Comment by spiderfarmer | Hacker News Reader

Comment by spiderfarmer | Hacker News Reader

Cancelled already:

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.

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

This was already going to be a tough sell with major publishers.

If Google isn't willing to promise they'll keep it around for a couple years, it simply won't be worthwhile for publishers to invest the engineering (and legal resources) to do these deals and the integrations. I don't expect this latest incarnation to gain traction in its current form.

I do have hope for this subscription model still. If Google or someone else makes a serious go of it, I'll be cheering them on.

Why should we trust it this time?

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.

Like, why should I even click the link?

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.

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