UPDATE 2: Here is the signup link,
UPDATE: Ads are temporarily running for testing as of 2/19/24. They’ll soon be disabled until we have our membership service running. – Anthony
A few weeks ago I mentioned that some big changes would be coming to WUWT in this post titled Thanks, and the Future for WUWT. Thanks to everyone for their support!
One of the upcoming changes that I didn’t mention in that post is that we are forced to move to a subscription model, and this model requires that we start running advertisements. Now this isn’t anything new, we had been running ads since about 2009 when we were first invited to do so by WordPress, and that worked well up until a few years ago. Then, Google decided that they’d tell our ad provider that “we’re not worthy” and pulled their support due to our content. WUWT and many other climate skeptic platforms all suffered the same banishment. Of course that meant the website generated no revenue….which was the purpose of the climate activists that lobbied for the ban.
There really wasn’t anything we could do, as Google essentially has a monopoly, until recently. A new ad provider has emerged that is not dependent on Google Adwords. So, starting Monday, we’ll be using them.
This is the beginning of a larger plan in which we will offer subscription tiers to premium content. WUWT will always remain free for the majority of content – but it will have advertisements – just like 90% of every other Internet sites out there. Some premium features will require subscription, much like what Dr. Roger Pielke Jr. has done on his substack website.
I hate begging like I had to do back in December, so this will put us back into revenue generation.
Here is what is coming:
I am setting up an Internet TV studio. I’ve been working slowly on it for about a year. The challenge for me is to make it work with my hearing issues while making it look professional like I did during my many years of live television weather. The studio will be for weekly live broadcasts and for making instructional videos. With the new studio, there will be a regular weekly live interactive broadcast at WUWT to discuss the issues. That will be a subscriber based event.
A subscriber based weekly newsletter is also in the works.
Along those lines, I am working on a 24/7/365 live “ClimateTV” channel that will run videos, graphics, data, news items, and entertainment. I have done some test runs and it is looking good. There’s still much more work to do before I launch. This will be free and public, though we may run advertising on it.
We will be updating the “Reference Pages” – they’ve been broken, mainly by WordPress cache issues which makes any fix disappear quickly, but our resident writer and programmer Eric Worrall has come up with a plugin that will solve this long-standing problem that prevents us from displaying live information. Our goal is to become the “one-stop-shop” for all climate information, especially the things you can’t find elsewhere.
Eric Worrall is working on a WUWT App, both for Android and Apple phones. This will be made available to everyone for free. The challenge was to make one that neither Google or Apple can “shut down.” We’ve got that figured out. I’ve tested it and it is a great start, we just need a bit more tweaking before release in early 2024.
We will be adding new topics to the Everything Climate section – feel free to make suggestions.
We will do a website overhaul, to go to a more modern theme that is better for speed and SEO. Our current theme is over six years old and it is creaking under the load. It has no update path.
I want to do a monthly “state of the climate” report, much like NOAA does, but from a perspective of sensibility. If funds permit, I’ll send out press releases each month to all media outlets. PRNewswire is not cheap.
Thanks – Anthony
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I will subscribe, I will not turn security off in order to read here. Oh, and I not only don’t buy crap from popup ads.
Some web sites go overboard with adds so I stop looking at those sites. One of the worst is ScienceDailey News: https://www.sciencedaily.com/.
The Boston Globe is also over the top- even though I pay for it. (but only temporarily at a discount rate)
What I don’t like is sites where the adds keep changing while you’re trying to read something.
Suggest replacing the B.G. with The Epoch Times. They offer LOTS of TV and Podcasts with the subscription. A Wealth of good, investigative Journalism!
I’m getting the BG on a discount- and because it might have something of interest to me living in the same People’s Republic. Also, mainly, because the state is trying hard to kill all forestry and that was my career for 50 years and I therefore detest the state government. When they discuss their policies or proposed policies, it’s often in the Globe. The paper of course is far left- inevitable in Wokeachusetts. Also, I want to see what climate BS is in the paper- the same sort of BS often reported here- so I can have the pleasure of passing it along to everyone here who likes to follow the latest climate idiocy for the joy of deconstructing it.
The thing I find hard to understand is that the advertisers pay whenever an ad is displayed and not when one of us clicks on something we are interested in yet they don’t grasp that the advertisers are charging for no public ultimate interest
I wish Everything Climate was called Climate Answers, because that’s how I think of it.
Sounds great Anthony. Your work for the ages.
I’ll be in for a subscription. And, if things go well, eventually for a bit of content.
Do what you gotta do, AW.
Anthony ==> Just put up a link to pay and I’m in.
Google has too much power.
I wonder a republican president could break up the company. My own blog, started in 2008, uses blogspot,com. It’s free but is owned by Google, which I didn’t realize at the time.
One day in 2022, Google shut down my climate blog (one of three blogs at that time) for unknown reasons.
Maybe someone complained I recommended conservative articles on climate and energy. I appealed and it was freed in 24 hours.
Google has too much power. There is no way I can move my content away from Google/blogspot, or I would have.
I don’t fear Google and do not self censor. I often call our president Joe Bribe’em or Adolf Biden. That could be offensive to someone at google.
Why would an “arm of the gov’t.” do anything like “break up” that arm?
Story Tip
The unravelling continues
https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/jpmorgan-chase-drops-out-of-massive-un-climate-alliance-in-stunning-move
Good move Anthony. Hope to stay with you . .
There’s lots of Substack pieces I’d like to read on various Substacks, but I can’t afford to subscribe to them all. I’d like to see some sort of model where you can buy single posts for a nominal amount. It would help writers get ground breaking articles out.
Elon, Substack, WordPress, are you listening?
I don’t know if I will be able to comment?
Do what you have to do. I don’t mind adverts as long as they are not excessive or irritating.
I hope your advertisers will be legitimate and won’t include the click-bait teases with half-naked women, snake oil, etc.
As long as it doesn’t require paypal its golden to me.
Te majority of us will be quite willing to subscribe in order to counter the government and environmentalist propaganda whose main aim is to raise tax revenue and cause a rise in living costs as well.
If you need ads to help pay the freight, great. This is a terrific site. I look forward to supporting your advertisers.
Story Tip.
Major UK EV rental/lease company goes into liquidation
How a crashing second-hand market slammed the brakes on EVs | NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT (wordpress.com)
I will defend Capitalism with my life
“Then, Google decided that they’d tell our ad provider that “we’re not worthy” and pulled their support due to our content. WUWT and many other climate skeptic platforms all suffered the same banishment.”
Seems like that should be a violation of some anti-trust law and the basis of a civil lawsuit.
Anthony, check out Rumble Studio, for your home for the TV shows,. It is free, safe and your can broadcast to all platforms. I like X, you get to keep 97% of the fees…Elon Musk, brought back my freedom of speech.
Check out Mike Benz on Tucker’s interview: https://x.com/tuckercarlson/status/1758529993280205039?s=61&t=z0JVYXH5Ge-0NtO7iiYVJA
You wonder why, about censorship?
Ok, Anthony. What do I have to pay you to get rid of the stupid click-bait ads? When you said “The Ads Cometh,” I hoped that you meant legitimate advertisers who choose to support WUWT.
If I wanted click-bait, I could go anyplace else.
I’ve been a loyal reader and occasional commenter for over a decade. Sell me some options, or I’m done.
“UPDATE: Ads are temporarily running for testing as of 2/19/24. They’ll soon be disabled until we have our membership service running. – Anthony”
Thanks for the update. I was wondering why I wasn’t asked to subscribe today (THE Monday) when I logged in to comment.
PS Even though I’ve allowed Ads (AdBlock) on this site on the 14th, I still haven’t seen any.
I’m not disappointed that the girl in her underwear selling work boots didn’t show up but, perhaps your tech volunteers can give a clue if I need to clear WUWT on another application?
(AdBlock still shows Ads are allowed. I also run “Norton 360 Select” and “Close & Clean”.
I also have “Malwarebytes” Google Store App running.)
I don’t want WUWT to loose a dime due to blocked Ads whenever I go here.
I just saw the new addition to the top bar “https://wattsupwiththat.com/wuwt-log-in-log-out/”.
I’m guessing that I was already logged in when the subscription thing became active.
I’d check it out now but, I’m getting old and I’m late for my nap.
PS No, my last name isn’t Brandon and there are no nuclear footballs I might roll onto in my house!
(Though we do have a masked bandit (a racoon) in the attic, it’ll be gone soon.)
Keep up the very good work Anthony I second
I dig it man, I get it , and I’m in. And Google and Apple, don’t even get me started – Bastards
I echo the opinion that others have shared above , that my climate understanding ( as well as my moss covered physics understanding) would be still in the remedial stage if not for WUWT)
This site brought back that feeling I had in my freshman year in college thinking “ man I’m glad I am here after all; getting this knowledge, learning to think, being exposed to these ideas in history literature as well as the hard sciences , and most importantly identifying fallacious reasoning. And thinking one can’t know what one don’t know .
Then sadly I remember watching as the radical lib progressives displaced bit by bit the guardianship of the classical liberal foundation – and ruined it all. Replacing liberation and enlightenment with tyranny and darkness once again.
Well in the end all we can do is endeavor to persevere.
Thanks Mr Watts and to all your partners and staff.
I hope I’ll still be able to point people to a specific article.
Beware popups, one that sounded like a trashy news source just partly blocked the login page.
BTW, perhaps Eric could point Charles to the reality that WorsePress does have options that can be set and does botch code.
And do avoid autocomplete which confuses people.