I finally made a postive, potential web trend; does this make up for the QR code fiasco?

Now hold on, I know you’re probably typing adsense.com into your browser bar already after reading the script to my fictitious commercial for Google Ads, but let me first caution you about the downsides. To put it plainly, Google ads are not a good fit for Maker blogs. I mostly post when I’ve finished a project so even though my site’s exposure is relatively good right after an article comes out, I don’t have the kind of repeat visitors that make big money, apparently. Additionally, whatever metric Google uses to decide the amount you get paid is inscrutable and chaotic. Two months ago I made 11 dollars with 3 ad clicks and this month I’m at 17 clicks after my IR Shield project and have amassed a small fortune of two dollars and forty seven cents.

So now that I’ve figured out that keeping the Google ad to the right of this text is like firing a pentagonal peg into an oval orifice, why is it still there? Because I’ve for the better part of a year I’ve been hammering the peg in so hard that the edges are giving way and the hole is cracking. I’ve almost reached the requisite 100 dollars needed to receive my official Google endorsed check. So in a nod to the sunken cost fallacy, I’m gonna ride this thing out.

However, in an attempt to mitigate the downsides for anyone reading the site who hates ads, I’ve come up with a compromise. I’ve written a little jquery code that will allow you to censor the ad or any other widget on my siderail. So as a bonus you can also hide my twitter feed if you feel like my tweeting is inane and tiresome. Just click the little red X.

If anyone out there has a wordpress blog and would like to offer the same functionality; here’s the code, it requires jquery. Just choose your own tag or leave it with what I think my readers would most appreciate.

//Personal Widget destroyer
//set this tag to the images that will show randomly
window.imagetag = "cleavage";
$(function(){
//	localStorage.setItem('w', "");
	//iterate through the stored widgets that were previously closed and close them again
	var lsstring = localStorage.getItem('w');
	//console.log(lsstring);
	if(lsstring != null)
	{
		wigs = lsstring.split(":");
		for(var i in wigs){
			if( wigs[i] != "" ) replace_widget( $("#" + wigs[i]) );
		}
	} else {
		localStorage.setItem('w', "");
	}
	//Add in the close button
	$(".widget-title").append("<div class='widget_close_button' style='width:16px; height:16px; color:red; cursor:pointer; float:right; background:url(data:image/png;base64,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%3D);'></div>");
	//Call the replace function when the close button is clicked
	$(".widget_close_button").click( function () {
		if( confirm("Don't want to read my " + $(this).parent().text() + " section? Fine, Click ok to replace it with pictures that will make you happy, unless you're dead on the inside.") ) {
			replace_widget( find_widget_contain_recursive( $(this).parent() ) );
		}
	});
	$(".bringback").live("click", function () {
		bb( find_widget_contain_recursive( $(this) ) );
	});
});
//Replace a widget with a flickr image full of awesome
function replace_widget( input ) {
	var lsstring = localStorage.getItem('w');
	if( !check_canceled(input) && $(input).attr('id') != undefined ) {
		if(lsstring == null){
			localStorage.setItem('w', $(input).attr('id') + ":");
		} else {
			localStorage.setItem('w', lsstring + $(input).attr('id') + ":");
		}
	}
	//blank out the widget just in case the flickr call fails
	$(input).html('Widget has been destoryed! <br /><span style="cursor:pointer; color:red; text-decoration:underline;" class="bringback"> Give me back my widget! </span>');
	//Get json feed of whatever from flickr
	$j.getJSON("http://api.flickr.com/services/feeds/photos_public.gne?jsoncallback=?",
	{
		tags: imagetag,
		tagmode: "any",
		format: "json"
	}, function(data){
		var ran = Math.floor(Math.random()* (data.items.length) );
		$(input).html('<div style="height:150px; width:160px border:1px dashed #CCC; background:url(' + data.items[ran].media.m + ') center; "></div> <br />Enjoy this picture instead of that widget that you hated :) or <span style="cursor:pointer; color:red; text-decoration:underline;" class="bringback"> Bring back the widget that you hated! </span>');
	});
}
//Has this widget already been canceled? (Check [yes] or [no])
function check_canceled( input ) {
	var lsstring = localStorage.getItem('w');
	if( lsstring.indexOf( $(input).attr('id') ) > -1 ) {
		return true;
	} else {
		return false;
	}
}
//Starting from the close button div, recurse upwards until you're at the main widget container
function find_widget_contain_recursive(input) {
	if( $(input).hasClass('widget-container') ) {
		return input;
	} else {
		return find_widget_contain_recursive( $(input).parent() );
	}
}
//Bring back a destroyed widget
function bb( input ) {
	var lsstring = localStorage.getItem('w');
	localStorage.setItem('w', lsstring.replace($(input).attr('id') + ":", "") );
	$(input).html('This widget will return after you reload the page!');
}

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