DISQUS

Not real keen on the zebra pattern, but this is a very practical idea, and a not so practical idea. I play poker at least once a week in home games, we often go through a deck in a few hours as corners get torn up and bends happen by accident all the time. The downside to these cards is that they would be nearly impossible to actually bend half up to look at your hole cards. It is further complicated should one get bent or broken, you can't easily replace that one card from another deck or buy a whole second deck. I'd have to say that these would probably do better on the wall then in play.

And here I thought I was the only one who did deep thinking in the shower.

To follow up, I just saw the poll for too many ads. I don't think it's too many persay, I think it's too many in one section of the site. Your menu is after the fold and I'm running 1280x1024. I shouldn't have to scroll down to find the site's menu. Try moving them around a bit, I think you'll find the CTR will go up, users will find things easier and they will in turn spend more time on the site.

My apologies for thoe horrible grammer in my first post, I worked an 11 hour straight shift at my day job on 4 hours sleep.

That said, I appreciate your honesty with your figures. What I also want to point out is that $25 per post isn't accurate (my $35 was a typo). Maybe, maybe 1 in 250 posts gets picked up by slashdot that a contributor makes. that means that poster is working for 10 cents per post. You only made 90 total posts last month, so at that rate, one would need to wait nearly 3 months to get $25.

I can't make the world go round any faster, I can only offer suggestions. Consider giving something away for free that you can for someone who posts quality work, like ad space. Ad space costs you nothing and carries a good deal of value to it.

Pay $5 per 10 posts, regardless if they get picked up. Give a bonus of $5 if that person makes more then 100 total posts per month (more then you did last month).

Lastly, and I will do this as gently as I can, look at your business model and advertisiment model. My 2 cents is that your blog is about 400 pixels wide and justified on the left, ads are about 375 pixels wide and justified on the right. As a reader, I am tending to block out the ads. Consider consoladating your ads down and working them into posts / between posts. Consider loosing some of them so it doesn't look so clutered and focus in on the ones that are really making money. Sell ad space outright. For me, this has always been the best payout, although it does require more work on your end as you need to solicit (spelling? its early, lol) other forums for it like WHT or sitepoint, but it could give you a more steady income.

I'm an avid reader of this blog, however I use google.com/ig as my homepage and have the RSS feed in there to view articles. As someone who blogs and runs forums and websites, I understand what advertising must be done to make a living. I also understand that content rules. That said, I don't mind getting paid $35 per post, but not per post that is slashdotted. I can't really see 6 posts per month getting picked up. Not trying to diss you or the site, but I searched slashdot and only came up with 3 total stories that linked back here. Realisticly, if you are looking for someone to help post content, pay for them. That content will bring more readers, regardless if its dugg or dotted and that in tern means more money from adverts. Not that I'm comparing you, but check out this article about Gawker Media on Wired.com and what they pull in. The average pay according to the article is $200-1200 / month for a full-time staffer.

As for all the Alexa talk, thats fine and dandy but who do you know who really has the Alexa toolbar installed? To add fuel to the fire, it is a proven fact that those numbers can be extremely manipulated.