>>> VOTE!!!! Ideas To Help Blur Busters!

Everything about displays and monitors. 120Hz, 144Hz, 240Hz, 4K, 1440p, input lag, display shopping, monitor purchase decisions, compare, versus, debate, and more. Questions? Just ask!

How Would You Like To Help Blur Busters Pay For Itself?

I Use An Ad Blocker
93
18%
Add More Advertisements to Main Website (http://www.blurbusters.com)
68
13%
Add Banner Advertisements Here (to these discussion forums)
65
13%
Patreon-style Monthly Donation/Subscription (pay to get ads removed)
96
19%
Early Access Content
57
11%
More Affiliate Links (Amazon, NewEgg, eBay, etc)
113
22%
Other (please followup with idea)
16
3%
 
Total votes: 508

User avatar
Chief Blur Buster
Site Admin
Posts: 11647
Joined: 05 Dec 2013, 15:44
Location: Toronto / Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
Contact:

>>> VOTE!!!! Ideas To Help Blur Busters!

Post by Chief Blur Buster » 23 Mar 2019, 15:49

Blur Busters has recently deployed new advertisements at http://www.blurbusters.com
I'm trying to keep them non-intrusive and gentle.

As Blur Busters grows, it gets more expensive to operate...
Media Content, Research, Invent New Motion Tests, Invent New Products, Help Other Web Reviewers, Trips To Cover Conventions, Help Display Industry, Advocacy For High-Hz, Push The Refresh Rate Race, Etc, Etc.

Ideas
Now BlurBusters.com becoming a more mainstream website, is considering several options like
- Adding advertisements to these Forums
- Adding a Patreon style system to remove advertisements -- similiar to sites like AVSFORUM and ArsTechnica
- Etc.

About Patreon Style Systems: Many media websites such as Linus TechTips as well as ArsTechnica and others have their own respective "subscription" style systems or "Patreon" style systems that optionally lets you remove advertisements as well as get early VIP access to content. I'm NOT going to paywall the main media website (content will be freely viewable, though early-access options may be considered), just trying to find ideas to balance things out in a way fans are happy with.

About Amazon Affiliate links: For the last few years, Blur Busters have often posted Amazon links, as Blur Busters uses the Amazon Affiliate system. This helps pays for the costs of operating Blur Busters. Many users willingly appreciate this because they understand Blur Busters needs to pay for the costs of operations, but I totally understand some users hate them.

About Ad Blockers: No worries! I don't mind if some of you use an ad blocker or such, and clicking on links is purely optional, but I want to give users the option to support Blur Busters the way they would prefer.

VOTE on this poll: Appreciate your vote. You can select multiple boxes at the same time -- though please vote only one per checkbox per person...

Thank you!
UPDATE:
Want to support Blur Busters TODAY without waiting?

Purchase your Amazon goods via this affiliated link: www.amazon.com/?tag=blurbust-20
Add anything to shopping cart, checkout, and Amazon will send a small commission to Blur Busters (usually 2-3%)
Head of Blur Busters - BlurBusters.com | TestUFO.com | Follow @BlurBusters on Twitter

Image
Forum Rules wrote:  1. Rule #1: Be Nice. This is published forum rule #1. Even To Newbies & People You Disagree With!
  2. Please report rule violations If you see a post that violates forum rules, then report the post.
  3. ALWAYS respect indie testers here. See how indies are bootstrapping Blur Busters research!

alexander1986
Posts: 155
Joined: 10 Jan 2019, 01:07

Re: *** POLL: Adding Ads and Patreon to Blur Busters?

Post by alexander1986 » 02 Apr 2019, 21:14

Chief Blur Buster wrote:text
I voted for option 2,3,4 and 5 as I think they are all viable,

What would REALLY interest me and probably a lot of other users who come to these forums to seek information and feedback all the time,

would be something like in-depth reviews on the most popular gaming monitors, like the pg258q xl2546 xg248q and so on and so on, with thorough benchmarks and pictures of overdrive implementation, blur reduction implementation, input lag etc,


There are sites like rtings and others but for some weird reason its very rare to find a review on the really popular monitors, you have to go to one site to find a review of one monitor and to another to find another one, their measure methods vary and so on,


some real modern reviews on the best,newest, and most popular gaming monitors (and older favourites like the above mentioned pg258q/2546 etc) would be really awesome to have on this site, the forums are already filled with people asking for opinions on input lag-overdrive-strobing etc on these monitors and answers/feedback vary wildly from user to user,


a one stop site for the best and most accurate reviews would no doubt increase traffic and interest to the site, having more ads or banners or similar would probably make it worthwhile aswell and perhaps it could snowball from there, maybe even combine the reviews with video reviews on youtube with the same content as in the written ones like gamersnexus do with their hardware stuff,


IDK just my 2 cents :P as someone who wanted to find the best 240hz monitor as upgrade from vg248q its been really difficult to find a clear answer and some thorough reviews comparing the popular options with the same benchmark methods, had to go on the forums here to try and get some answers but still not really clear what is the best choice between for example pg258q or xl2546 or something newer/different to upgrade my old vg248qe, which by the way I purchased in 2012 after visiting this site and being blown away by the ufo tests :)


GL anyway whatever happens in the future!

User avatar
Chief Blur Buster
Site Admin
Posts: 11647
Joined: 05 Dec 2013, 15:44
Location: Toronto / Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
Contact:

Re: *** POLL: Adding Ads and Patreon to Blur Busters?

Post by Chief Blur Buster » 04 Apr 2019, 16:50

alexander1986 wrote:would be something like in-depth reviews on the most popular gaming monitors, like the pg258q xl2546 xg248q and so on and so on, with thorough benchmarks and pictures of overdrive implementation, blur reduction implementation, input lag etc,
All great ideas! Thank you for your feedback.

Blur Busters is a supplier of testing inventions to other reviewers & don't want to make allies turn into enemies (compete with allies)
Currently, Blur Busters takes the role of being a supplier of testing inventions to other review sites, and I am cognizant of competing with my fellow allies that use the Blur Busters tests. So, at the moment, we've not decided to mass-test monitors, traditional-reviewer-style. We also have additional testing inventions in the pipeline (in addition to TestUFO and pursuit camera), keep tuned. Thus far, we focus on specialty tests such as GSYNC 101, which are rare special features. And we are the inventors of some new monitor testing industry standards.

Possible Approach
So any decision to test monitors will be as a Blur Busters Certification Laboratory instead of as a traditional web reviewer. Blur Busters is already working on a Blur Busters Approved program for monitor manufacturers, so public publication of certification reports is one possible angle as an alternative to a traditional monitor review. Much like a motion-blur-reduction-testing equivalent to a FreeSync certification laboratory, or such. HDMI forum certifies HDMI stuff, AMD certifies FreeSync stuff. Blur Busters is well positioned to certify motion blur reduction stuff (and related topics). This will be an excellent supplement to regular reviewer research.

One-Stop Elements That Helps Our Reviewer Allies
Some "elements" of a one-stop is a good idea; Blur Busters might actually accumulate links to Allies (e.g. RTINGS, etc) within those certification test reports, as a one-stop-for-all. Few reviewers link to other reviewers, but we're willing to link to all of our ally reviewers. Some behind-the-scenes due diligence in preparing for reviews was done, and will be recycled into this. This is an approach we are evaluating in taking. Focus on Lab Tests (that other sites don't do) + links to Blur Busters allies who have reviews on the said monitor. This will avoid the "competing with our ally reviewers" factor.

Timeline is "When Ready"; it hugely depends on funding too -- the purpose of this POLL.
(Other readers, I appreciate your votes!)
Head of Blur Busters - BlurBusters.com | TestUFO.com | Follow @BlurBusters on Twitter

Image
Forum Rules wrote:  1. Rule #1: Be Nice. This is published forum rule #1. Even To Newbies & People You Disagree With!
  2. Please report rule violations If you see a post that violates forum rules, then report the post.
  3. ALWAYS respect indie testers here. See how indies are bootstrapping Blur Busters research!

alexander1986
Posts: 155
Joined: 10 Jan 2019, 01:07

Re: *** POLL: Adding Ads and Patreon to Blur Busters?

Post by alexander1986 » 05 Apr 2019, 08:24

Chief Blur Buster wrote:
One-Stop Elements That Helps Our Reviewer Allies
Some "elements" of a one-stop is a good idea; Blur Busters might actually accumulate links to Allies (e.g. RTINGS, etc) within those certification test reports, as a one-stop-for-all. Few reviewers link to other reviewers, but we're willing to link to all of our ally reviewers. Some behind-the-scenes due diligence in preparing for reviews was done, and will be recycled into this. This is an approach we are evaluating in taking. Focus on Lab Tests (that other sites don't do) + links to Blur Busters allies who have reviews on the said monitor. This will avoid the "competing with our ally reviewers" factor.

Timeline is "When Ready"; it hugely depends on funding too -- the purpose of this POLL.
(Other readers, I appreciate your votes!)

sounds great :)

and yes I was thinking something neutral/objective instead of "this monitor good that monitor bad" but just pure numbers and data, objective photos of testufo and input lag/strobing crosstalk etc, if the measurement method stays the same and consistent then the results will speak for themself, I do understand what you mean and where you coming from though,

hopefully we will have some cool stuff anyway in the somewhat near future anyway in the blur busting development, both on this site and from hardware makers :)

cheers

Dmoney405
Posts: 48
Joined: 01 Mar 2020, 01:14

Re: >>> VOTE!!!! Want Ads? Want Patreon? To Help Blur Busters!

Post by Dmoney405 » 14 Mar 2020, 18:58

Out of those options Patreon makes the most sense. 99% of add traffic is from mobile devices (not a real statistic, but its high) even on normal webpages. Since this is very niche site for a hardcore pc audience I would assume most traffic will be from desktops. Most people like this probably use adblock.

I don't want amazon affiliates because I feel they make people push products harder. The exception to this is in my next point.

Instead of ads or Patreon you could push your Blur Buster Certification harder to monitor manufacturers. Charge the companies for this, then if they make a good product and you certify it put an affiliate link to it.

Another thing you could do is copyright the usage of your tests for reviewers while keeping it free for individuals. I mean if people are showcasing a monitor and proving it's worth by using your tests so people buy things from them through their own affiliate links then maybe you should get a portion of that as well.

If we break down the audience for this 'product' then maybe you can see why my view may be a bit more fair.

1. You as a creator and owner profit off of this. The profits probably only happened recently with the certification and most of this has probably been a pro bono passion adventure up until now and even though it may not be much, certainly there has been something acquired for all this work (as there should be, this is a good thing because you deserve it).

2. Reviewers profit off of selling items that pass your tests.

3. Companies profit off the reviewers and now (theoretically)profit off of your certification applied to their hardware.

4. We, normal visitors, do not profit from any of this. If we are here then we simply like talking tech and being up on current tech and recent strategies.

So just like in government it seems the burden of funding is once again thrust upon the weakest group instead of the people actually profiting from it. Our entire purpose of being here should be spreading the word and commonizing this for others so when they see 'blur buster's approved' on it they will already know it's a high quality gaming monitor and be more likely to purchase it, then with the proper contracts in place, allow you to get paid for it.

But who knows, I maybe I'm just a crazy person. :lol:

User avatar
Chief Blur Buster
Site Admin
Posts: 11647
Joined: 05 Dec 2013, 15:44
Location: Toronto / Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
Contact:

Re: >>> VOTE!!!! Want Ads? Want Patreon? To Help Blur Busters!

Post by Chief Blur Buster » 26 Mar 2020, 15:32

Dmoney405 wrote:
14 Mar 2020, 18:58
1. You as a creator and owner profit off of this. The profits probably only happened recently with the certification and most of this has probably been a pro bono passion adventure up until now and even though it may not be much, certainly there has been something acquired for all this work (as there should be, this is a good thing because you deserve it).
Although Blur Busters is a "hobby turned business", Blur Busters have had income sources long before this. For example, I've done several consulting services for multiple display vendors over the last few years. In fact, I worked with display vendors since year 2000 (I"m the programmer of the HOLO3DGRAPH application with the Faroudja chip, RUNCO Line Doublers, author of the world's first 3:2 pulldown deinterlacer in dScaler), then various videophone projects (Avaya / Nortel videophone), but then I started a hobby (Blur Busters). I have only recently become full-time with Blur Busters, having originally been a hobby turned business. Now I'm not the only one whom I have to pay...

Blur Busters has long been an Amazon Affiliate since 2013 with the Monitor Lists, such as lists in my signature. Affiiate revenue from LightBoost monitors and G-SYNC monitors did indeed help propel Blur Busters at the beginning. Blur Busters Approved will only be a small portion of the Blur Busters business income and we need multiple diversified lines of businesses & products to pay all contractors who works for Blur Busters (fortunately, they're all working remotely). It is not an option to remove Amazon Affiliate income since we've been using that income source for 7 years now.

Rising tides lifts all boats. The advocacy that Blur Busters does, improves technology products for all reviewers. This helps all users, as I am an inventor of multiple display tests that help reviewers. And monitor manufacturers take heed with some of what Blur Busters does, too!

The bottom line is that not a single program (only Blur Busters Approved, or only Affiliate, or only Patreon) is capable of funding the costs of operating Blur Busters anymore, especially with the big growth of esports, VR, refresh rate race, etc. Now that I left my full time job in year 2018 and turned Blur Busters already into a full time outfit.
Dmoney405 wrote:
14 Mar 2020, 18:58
So just like in government it seems the burden of funding is once again thrust upon the weakest group instead of the people actually profiting from it. Our entire purpose of being here should be spreading the word and commonizing this for others so when they see 'blur buster's approved' on it they will already know it's a high quality gaming monitor and be more likely to purchase it, then with the proper contracts in place, allow you to get paid for it.
Patreon is 100% optional and is simply for well-off readers who wants to help support Blur Busters, whereupon we reuse this dollar to PAY other contractors who work for Blur Busters, etc.

Some of the improvements you see at Blur Busters is all because I helped stimulate the economy by paying other people who may now be unemployed in this COVID-19 crisis, and Patreon will help me do that. There are tons of projects I need to pay for that are simply currently waiting for new income sources. Even running the Blur Busters Approved program is only a small revenue-add.

Occasionally, I even hire some of my readers to do things like PHP or write an app. I'm a software developer but I can't spread myself too thin and the demands of a growing business means I've gotta pay others to help me. My personal take-home pay is less than half what I used to when I used to be employed full-time at a different company, but I love what I do.

The current COVID-19 coronavirus crisis is giving me pressure to find new income sources to make up for lost income sources, which is why advertisements will begin to appear on the Forums, later followed by an optional Patreon to allow more well-off readers to disable these ads. I really don't want to pay less often to my contractors (article writers / editors / PHP developers / etc.) and I rather continue to expand.

We have numerous amazing projects and breakthroughs in the pipeline that are slow developing simply because of funding. Especially as more people are working from home in this crisis and gaming is starting to boom a bit but my income is being hurt anyway (my usual behind-the-scene software contracts, such as programming a small piece of software for a monitor manufacturer). Blur Busters is comletely unable to rely on one source of income, and there needs to be multiple parallel sources of income just to pay the bills (even mudane things like an electricity bill, or a replacement cable, for example).
Dmoney405 wrote:
14 Mar 2020, 18:58
But who knows, I maybe I'm just a crazy person. :lol:
No, you're not. ;)

You have quite reasonable comments, though!
Head of Blur Busters - BlurBusters.com | TestUFO.com | Follow @BlurBusters on Twitter

Image
Forum Rules wrote:  1. Rule #1: Be Nice. This is published forum rule #1. Even To Newbies & People You Disagree With!
  2. Please report rule violations If you see a post that violates forum rules, then report the post.
  3. ALWAYS respect indie testers here. See how indies are bootstrapping Blur Busters research!

Dmoney405
Posts: 48
Joined: 01 Mar 2020, 01:14

Re: >>> VOTE!!!! Want Ads? Want Patreon? To Help Blur Busters!

Post by Dmoney405 » 23 Apr 2020, 18:13

Chief Blur Buster wrote:
26 Mar 2020, 15:32
Rising tides lifts all boats. The advocacy that Blur Busters does, improves technology products for all reviewers. This helps all users, as I am an inventor of multiple display tests that help reviewers. And monitor manufacturers take heed with some of what Blur Busters does, too!
Yeah I get it, I am in transition from mostly solo to the fun of employee overhead issues as well. I think patreon is awesome and should 100% be one of the avenues. I just wish there was a way to bundle your tests into a benchmarking package similar to all the others used for gpu/ram/cpu testing. They have free lite versions and paid versions that unlock more options. Reviewers buy these programs then use the programs to convince the consumer to use their affiliate link. To me this software should be no different, if they are using something you made to convince us to give them money then you are entitled for a portion of it somehow and the easiest way is to copyright it and limit the normal user to basic tests or even remove it entirely for the public and make it paid only with no free versions. Another option is to include it for free with patreon or sell it for a one time price of $xx.xx without patreon membership. Hell even make the stand alone only be a only a 1 year license since that's what everyone else is doing.

Adds are just....meh. Maybe I underestimate the amount of people without addblocker, but this just seems like such a dark part of the web where I just find it hard to believe you can scrape any decent amount of coin from.

User avatar
Chief Blur Buster
Site Admin
Posts: 11647
Joined: 05 Dec 2013, 15:44
Location: Toronto / Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
Contact:

Re: >>> VOTE!!!! Ideas To Help Blur Busters!

Post by Chief Blur Buster » 24 Apr 2020, 11:08

New revenue sources from display tests are something Blur Busters is already working on.

Blur Busters services / Blur Busters laboratory testing is another source of revenue
Less advertised (for the moment) -- but we already create custom tests for many vendors (internal-only tests too, and some public tests too). One good example is the TestUFO DOTA2 test for the 360 Hz monitor that we did for NVIDIA. Also not well known, but last year before COVID-19, I already flew over both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans in 2019 to give multiple classroom training on display temporal concepts -- including TestUFO PowerPoint presentations complete with high speed videos, hands-on demos (VRR, ULMB, etc) and other display training that are beyond what I provide publicly. Among other services other than training too. Some small mentions are already at services.blurbusters.com, however, an expanded corporate website is being launched shortly.

Advertising
Understood about ads -- that said -- they are already flowing a useful baseload income that stabilizes the revenue fluctuations of other sources. I once enabled Google Ads (only) two years ago, it did not earn much, I disabled it within the month. Then I tried a different website ad agency that aggregates an industry standard ads.txt system -- then rose more, above the minimum threshold. And ad blockers are permitted. Aggregate statistics show more than half of visitors aren't blocking the ads and I have tried my best to put ad placements in non-annoying locations. I have definitely refused pop-up ads & more invasive middle-of-screen ads, and sticky-edge ads (on desktop), as I find ads annoying. That said, Blur Busters plans to keep the upcoming corporate site and TestUFO ads-free (except for links to Blur Busters or Blur Busters services)
Head of Blur Busters - BlurBusters.com | TestUFO.com | Follow @BlurBusters on Twitter

Image
Forum Rules wrote:  1. Rule #1: Be Nice. This is published forum rule #1. Even To Newbies & People You Disagree With!
  2. Please report rule violations If you see a post that violates forum rules, then report the post.
  3. ALWAYS respect indie testers here. See how indies are bootstrapping Blur Busters research!

Dmoney405
Posts: 48
Joined: 01 Mar 2020, 01:14

Re: >>> VOTE!!!! Ideas To Help Blur Busters!

Post by Dmoney405 » 25 Apr 2020, 13:59

Do you have analytics on mobile vs desktop users with addblock? Since Ublock isn't available on safari, chrome, or edge mobile versions I would expect most mobile visitors do not have addblock and most desktop users do. This is the reason I use Firefox as my phones browser. I just can't stand closing 5 adds and muting 3 autoplay videos just to read a small article that they most likely just paraphrased from a different source in the first place.

I love that you are doing the custom tests and that you plan to advertise it more since you need more brand recognition. If "blurbusters approved' had the same recognition as "dolby certified" or similar tags then manufacturers would be lining up on your doorstep with checks in their hands begging for your stamp on their box.

User avatar
Chief Blur Buster
Site Admin
Posts: 11647
Joined: 05 Dec 2013, 15:44
Location: Toronto / Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
Contact:

Re: >>> VOTE!!!! Ideas To Help Blur Busters!

Post by Chief Blur Buster » 28 Apr 2020, 21:26

I currently am not paying attention to how many people use ad blockers. Fortunately, it is not a significant factor.

Literally ~99% of Forums traffic is lurkers for real. As of now, low six figures of forum visitors per month but only four figures of registered members. Even if 100% of forum members used ad blockers, the lurkers that come from Google will often be people who are less experienced than registered forum members -- so it's not worth my time to worry about forum members enabling ad blockers. My policy is: Go ahead.

With the increase in traffic, I'm not focussed on analyzing data at that fine level but -- Most views are via desktops because unlike other ordinary websites, Blur Busters is traditionally desktop-overweighted because of the nature of high-Hz.

Buying 1 monitor via Blur Busters Amazon Affiliate link has a commission that fully compensates for 1 registered user enabling an ad blocker for several years.

<Fair Disclosure>
So if you feel guilty about turning on an ad blocker, buy something via our Amazon links and put your conscience on a big fluffy pillow. Go ahead and enable your ad blocker, and just buy your next monitor or GPU upgrade at the links below :D ...

Heck, any Amazon link clicked via Blur Busters will do, then shop to other Amazon pages to buy other things unrelated to monitors to your shopping cart, checkout, and the whole shopping cart sends a small commission to Blur Busters.
</Fair Disclosure>
Head of Blur Busters - BlurBusters.com | TestUFO.com | Follow @BlurBusters on Twitter

Image
Forum Rules wrote:  1. Rule #1: Be Nice. This is published forum rule #1. Even To Newbies & People You Disagree With!
  2. Please report rule violations If you see a post that violates forum rules, then report the post.
  3. ALWAYS respect indie testers here. See how indies are bootstrapping Blur Busters research!

Post Reply