Opinion by Hal Brown
We’re all used to scrolling down to read websites so it isn’t the end of the world when a site uses a lot of space for advertising on the top of their page. It’s not like you have to walk a quarter of a mile in a large grocery store when all you want is a dozen eggs and a muffin because the store wants shoppers to buy as many other items on impulse as possible so they put the baked goods at the far side of the store for those who want a tasty treat. Worse yet is following the notorious maze in an IKEA to find out where the placemats are (been there, done that). After all, we’re not really walking. Some of us are old enough to remember the slogan “let your fingers do the walking” which the Internet has made all but obsolete. It was one of the most successful ad slogans of all time. Trivia points if you can guess what it was for (click for answer).
Not only don’t we have to walk when we use the Internet, since the mouse has all but been replaced by the trackpad, we barely have to use our hand to move down a page. Our fingers merely slide a few inches.
I was struck by the amount of laptop real estate an advertisement for Louis Vuitton took up on the front page of The New York Times yesterday, not to mention that it featured a woman who appeared to be naked who was, dare I say, seductively reclining with her eyes half closed wrapped in a sheet on a bed. Next to her is a handbag similar to this $4,150 one. Here was a bit of mild cheesecake distracting from important news. Content aside, it seemed to be an unusual and a rather excessive amount of space for a news website so I decided to compare it to their main rival’s main page:
Since I pay for subscriptions to the Times and Post this doesn’t free me from having to look at their top of the page advertisements.
Hmmmm, I thought, I am tired of writing about politics so how about a story for another in my infrequent diaries in my Annals of Advertising series? Going across the websites I look at, which you can see in my bookmark bar, here’s what I found starting with Portland, Oregon local news:
Then I thought I’d look at some national newspaper websites for the purpose of caparison. I think all of these require a subscription.
Next I decided to compare online only websites starting, of course, with Daily Kos (from yesterday):
To their credit the most prominent ads on Daily Kos are for causes and aren't commercials. The ads for companies are relegated to small ads in the sidebars (click to enlarge).
As I scrolled down this page I counted 21 ads in the sidebar, for example shown much enlarged below:
There’s no sense singing the praises of Daily Kos. It is a website unlike any other. Depending where you look and which sites it is compared to, it is always ranked at the very top or near the top of all political or news websites. 1, 2, 3, 4
The only fault I have with it is that unlike in major newspaper websites which have prominent sections for columns all the Daily Kos original stories are mixed in with stories which just report on the news offering little if any of the author’s own take on the story.
Those community members like myself who often post their own opinions on various subjects have their stories lost among dozens of stories which have been reported on elsewhere. I believe there is a great benefit to having these news stories because it enables give and take between a large, but not too large, group of commenters. A one paraphrase story about something in the news can generate hundreds of comments. Many of us come to recognize frequent commenters.
I’d just like to see a separate section for opinion, not just mine of course (I’m only human and like people to read what I write), but the many others writers who have their unique perspectives on a whole range of issues.
Now for other political websites and how they use their main pages for advertising:
The winners for having the least ads and the most stories when you open the page of the websites (all of them entirely free) which I check out each morning are the following. I rank them for number of visible stories and for overall design
Fourth Place
Third Place
Second Place
Politico and Buzzfeed are very different than RAWSTORY because they have numerous original articles. Recently RAWSTORY has been posting original article too. Buzzfeed also does investigative reporting.
RAWSTORY is not only one of the most user friendly of the sites I regularly look at it also offers the most timely breaking news coverage updated within minutes after a story is covered on other media. It summarizes articles from all the major subscription websites which is another major benefit from looking at it. Recently RAWSTORY has been posting original articles too.
First Place
Salon recently changed their look from having a red background to having a white background which to me is more pleasing to the eye. It is entirely free. It has what I consider to be some of the best original writing online offering stiff competition to the opinion writers working for The New York Times and The Washington Post. My two favorite writers, Heather “Digby” Parton and Amanda Marcotte write a daily column for them. I also like Chauncey DeVega for his penetrating interviews of experts in the social science field, most recently Steve Hassan on the QAnon and Trump cults.
There is no wasted space for an advertisement on the top of the page and only that annoying pop-up on the bottom leaving space for numerous stories. They also have recently begun a partnership with RAWSTORY (and sister site AlterNet) to cross-post select articles.