream by such a system. Companies like this are double dipping
by charging everyone else to be the broker and also by being the service
provider being paid.

I honestly don't know if an ad free web is allowable. It's technically
possible but everyone who isn't the content creator is going to do everything
they can to stop it form happening.

~~~
Eridrus
> Any payments to avoid ads served by these companies would require
> compensating all of these companies

I think you misunderstood how this iteration of Contributor would work; the
publisher integrates Google's contributor code in such a way that if you pay
them, they don't show you any ads, no need to worry about the ad ecosystem.

> People want to maintain their privacy

I will start believing this when people start acting like it rather than just
saying it. I would be surprised if the group of people who care enough about
their privacy to do anything about it is above 1% of internet users in the US.

> It's easy to envision a system utilizing a crypto currency and a digital
> wallet held by your browser

Brave is really killing it with their user numbers, right?

~~~
cptskippy
> I think you misunderstood how this iteration of Contributor would work

No, I understand perfectly well how it works. If you pay Google, then Google
doesn't show you ads and it gives the Content Creator a cut.

Google is part of the Ad ecosystem. Contributor not only excludes other Ad
providers from participating, it also requires the Content Creator to sign up
to Google's Ad ecosystem. And Google is still gathering metadata about you.

So who benefits? Google has compelled Content Creators to join it's Ad
Network, Google has compelled you to disable your Ad Blocker under the guise
of compensating Content Creators, Google gets paid whether it serves an ad or
not, and Google gets to track you in ways it couldn't with your Ad Blocker up.

You know god damn well this system won't work with uBlock or any other 3rd
Party Ad Blocker. I'm sure it will work just fine with whatever Google Ships
in Chrome though.

~~~
Eridrus
> Content Creator to sign up to Google's Ad ecosystem

I don't think there has been any indication of this one way or another, and
I'd be sort of surprised if this is the tack they're taking.

We'll see how it turns out, but it doesn't sound (to me) like they are
compelling companies to show Google ads, merely providing the paywall
technology.

> You know god damn well this system won't work with uBlock or any other 3rd
> Party Ad Blocker.

I think the entire point is to get people using uBlock etc to either turn it
off or to pay, so I have no idea where you're getting this idea from.

~~~
cptskippy
> I think the entire point is to get people using uBlock etc to either turn it
> off or to pay,

It is not an either or situation. Google wants to track you and get paid for
doing so. They don't care if the money comes from you or advertisers. They do
however care if they can't track you.

A contribution system could be setup completely independent of the ad serving
system. That however has not been the case. With all iterations of Contributor
before this, if you had Ad Blocker enabled then Contributor did not work at
all.

~~~
Eridrus
> With all iterations of Contributor before this, if you had Ad Blocker
> enabled then Contributor did not work at all.

"This time is different", or at least I think this time it will be different,
since the whole point is to reach users who have ad blockers enabled, I guess
we'll see how it goes.

------
BoiledCabbage
Whether it comes from Google, or someone else I believe this is the only way
the web survives.

Content creators need to be able to charge different amounts for different
quality content.

In depth, well researched reporting needs to be able to earn more than a
buzzfeed article. That's not possible with a flat "per-eyeball" cost, where
the revenue to the content creator is uncorrelated with the cost to create or
the value/quality of the content.

I wish it weren't google (who also already owns advertising), but someone
large is the only one who can make it happen.

A model like this is necessary to support quality content online.

~~~
Sir_Substance
>A model like this is necessary to support quality content online.

It's totally not. People essentially enjoy creating and sharing, and love
putting up quality content about things they truly give a shit about.

The internet was built on people writing massive forums posts about completely
stripping down Kawasaki motorbike engines, and hosting their own websites
where they ramble about conditional probability. Wikipedia was written by
unpaid but enthusiastic curators, and no one got paid for uploading popular
Youtube videos until long after it was already a staple of the internet.

I totally and utterly refute your statement. The world came to the internet
for the content that people made for free, because it was the best. It's still
the best. After all, you're here reading the comments on hacker news, which we
are all freely contributing too with no expectation of compensation.

Quality online content will not vanish if online advertising fails, because
quality online content is posted by people who first and foremost /want to
post content/. It'll move to different kinds of websites depending on how
people want to access content at the time, but it will still be here, just as
it always has been. What will vanish is all the mediocre spacefilling
bullshit. The stuff so dull you _must_ pay someone to write it because no one
would do it for fun or kudos.

~~~
jevgeni
So who pays for the servers?

~~~
Kostic
Enthusiastic individuals. I personally have content which I host on Digital
Ocean droplets and which do not generate any kind of revenue for me.

~~~
jbreckmckye
And who pays for the investigative reports?

Who pays for the academics who spend their lifetimes researching the field
we're reading about?

Who pays salaries so the best people can make a living doing what they're
truly great at?

Who makes enough money to get big and old enough to gain a reputation? Without
which, the news is a hail of unsubstantiated bulletins from semianonymous
writers, a wilderness of mirrors and fake news amped up to eleven?

Believing that we can make content totally free is utopian. You might as well
ask why to bother paying software engineers large salaries when open source
software exists.

In a world where content is free, all that happens is that newspapers become
the organs of plutocrats and political groups. If you want to imagine how the
internet looks when content is totally free, imagine a Facebook news feed
written by the Koch brothers.

~~~
jevgeni
Oh, come on man, the academics should would for kudos. /s

~~~
Sir_Substance
Academics are paid with tax dollars.

~~~
jbreckmckye
Assuming this is serious: actually, no. Academics are ultimately paid by a mix
of university tuition fees (paid by students) and research grants (which may
come from tax-funded entities, but more generally come from charities and
philanthropic orgs).

~~~
Sir_Substance
We don't live in the same country FYI.

------
r3bl
Maybe if Google went with "Pay us $10 per month for us not to show you any
AdSense anywhere on the web", this would be successful. In this form, I highly
doubt it.

~~~
cJ0th
Sounds a bit like good 'ol protection money, though ("You don't want some
malware on your pc, do you?"[0]). A business classic but not exactly what
you'd want from a tech company.

[0] [http://www.businessinsider.de/android-malware-spreads-
using-...](http://www.businessinsider.de/android-malware-spreads-using-google-
adsense-advertising-network-kaspersky-researchers-2016-8?r=US&IR=T)

~~~
underyx
Huh? Do participating sites need to pay to be included? How is this protection
money?

~~~
TeMPOraL
This is protection money from the user's POV. Protection against malware
delivered to user through ads. Particular site that displays the ads is
utterly irrelevant here.

------
kemonocode
Then naturally, as soon as I try to sign up for it, I get told "Contributor is
not yet available in your country" as it seems to be US-only at the moment.

That's okay, uBlock Origin with its whitelist I compiled with sites I know
won't violate my browser with ads is still available in my country.

~~~
freehunter
>with sites I know won't violate my browser with ads

But that's one of the problems. You know they haven't violated your browser
_yet_ but that's no indication that they _won 't_ in the future. A lot of
people trust/trusted Imgur and whitelisted their ads, and they were rewarded
with an ad network that was redirecting them to malware sites. It's cleaned up
now, but what's to say it won't happen again? Ars Technica suffered a similar
situation a while back. Reddit has had it happen too. All seemingly
trustworthy sites.

It's not safe to turn off your ad blocker, there are no third-party ad
networks you can trust. The only acceptable ads IMO are native sponsored
content, which sites don't like because it's extra work. But guess what: you
can't (easily) block native sponsored content.

------
Leynos
This doesn't seem that useful to me as only a small number of sites (none of
which I visit) support it.

Hypothetical question: If I were allowed to bid on my own ad impressions - and
if I won an auction, no ad would be shown - how much would it cost a month for
me to see no adverts? (I realize this is heavily dependent upon the type of
sites that are involved, so I guess take the average HN user as an example).

~~~
lrem
According to my first search result [1], average CPC is 2.04$ with 1.16% CTR.
Say you see 200 pages a day, 2 ads each. You end up at 9.5$/day.

[https://www.hochmanconsultants.com/cost-of-ppc-
advertising/](https://www.hochmanconsultants.com/cost-of-ppc-advertising/)

~~~
beojan
Shouldn't you multiply by your specific click through rate? For many people,
this is 0.

~~~
coldpie
Indeed. I'm almost 30 and I don't think I've ever clicked on an ad in my life.
Cost per impression seems more relevant.

~~~
pythonaut_16
I only click ads when the content jumps at the last second and suddenly it's
an ad under my cursor, and other such fun mistakes.

------
comm1
One has to mention the Brave browser for comparison:
[https://brave.com/](https://brave.com/) \-- similar concept but using
Bitcoin. The accounting at
[https://brave.com/publishers.html](https://brave.com/publishers.html) looks
like you as the reader can DECIDE whether you want to issue micropayments to a
particular site or not, and publishers don't have to explicitly opt-in
beforehand (thereby instantly including all of the web). A publisher won't be
able to charge different prices, but a publisher with goodwill (hence users
opting on their own to pay that publisher) will make money. This seems like a
better execution.

~~~
ElijahLynn
+100 for Brave. Also worth noting you can still block ads without paying with
Brave. But if you want to contribute, then you can.

------
chr4004
Don't know, feels a bit like ransom when coming from Google, not the
publisher.

~~~
H4CK3RM4N
I think that the ideal here is that something like this manages to supplant
AdSense as Google's main actual business.

~~~
Bartweiss
But the issue is that for AdSense, Google solicits ad buyers, removes scams,
and distributes traffic. If you're paying to _not_ see ads, it's unclear what
good Google is doing compared to just paying the publisher.

It's not zero-value, since the transaction costs of paying every publisher are
crippling. But there's no definitive reason to look to Google for this value.

------
spiderfarmer
Cancelled already:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Contributor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Contributor)

Google Contributor was a program run by Google that allowed users in the
Google Network of content sites to view the websites without any
advertisements that are administered, sorted, and maintained by Google.

The program started with prominent websites, like The Onion and Mashable among
others, to test this service. After November 2015, the program opened up to
any publisher who displayed ads on their websites through Google AdSense
without requiring any sign-on from publishers.

Since November 2015, the program was available for everyone in the United
States. Google Contributor stopped accepting new registrations after December
2016 in preparation for a new version launch in early 2017.[1] On January
17th, Google Contributor was shut down. As of January 17, 2017 8:40 AM no
replacement had been announced.

~~~
d2kx
The first iteration was cancelled, this is the new iteration that launched
yesterday.

~~~
nilved
Why should we trust it this time?

~~~
mankyd
I'm not sure where the "trust" issue is. You pay $x/month, you see less ads.
If they shut it down, they stop charging you money and you start seeing the
ads you saw before.

~~~
nilved
Like, why should I even click the link?

~~~
mankyd
Because you don't want to see ads and are willing to pay for that? Possibly
for a long time; possibly until Google shuts it down. Either way, you can show
your support for the content creators who currently rely on ads.

------
catskull
Wait so it only works on those 4 websites? I've only heard of Popular
Mechanics, but I rarely (if ever) visit their site.

If this was more like Youtube Red, I'd be all over this. I would love to pay
to remove all google ads. I get that uBlock exists, but I want to support the
sites I use.

Unrelated: the sidenav thing is empty? WTF?

~~~
SamBam
I don't understand why it _doesn 't_ work for all Google Ads.

The content creator would just like the money. They don't actually want to
display the ads. If they could get the money without displaying the ads,
they'd be over the moon.

Why doesn't Google make it work across all sites, and pay the sites using
Google Ads the average revenue they were already getting per page view?

~~~
zigzigzag
They did that. It was the first iteration.

The problem is that - as described above - many websites use ads from multiple
networks, so actually even if you paid, most ads did not disappear. It was
more or less random. Also, it turns out ads make sites a lot of money (who
knew), so to get even that sketchy coverage required you to pay a LOT.

~~~
sornars
I feel like your second point was a missed educational opportunity for users.
Ad views are worth a lot more to advertisers (and consequently, publishers)
than what you are willing to pay - 'free content' isn't free and if you as a
user aren't willing to pay for it then it's probably not fair to complain
about the ads. The thing that upsets me is when I am willing to pay for
content (Washington Post, The Economist, FT, etc.) and I still get served ads.

Online advertising reminds me of airline travel in the sense that people
complain about the low quality service but are only willing to purchase the
cheapest flights. The industry has shifted to accomodate what people actually
want, not what they say they want.

------
andy_ppp
A little concerned, I'm bootstrapping my own version of what they have built,
but with a clearer charging model and no need to block Ads IMO. If you care
about blocking ads you are already doing it.

It'll be launching in literally a week or two... it's very simple to integrate
and comes with it's own Wordpress plugin (and instructions to integrate your
own CMS).

What advice do people have about this per article payment space; I have a load
of ideas I want to try so maybe while Google concentrate on ads I'll be able
to look at various optional payment models.

Initially I want to just charge a flat 5% + whatever Stripe fees you use to
top up your wallet, but I'm concerned I'll get a lot of noise/scaling issues
if I don't charge a monthly fee? Thoughts?

~~~
wehadfun
I had an idea for something similar to this as well. Have not put code behind
it though. Could you post link to your solution?

~~~
andy_ppp
It's not finished yet! Just Stripe Connect (50% done) and testing everything
and a couple of small features that probably shouldn't be in version 1. Send
me an email (see profile) or check paypip.com in the coming weeks...

------
time4tea
You can use pihole or pyhole to just block them for your home, then vpn from
your phone. No more ads.

Then buy subscription to sites you like.

Dont give google a percentage of everything.

~~~
kelnos
The problem is that most (all?) site subscriptions now are all-or-nothing, and
even if you do like a site, you probably like several, and paying $10-$30 per
month (or whatever) each for even 5 different sites starts adding up real
fast.

If sites were to offer an "article bank", it might be more compelling: you put
in $X and that buys you Y articles, which you can read over the span of days,
months, or years. But no one seems to be doing that, probably because they
believe the economics of breakage is better.

~~~
resf
Or just buy a games console.

Articles on the internet exist primarily as free entertainment.

If I am going to spend money on entertainment, there are much more fulfilling
options.

~~~
majewsky
That's dismissing all the genuinely insightful articles that I discover
through my subscription [1] to HN.

[1] Read: Addiction. :)

~~~
resf
Perhaps read a book. Just visit your local real or virtual library.

My point is not that articles on the internet are useless. But there is a
certain tunnel vision in these discussions where we forget there are other
_even better_ ways to spend our time.

Whether you want education or entertainment, paying $x/month to Google is not
the right way to achieve it. Go paintballing instead.

~~~
majewsky
Not disputing that. But reading HN is something that I can do during work
while waiting on a job to complete. Reading a book is much harder because the
information is not quite as bite-sized and thus harder to ingest if you have
only five minutes at a time. And paintballing is a whole other level of
impossible during work time. :)

------
JetSpiegel
Remember when we were sold that ads payed for content so that could be free?
Now you can pay extra to get ads anyway, the non Google networks don't care.
The web is turning into cable, and it only took a few years.

------
justinjlynn
Wow, how much does this have to do with their announcement to add ad blocking
to Chrome (only for other networks ads, I'm sure)? How have they not attracted
regulator action yet? You'd think the EU would be all over that kind of
behaviour.

~~~
reaktivo
Which announcement are you talking about?

~~~
sohkamyung
I believe it might this one about Chrome support for the Better Ads Standards
[1]

[1] [https://blog.google/topics/journalism-news/building-
better-w...](https://blog.google/topics/journalism-news/building-better-web-
everyone/)

------
waterflame
Everyone is forgetting that Google can provide such tool because of Chrome
(60% market share); they don't need to track you. They already are. Google
it's tightening it's grip on the web. Yesterday the announced that they will
apply the Better Ad Standard by 2018. They said they'll ban intrusive ads that
block the user from the content, ads that play sound automatically, and flashy
ads... Now "flashy" is so vague.

------
Fiahil
I already have an ad removal pass, it's called uBlock origin.

~~~
fredley
I use uBlock too - it's great. Sometimes a site will have an obnoxious popover
or something that's usually relatively easy to create a rule for, but
generally it works, and in combination with Ghostery I'm confident it's
protecting me from most tracking, which is what I really want to avoid.

However it is an ethical dilemma, especially in a World where Contributor
exists. Content is not free, hosting is not free, development and the
application of security patches is not free. Currently sites are monetised
using ads, and by using uBlock you're getting for free something that is not
free. You are also inevitably causing people who do not have uBlock to 'pay'
more, or contributing to putting the site out of business.

While Contributor obviously doesn't prevent Google from tracking your every
step, and I'll still take steps to avoid data harvesting, I'll be buying it
the moment it's available on any of the sites I read regularly.

~~~
sundvor
I want a UBlock where in place of ads a single micro tipping facility is
inserted. Maybe the website can remember this for the future, etc.

I've done a few PayPal tips but it's just too clunky / unfit for purpose.

~~~
fkooman
[https://www.brave.com/](https://www.brave.com/)

~~~
ElijahLynn
Brave is the first real solution to this issue. Big fan of Brave. Once they
get the extensions more compatible then the user base will grow rapidly.

~~~
sundvor
The Android version is great in that all ads are blocked. I will see if I can
get my single LTC transferred into it.

------
omarforgotpwd
Good idea, extremely poor execution. Nobody is going to want to use it if
different sites are charging you different amounts per page. People want
predictable bills.

~~~
BoiledCabbage
Completely disagree.

I want to be able to pay more for quality content and pay less for buzzfeed
articles. I want content creators to be able to charge based on the the
content they are producing.

I prefer a world where I can stop in a fine dining restaurant or a fast-food
place, get the experience I want and be charged appropriately. I don't want a
top of the line steak-house to have to find a way to serve my meal, while only
receiving McDonald's priced payments. That's the problem with the current web.

~~~
seanp2k2
Where are the steakhouses? That's my problem with the current state of the
paid content web; it seems to be a race to the bottom, with few exceptions
(and the exceptions in my experience seem to be mostly enthusiasts doing it
not for a living).

~~~
RunawayGalaxy
Is it not the point that this system will incentivize better content by
allowing creators to charge what the market is willing to pay for content?

------
chx
This is ancient?
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8637365](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8637365)

~~~
sohkamyung
This appears to be a new iteration. According to this Android Police post [1],
_Contributor was discontinued in late 2016, with Google saying that an
improved version would become available in "early 2017."_

[1] [http://www.androidpolice.com/2017/06/01/google-launches-
fund...](http://www.androidpolice.com/2017/06/01/google-launches-funding-
choices-way-users-pay-sites-hide-ads/)

------
cyphar
I really think a much better system would be for websites to adopt GNU Taler,
and allow people to conduct micropayments using digital cash. The system is
about as seamless as Flattr, except that the website can actually charge an
amount rather than a fraction.

But, most importantly, Flattr guarantees the anonymity of consumers'
transactions. So the big G won't have a log of what websites you paid to
access.

~~~
majewsky
But Flattr will.

The data is still being generated. It's a matter of whom you trust with this
data.

~~~
cyphar
Sorry, I meant Taler not Flattr in the last line. Taler uses blind signatures
to protect the spending habits of users from being discoverable by vendors or
mints.

------
nextlevelwizard
I like how Google doesn't remove ads from it's own sites

~~~
a2decrow
Their own ads of course fit the "standards" that they themselves designed. Any
other way and they'd only harm their own business model. This is a defensive
move against full-scale ad-blockers, nothing more.

------
ghostbunnies
Hmmm - the service sounds a little bit like Flattr, the logo looks quite a bit
like Flattr - now what?

~~~
rawfan
Yeah, this is totally Flattr. Except for the even-split concept.

------
ff_
How is this different from paying for an adblocker? There is lots of good free
ones.

I pay publishers I like for their content (buying newspapers, subscriptions,
etc) and I don't get why Google should be the middleman in this.

~~~
ocdtrekkie
It's not that Google "should" be the middleman in this, it's that Google
"wants" to be be the middleman in this, since you paying for a subscription
directly cuts them out of that sweet ad revenue.

------
technological
In simple terms , is this a moral way rather than using ad blocker ? Rather
than using ad blocker I get this pass , where I won't be seeing ads and at
same time feel I am letting publisher earn some money ?

~~~
a_imho
Only if you accept ad providers are in charge of dictating morals and they are
entitled to your money by default. Publishers can and should look for
alternative monetization strategies.

------
yellowsir
the question is do i want to get tracked by google contributor or google ads?

~~~
netzone
I can just imagine; try contributor once, get drowned in invasive ads because
you've already shown you're willing to pay for less ads.

~~~
nsebban
Hey, do you remember that time when people thought Google would never do any
sketchy or annoying stuff to their users ? That's now so far away...

~~~
isoprophlex
"Don't be evil"

Yeah right...

------
xchaotic
With 12 websites out of which I visited 1, once, I suspect another Google
abandoned project in 18 months.

------
ktta
I feel like I'm going to remember visiting this website for years to come.
Either because this is will be future, or this is one of the biggest bets
Google has made and failed.

------
HXFIVE
I like the technology and pricing model, but I don't think that it is being
put to its best use. I think a better use would be for news sites that require
a login to view articles. At present I usually just go without viewing many as
I can't afford to sign up to 10 different sites where I might view a couple of
articles each week. If I could make a one off payment per article then I'd be
all over it.

------
intoverflow2
>a small portion is kept by Google to cover the cost of running the service

This is incredibly cheeky.

~~~
majewsky
Well, there certainly is a cost involved in running (and developing) the
service. It would be more credible, though, if they disclosed the size of that
"small portion".

------
nrjames
Somebody should do this for mobile game advertising. A player buys a $5 card
with allows them to skip ads in all participating mobile games until such time
as the $ is depleted. If that card worked across lots of games, it would be a
great convenience. Considering ARPDAU from ads for mobile games isn't often
more than $0.01, it would be a win-win for gamers who hate ads and want to
play free mobile games.

------
geraltofrivia
So, this is kinda like Blendle, but for the open web. I'm not too sure if
this'll fly. Personally, there's a certain flinch, a certain decision before
opening any article in Blendle as I evaluate if it's worth the price
mentioned. I'm sure the same will manifest itself, perhaps in uglier forms if
I set out to use Contributor. Do you guys think so?

------
bikamonki
Isn't this how the mob works? Pay us to protect you from us.

~~~
factsaresacred
You mean extortion.

No. Google don't demand that you view ads, the content creators of the pages
you visit do.

This is an advertising company imaging a future of ad-blocking browsers and
dabbling in a new revenue stream: providing a platform for patron/creator and
taking a slice of the dough.

------
azazel75
That's like a Google tax, with the plus that you consciously agree to let it
track you more than ever... wtf!

------
gabrielgoh
im not sure this is a good idea (as a consumer) anything which injects extra
buying decisions in my life seems like a bad idea. Imagine having to wonder if
I really wanted to spend that 0.01 cents on the next page of popular mechanics
or not. I'd rather pay more for say, unlimited monthly access

~~~
kelnos
That's the thing that really annoys me about human psychology (to which I
myself am of course not immune). I don't subscribe to any sites that offer
subscriptions because I rarely visit any one particular site to make it worth
it (I rarely, if ever, run into, for example, the NYT free article limit). I
block all ads, but I certainly wouldn't mind paying a reasonable per-article
price all the same.

By not offering per-article pricing, they're actually _losing_ money from me,
but I wouldn't be surprised at all if going to per-article pricing would
result in less revenue than monthly subscriptions overall.

------
JustSomeNobody
Google: Nice internet ya got there. It'd be terrible if something were to
happen to it like, say, ads everywhere. But if you just give me a few dollars
I'll protect ya from 'em.

Edit:

>How it works You load your pass with $5. Each time you visit a page without
ads, a per-page fee is deducted from your pass to pay the creators of the
website, after a small portion is kept by Google to cover the cost of running
the service. The price per page is set by the creator of the site. You will be
informed in advance if a site creator changes their price per page.
Contributor is easy to update: change settings and add sites or remove them
from your pass at any time.

I love the sound of this, I just do not like the idea that it is Google doing
it. It feels ... dirty somehow. A third party doing this I have no problem
with.

------
ISL
How is this better than the old Contributor?

I've always wanted a way to simply specify the minimum bid (by bidding myself)
for my attention into the ad exchange. This peer-reviewed pricing seems like
it adds lots of cognitive overhead for me?

------
mtgx
It's U.S.-only? Are you kidding me? So this will actually _restrict_ who can
visit a website, as opposed to the ad-version?

Whoever came up with that bright idea?

~~~
ocdtrekkie
It just means people outside the U.S. will always see the ads, and won't be
able to choose to pay with Contributor instead.

I'm not saying this isn't a hilarious embarrassment for a global company like
Google to keep launching products U.S. only, but it's not as bad as you're
making it sound: It will simply not have a noticeable impact on international
users.

------
awinter-py
Almost. I would pay money to NOT be tracked everywhere by a big company. It's
easy to misunderstand.

Thanks, as always, for understanding privacy big G.

------
ptr_void
Google at it again to kill the web, now making commodization of web contents
mainstream.

You WON'T BELIEVE YOUR EYE what GOOGLE will do NEXT! - $0.5

------
peteretep
I love the idea, but go to some lengths to try and stop Google sucking in my
web history, and I don't think this will help.

------
spullara
My idea in this space is to launch the no-ad-network. Basically you would pay
them to bid on your behalf across all exchanges for your cookie. It would
either display nothing, nice photos or maybe even some customized data about
the site you are on. Everyone wins.

------
kraig911
It simply isn't worth it as Google doesn't actually enable content creators
unless you create content on their sites. We need a better way to say give
content creators something akin to Patreon but easier.

------
nottorp
Is it me, or the pricing per page view isn't displayed anywhere in the
overview?

Of course, if i click on the links to the actual enrolled sites i get 'this
service is not available in your country' so it may be there.

------
skinnyTotonyo
This is terrible. This is where Google is trying to control the web even more
than they do already. If this sticks around, if this actually happens, then
this will destroy what so many have worked to achieve.

Let's actually sit down and think about this. If this happened, there would be
some big changes to the web. (Note- this is a quick response. I should write a
real paper about this)

First of all, now that people would be paying for no ads, websites will
overload their sites with ads, because Google will have the solution that
"everyone is choosing anyway". It would make it "OK" to have tons of ads on
your site, because there's a solution.

Then, your web experience becomes terrible. For a "small fee", you can keep a
"nice" experience- one that used to, and always should, be free. However, if
you don't give Google your money, then your web experience is going to be so
filled with ads that content will take forever to load. And even if it does
load, it'll take 30 minutes to read an article, because every 30 seconds
you'll have your regular add popups. Then, you'll have the sidebar ads that
follow you. Or the mobile ones that get in your way as you scroll. You won't
be able to view content, because ads will have taken over even more than they
already have.

Now, in this terrible future, what about those that can't afford Google's
"small fee"? They'll be condemned to the ad version of the entire web- one
that doesn't load properly, that people have started to discard. The true
"web" will be the one where you pay to view. These people won't have access.
And, if they aren't able to pay the small fee, then most likely they're
accessing the internet from a slow connection. Maybe it's a library that can't
afford the fee either. Or maybe it's in the home, and they can only afford
small internet speeds and second hand computers. Not everyone has the money to
buy a brand spanking new macbook /pro/air from Apple.

So now, 5 years down the road, there's two versions of the web. The one that
Google controls and tracks 100% (oh yeah, we didn't even get to that yet), and
the one that is so ruined with ads, that the people make a decision. A big
one. Let's just get rid of the ad version of the web. You can't use it anyway,
so there's no use. The only way to go- is to give your monthly payment to
Google, so that you can access the web. Now, you gotta pay to view the web at
all. The free web is gone. Google took it away.

There's also Google, sitting on their even exponential growth pile of money,
tracking every web user. Sure, there may be other competing services that let
you "into" the web, but they're also gunna track you. No doubt about that.

There's so much more that I haven't even said. How will websites determine how
much a "view" is? What about requests that are half loaded? How will you know
how much it costs to view a webpage? Not all web content is created equal.
Definitely not.

There's so many more things. So many more.

We can't let this happen.

~~~
jbreckmckye
This is also a quick response, on my part.

Basically: you seem to believe people have a right to view the web cheaply. I
would argue otherwise. For most of history, humans have had no opportunity to
obtain content for free - in fact, for the most part, books and literature
have been expensive novelties for all but the most hyper-privileged.

The idea people should pay for content does not seem to me a violation of some
inalienable right.

~~~
skinnyTotonyo
You're right, and you bring up a good point. Almost nothing is free, and there
is always a cost. So it makes sense that ads started coming into the web in
the beginning, so that people might click them and people who hosted the
content might get money that way. However, nowadays, that's not enough.
There's usually more than just one ad.

Obviously my comment was the "cynical" view, and looked at a future that may
not even come to fruition. There are some benefits too. However, I think that
I would prefer that the web be supported in different ways. I haven't thought
long and hard about the "best way", but it makes me think of websites that
limit how many times you can view their content. Take the New York Times for
example. If I remember correctly, they let you view ~10 articles or something,
and then from there, you have to pay to see more. That could be a potential
way to keep content supported? Let the websites choose themselves how they
want to monetize content. Maybe that's better than Google holding accounts for
anyone who wants to access the ad free web? I'm not sure what the best
solution is.

In the fantasy future I mentioned in the first comment, I could see there
being a pay-to-entry model for the web, if the ad free and ad versions of the
web started separating and they just "killed" off ads. Then, to access the web
in the first place, payment would be required, and would have to be refilled.

This is one reason I love HN - discussions get me thinking. I appreciate your
comment, and you're right. All content just can't be free. I guess I just
don't like the possibility of the web turning into a pay-to-view model. I'd
rather let the sites choose individually, that way, no one has control over it
all. But yeah.

------
sbergot
"sorry, contributor is not available in your country" (france)

------
ctz
So, does this work with YouTube and all the other google properties?

~~~
arjie
YouTube already offers a different ad-free plan. I have YouTube Red through
Google Play and you don't get ads.

------
sdrothrock
I wonder what kind of reaction site owners will have to this; I can think of a
lot of smaller sites or forums that rely on Google ads + premium access with
no ads for revenue.

------
youdontknowtho
Wow. I'm really (sounds strange saying this to myself) excited about this
Google project.

I really hope this works out. As much as I dislike advertising...and
Google...something has to happen. The "ad blocker" \- "ad blocker blocker"
arms race is patently stupid. There has to be a way to get money to content
providers so they can opt out of the madness. Google will still be able to
provide them with all the sweet sweet surveillance data that they thrive on.

One problem at a time, I guess.

------
GabrielBerlin
We also thought about this at Steady (www.steadyHQ.com). We built a system for
recurring payments to independent creators and some of our publishers allow
users to pay for not bugging them with their adblocker detectors. This
generates additional turnover from users that normally do not get served any
ads b/c they use adblockers, but I believe such an offering should encompass
all ads, not just Google AdSense (why would you pay just to _reduce_ the
amount of ads), and it should include removing paywalls (e.g. at a higher
price point, to monetize "superfans").

------
obeleh
I've got a new productname for this: Google Paywall

------
a_imho
I'm sure there will be people taking this seriously because it is Google, but
they are getting a bit desperate.

------
ryandrake
What's the advantage for the end user of this, over an ad blocker which is a
_free_ ad removal pass?

~~~
dragonwriter
> What's the advantage for the end user of this, over an ad blocker which is a
> free ad removal pass?

You are paying to support sites you visit with money, instead of advertisers
doing that, so you are still providing incentive to create the kind of content
you consume.

------
nsnick
The reason this will fail is that it competes with free. Why pay google when
you can install an ad blocker?

------
stephen123
Is this spotify premium for web pages ?

------
caogecym
It's too expensive for consumers.

------
45h34jh53k4j
Thanks Google, but im going to stick with ublock/umatrix and get ad removal
_for free_

------
themihai
I guess you also need a google account...how does it work with "do not track"?

------
davb
I'm not sure how much value I derive from ad-funded websites, besides maybe
Google Search. There was a time most websites were free and run for the good
of the community, not for profit and not as a full-time job. I could buy my
high-quality content in the form of magazines and newspapers. Maybe that's the
paradigm worth investigating - community generated, ad-free content on the web
but paid-for, bundled (magazine-style) high quality content for sale.
Delivered not through the browser but through some other, open platform (think
zines, PDFs, epub/mobi).

For me, this is what an ideal web would look like. My ad-blocker would barely
get a workout, and I'd happily pay for bundled (not pay-walled, bundled,
downloadable) content as I did for many years with magazines.

No-one wants high quality content to disappear, but advertising and web
paywalls are not the only options.

------
whyagaindavid
Interesting choice of background image with a macbook air!

------
sandov
Why not just donate to the sites whose content you value?

------
bunnymancer
So it's Flattr but run by the same company that also serves ads..

Eh.

------
yolo66
People will likely hesitate as it comes from Google.

------
tannerwj
This comes just after the BAT ICO? Interesting

~~~
foepys
Do you really think that Google cares about somebody's niche blockchain tech?
Google Contributor is older than the whole ICO fad and has just been
overhauled.

~~~
andirk
"You obviously don't know enough about Bitcoin to argue the way you did." \--
foepys

I think BAT makes more sense than Google's response to waning ad bucks. None
of it has got off the ground so age doesn't mean too much to me.

------
designium
It doesn't work for Canada.

------
diimdeep
laughable uBlock alternative.

------
redxblood
Nope. Trash. uBlock origin.

------
jerianasmith
Good content will always find it's audience. Readers are far more likely to
come back, if the content is engaging enough.

------
draw_down
Problem is you have to be logged in to use this, same problem as with Youtube
red. As soon as you open something in an incognito window.... who are you??

