Should PipesMagazine.com Start Charging a Subscription Fee?
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Kevin Godbee - Jan 2, 2011
- 3 min read
HERE’S WHY YOU SHOULD TURN OFF YOUR AD BLOCKER
It’s obviously the New Year, but it is also the beginning of a new month and what does that mean? That means it’s time to pay rent, child support, credit card bills, insurance, etc.
It’s also time to pay the business’s bills.
This means that there are some actual real people waiting for checks to arrive in the mail. I’m honored and proud that G. L. Pease writes a monthly column for us. We like each other and I think we’re friends, but he does get a check each month.
Then there’s Bob Tate. Another great guy that I consider a good friend, but he has to pay his mortgage and eat and other stuff to live. He gets a check too.
There’s our new video editor, who happens to be named Kevin too, and he gets a check every month. Let’s not forget Carter. He’s a full time student with dual majors in psychology and journalism, but he also had a part time job that he recently lost. So he asked if he could write two articles this month instead of one. I said yes and we will pay in advance for the 2nd one before it is done so he can pay his bills on time.
Let’s also realize all the travel; airfare, hotels, rental cars, meals, etc. to the pipe shows, tobacco factories, pipe makers workshops all over the USA and to Denmark. That does not come cheap.
We acquired a new server last month so the site would run better and faster – and doubled our monthly hosting bill in the process.
Oh yeah, and let’s figure in a little something for my time doing all of this and managing it all in lieu of having a real job.
We have lots of new content coming in the next few days including a Mac Baren factory video tour, which required travel to Denmark and hours and hours of video editing and other work.
We are doing new Pipe Babe photo shoots next week too. The model gets paid, the photographer and make-up artist get paid. Then there is renting a location for the day and the cost of pipes and tobacco.
We pride ourselves on offering the highest quality content available. Guided by our principles of quality over quantity, all of our content and information is of the highest caliber with extreme attention to detail and accuracy. This does not come free. We employ many people that help keep our site updated with original content on a frequent basis.
Keeping our site supplied with fresh content is not cheap, nor is our monthly hosting expenses or the team required to keep it all running smoothly. While there are many ways to cover these expenses, we have decided on banner advertisements. This means our website can remain free, and we do not have to charge any kind of premium to access our content.
99% of the ads we run are about pipes and tobacco – just the reason you come to the site anyway! We are not showing you things you might not be interested in. The one exception is the video ads. Our regular pipe and tobacco sponsors cannot afford to produce video ads. This business is not big enough to support it. Therefore, we use an ad network that feeds regular TV-style video ads – just 15 or 30 seconds before a video that may have taken 100 or more man-hours to produce.
And wow! Some people can’t be bothered with that!
We bring our audience specialized high quality content that cannot be found anywhere else. We provide unique information, news, advice, and entertainment that would otherwise be non-existent … and we give it to you for FREE.
We’re just trying to make a living.
If you’re using an ad blocker, please turn it off before we block YOU.
Kevin Godbee
Owner / Publisher – PipesMagazine.com
Right Click Media, LLC
Written by Kevin Godbee
12 Responses
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Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 634! Our featured interview on tonight’s show is with Warren Ertle. Warren is an extremely accomplished musician with a PhD in music. He started early as a percussionist in sixth grade. Later his grandmother got him a cheap Casio keyboard which he taught himself to play. He started playing in blues bands in high school, and has been a pianist with jazz big bands for years. Even though he was already a professional musician, he took his first real piano lesson when he enrolled in college with his studies in classical music. He is of course a pipe smoker. At the top of the show we will have an Ask the Tobacco Blender segment with Jeremy Reeves. Jeremy is the Head Blender at Cornell & Diehl, which is one of the most popular boutique pipe tobacco companies in the USA.
Soon now, supposedly, our neighborhoods will shift from grinning pumpkins, skeletons in various assortments, and zombies dashing about to pretty reindeer, angels, and flashing lights illuminating homes with sparkling stars and laughing, scurrying Santas. But, lest we forget, there is the turkey season, fancy pie aromas wafting from kitchens, and a national pardon of a big Tom Turkey. Remember, now, that only one of these holiday personalities is a pipe smoker. And that is the hefty, bearded fellow in a bright red suit sitting in a sleigh with a herd of deer hitched up and ready to streak across the globe, bringing tidings of joy and many presents. Ok, the scene is set for the next couple of months, right? So, before we get too far off the beaten path, let’s just take a deep breath of fresh autumn air, shall we? Ahh. That’s better, isn’t it? What’s got the Pundit in a snit is not all the Halloween spooks who came a-jostling for candy. Or the wild turkeys gobbling in the backwoods or all the fuss and feathers over the big one—Christmas. No, it is that we might need to take note of all the little things that mean so much to us. Like a good sunrise (seriously, Pundit has not gone all Pollyanna.) Mayhaps we need to appreciate more of what we have than what we have not. Or something like that. Like, a good pipe in the morning with coffee as the dawn brings us coolish weather now that we have flipped the calendar to autumn. But it also brings beautiful leaves that have become a spectacle of technicolor in the wind. It is the little things. The rereading of an enjoyable book and finding something you did not see or learn in the first go-round. Or a stunning phrase you commit to memory with the re-read, while smoking that favorite pipe. And you notice a superior puff that just seems to be different. It’s in the air and the seasons of meaningful little things. It’s aromatic! Or perhaps it is that sense of satisfaction knowing and appreciating you made it to another day. With the world in a kind of rinse-and-repeat history, reminiscent of a Shakespearean play, it is perhaps a good moment to remember some of Pipedom’s philosophers whose cogent thoughts brought light to clear a path in the mists of confusion and confounding opinions. Ok. No gloom and doom. Just some down-home thoughts. Think of times in the past when history was running off the rails. It took our pipe-smoking thinkers (the mind workers of the world) to speak of better pathways to more light. Think for a moment, with a pipe in hand, these wizards of the world and word: Albert Einstein, J. R.R. Tolkien, Mark Twain, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Edwin Hubble, Bertrand Russell, C. S. Lewis, and Jean-Paul Sartre. All learned and enlightened. They offered wisdom instead of storms of meaningless roads to nowhere. All while smoking their pipes! Maybe especially with the help of their pipes in the art of thinking and philosophy. Recall the words of Mr. E=MC2 when he said, “I believe that pipe smoking contributes to a somewhat calm and objective judgment in all human affairs.” Amen and amen! Dealing with world-rattling events takes a calm and objective view of things, to the Pundit’s way of summing it up. You just don’t go messing around with quantum physics without a calm and objective approach, methinks. Or as the extraordinary physicist Robert Oppenheimer said after he and a team in the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos Labs developed a way to split atoms into bombs during World War II. “I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds,” said Oppenheimer referring to the development of the first nuclear bombs dropped on Japan. It must be pointed out that Oppenheimer was more of a cigarette smoker than a pipe smoker. Nonetheless, pipes were part of his personality. Now, if you have read some of the great authors of the past and present, their pipes were always nearby. Reading Sir Arthur Conan Doyle can be a three-pipe problem at times. S. Lewis and Jean-Paul Sartre require time with your pipes to reflect on the existential problems and solutions these authors provide in learned novels and other narratives. Or take Edwin Hubble and Bertrand Russell, philosophers of another world. Pipes are required for reading. The quantum lode of ideas Pundit is attempting to sort out is that our pipes are relaxing and stimulate our thoughts and creativity. Especially in these last months of the year. Many times Pundit has had that light bulb flick on while smoking my beloved pipes. And friends in Pipedom, it ain’t easy to turn on the lights in Pundit’s rock pit head. Now it’s time for a quote from a Pipe Smoker of the Past. Shelby Foote was born Nov. 17, 1916, in Greenville, Miss., and died June 27, 2005, in Memphis, Tenn. A fact is not a truth until you love it—Shelby Foote. A parting thought: It is said that famed Southern author William Faulkner carried a packed pipe in a coat pocket wherever he went. That’s one effective way to deal with workday conflicts and confusion. A calm and objective judgment in our everyday human affairs, as the quantum man said.
Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 633. Our featured guest tonight is Jon David Cole. JD is the Owner/Tobacconist at The Country Squire in Jackson, MS, and the accompanying online store. We’ll have JD and Brian talking about what’s new at the store and in the business in general. At the top of the show, Brian will discuss tobacco growing, what happens to the leaf, and provide updated information on where tobacco is being gown today. Tobacco production originated in the United States and we were once the #1 producer. It’s quite different now.
Well there’s nothing like a touch of the plague to usher in the changing season. Leaving the airport just when the first advertisements for all things pumpkin spice began to appear—lattes, muffins, shampoos, trash bags, and myriad other concoctions—so, too, my ability to breathe freely disappeared. The unfortunate side effect of losing one’s sense of taste and smell for weeks is the utter inability to enjoy tobacco. Not that I consider myself an expert on anything but my own tastes, but be forewarned that this review was made with mildly impugned sensory equipment. Just when a comforting pipe was most needed, its comfort was denied. Be that as it may, the road to recovery found me limping along on one lung this past month, trying to wrest the particulars of two blends on offer from Sutliff: the latest 175th Anniversary blend, Silver Quarter, as well as their spooky seasonal Maple Shadows II. Silver Quarter is a new style on offer from Sutliff, their first coin-cut blend. Naturally a Virginia-Perique, it is enhanced with a traditional core of black Cavendish. In the tin it holds much promise, with a lightly bready and very woody, if ever-so-slightly sour, aroma. After some time acclimating to air, the bouquet softens further and offers hints of the burley with some chocolaty notes wafting through the more dominant dry grassy aspect. The tin art is of a coin-style bas-relief bust, presumably of a founding Sutliff brother, Ă la The Old Boss On the reverse of the tin we find the blend’s description: Reflecting on Sutliffs 175 years of tobacco excellence, we came across a brand that embodies true value, SILVER QUARTER. This name pays homage to Sutliffs roots, the legacy of two brothers who popularized pipe smoking in the burgeoning mining society of San Francisco. We celebrate this heritage with a coin cut composed of the finest African Virginias, complemented by a core of Perique and Black Cavendish. The tin notes are, forgive the pun, on the nose for a good VaPer blend: mild tart sweetness peeking out from behind dried hay and slight chocolate undertones, with a lightly tannic finish of weathered oak. It is always a joy to prepare a coin cut, my preference being to put a few in my palm and vigorously warm my hands together to fully break them apart. These well-formed discs pack and light easily, and smoke with little prodding to the end of the bowl. For technical points it scores well—it smokes light, and it’s easy to tend the ember. While it gets sharp after a few quick bowls, pacing should be heeded to easily smoke down to the heel without inviting bite. Of the flavor, though, I am left a bit wanting. There are tart and high notes aplenty, but very little of the lemony citrus I would anticipate, as well as scant midtones; they tend more toward the red wine-vinegary and sour. The flavors are muted, also, lacking the sweetness and piquancy of other marques—the small measure of Perique tickles the nose now and again with peppery hints, and there is a smidge of a deeper sweetness to be found in the Cavendish from puff to puff, but overall it lacks some dynamism. The Virginias, to my palate, come off a bit on the dry side, and here they dominate the blend. The aftertaste and mouthfeel are neutral, again evincing more of the dry, woody, tartly tannic end of the spectrum. The blend has plenty of polish, but not enough depth or richness (*yet) to make it a standout. Here, comparisons are inevitable: Luxury Bullseye Flake has more sweetness, both from its Virginia as well as its Cavendish, and a better finish; Davidoff is similar but with a pronounced umami that is absent here; as for Escudo, I haven’t had any fresh tins lately so it would be unfair to compare. While it rates as a solid, fairly mild smoke, particularly to lovers of the genre, it does not surprise with any exceptional flavors. To be fair, all the boxes have been checked for the blend to benefit from some real aging, and it would be worth checking in on this after a couple of years sealed away. I’ve set half my tin aside to sample again in a month or two, in case I’m merely suffering from the lingering effects of parosmia, and will amend this review in that case. Maple Shadows II, on the other hand, made up for the weeks of sniffling and sneezing I’d endured. Offered in a full 8 ounce tin with delightfully spooky Halloween art, it’s (hopefully) enough to last through the season. Somehow I had missed this last year, so it’s a real pleasure to get some in my candy bucket this year. As the chilling winds of autumn draw eerie prattle from contorted, deciduous limbs, we find ourselves possessed by the spirit of the season. Bewitched by a dissonant charm, we’ve created Maple Shadows. In a season that is defined by the unlikely harmony of treats and frights, we’ve joined the enchanting sweetness of maple with the earthy spice of Dark Fired Kentucky for a smoking experience that captures the senses with an otherworldly fusion of flavor. This may be the best aromatic blend Sutliff’s ever made—and they make a ton of them. First off, it’s not overbearing in the least—quite the opposite, it is also one of the more restrained aromatics they’ve ever made, with a clear but very light topping that melds oh-so-well with their choice Kentucky added to the mix. Opening the tin, the sweet maple is up front and center, but so too is the must of fallen leaves, bready pie crusts, and a crackling fire in the hearth—a perfect invocation of HerbstdĂĽfte in a can. Packing best in an open and capacious bowl, the flavoring is subtle, and recedes to the background while puffing. With a sweet coffee or tea to accompany, the aftertaste of the maple is reinvigorated on the palate […]
Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 632. Our featured guest on tonight’s show is the host of the Pipe & Tamper Podcast, Mike Murphy. Brian and Mike will have an extended chat revolving around the days before, during and after the Las Vegas International Pipe Show. We will hear about their travels to the show and the anxiety of Hurricane Milton bearing down on Florida at the same time while running a show and not knowing if your house is going to be there when you get home. In the end, the show went great and our homes survived, although many others in Florida were not so lucky. We’ll have clips from the show, and shoutouts to other podcasts and vlogs that were broadcasting from the pipe show.
Vegas Baby The show started out strong on the 14th floor hospitality suites hosted by the Vegas Pipe Show and Smoking Pipes as well as room hopping to carvers, estate sellers, and vendors to pre-game for the festivities. If you’re interested in what that looks like I’ll refer you to last years pipe show round up. I circled with Brian Levine to get the totals in comparison to last year: This year’s show numbers: 108 Exhibitor tables, 445 attendees, 3,250 Raffle Tickets, 100ish dinners, 172 Rooms in the Hotel. Last year, by comparison, 107 exhibitor tables, 425 attendees, 2,200 raffle tickets, 104 dinners, and 175 rooms on Friday and Saturday nights. We were at capacity, basically, when it came to vendor tables and the dinner, so there is no physical room for growth at this point except for attendees. That said, we filled that smoking lounge to the brim. New Carvers Spotlight Garret Woo (Pipes by Woo) How long have you been carving? Garret: I’ve been carving since 2021, and I’m guessing your next question is probably how’d you get started carving? James: Yes. Garret: In 2021 I took a break from my full time job – that included machining and assembly work and I thought maybe it was time I made something that I would like and I started looking at youtube and Instagram and putting together my shop. I did struggle on the stems to start and there was a lot of failure at the beginning. James: How many pipes have you made so far? Garret: I number my pipes, so I just finished up 186. James: What is your favorite shape you’ve been making? Garret: I really dig Canadians and pipes with longer shanks and lovat Canadian blends. I like to play with different shapes of stems on the longer shanked pipes. The billiard would be my go-to shape but I want to learn more techniques on freehanded shapes. I like to put brass and copper adornments on my pipes with my machining background it helps. James: What is the craziest thing you’ve seen at this show? Garret: The first thing that comes to mind is the table over there with C-Pipes with the shapes and the size and petiteness and the intricate details they did. You can check out what Garret is working on by going to his Instagram. Stefan Cashwell James: how long have you been carving? Stefan: about 3 years. James: What’s the craziest thing you’ve seen at the show? Stefan: The Adam Davidson pipe with the clear shape and the bamboo—I don’t know if it’s 3D printed or what, but it’s amazing. James: What’s your favorite shape to do? Stefan: That’s a tough question. I think they’re all the same shape, but what’s fascinating is that Dublin, volcano, and blowfish are all the same depending on how you turn them. Playing with that, with all its variations, is a lot of fun. My favorite accent to use is also horn; it’s finicky, but it’s a great accent on pipes. You can check out Stefan’s work on his Instagram. Science: Meet Pipes I chatted with Chris from the San Diego Pipe Club; he started off doing stem replacements for estate pipes but also improved the airflow. James: How are you doing 3d printing? What is the thought process? Chris: It’s a 3D-printed pipe with a briar insert. The design is a calabash meets a Peterson system meets a metal Falcon/Kirsten radiator style. It is a bottom draft smoking bowl like a radiator like those metal pipes. The inside chamber is a calabash. The stummel and accent rings in the stems are all 3d printed. The insert is briar, olive wood, or I have the potential to use meerschaum as well. This idea came about through the San Diego Pipe Club, wanting to see if we could 3D print a pipe and being curious about the technology; I have a printer and design ability, so here we are. James: What’s the type of plastic you’re using? Chris: It’s all PLA plastic, a renewable potato starch plastic that is food-safe. The stummels are printed with a plastic that has wood in it 40% wood fiber, bamboo, rosewood, ebony, redwood, and walnut are the woods I’m printing. For the accent rings I just got a new material that I’m printing that has 40% copper, so its real metal that you can sand, and polish the same as wood filament. The stems are 3d printed as well. The concept is renewable and cheap from a production standpoint, with the ability to make a very high quality smoking pipe based on the experience. By combining the calabash system pipe and bottom draft hole and using 3d simulations to see airflow, I can see where I’m having eddies and ripples in my current, and see where my moisture and all the particles are dropping back out from a vapor to a liquid. Most people who have tried these say the stems are clean, and they don’t even have to run a pipe cleaner afterward because everything collects at the bottom. Chris has also been experimenting with color-changing plastics so you can see the hotspots. Chris said he was able to use this to slow down his cadence, which, of course, could mean you could get a slow-smoke training pipe to teach yourself to perform better. If you’re interested in learning more or want to check one out, you can contact him on Instagram: Copper Beard Pipe Works The Negative Space The show was buzzing about one specific pipe, which had everyone guessing how it was made. I chatted with Adam Davidson briefly about it. James: How did this idea come to fruition? Adam Davidson: Smokingpipes.com had an expo back in August open to all of the makers they carry. The theme was to make a pipe utilizing bamboo. Given that the last time we had the expo I made a smooth Almond with three bamboo shanks, […]
Kevin,
You and you “staff” provide a wonderful product that I truly enjoy. The articles are well written, informative and entertaining. The forums are a lot of fun as well, inhabited by some wonderful, pipe loving folks. This site has become a nice little corner of the world to escape to and I look forward to it most everyday.
As for the ads, bring them on. I don’t see them as obtrusive at all. In fact they have lead me to some products I might not have otherwise considered. When I combine those ads with product reviews I see in the forums I find that the ads are not misleading. By and large the company’s that advertise here produce fine products and provide good service. I tried Chelsea Morning based on an ad I saw and some comments made in the forums. And I just ordered a pipe through smokingpipes.com, again based on their site and on positive comments I found here on pipesmagazine.com.
Paying for “enhanced” access might be worth considering if push comes to shove. I believe those who could, would pony up. I also think that in today’s economy, paying for access may well drive some folks off. This is a hobby after all and many of us enjoyed our pipes long before the internet came along.
What I’m getting at here is that you are right, ad blockers do no one any good in the end. You don’t want to have to charge people for access and the visitors to this site don’t want to have to pay for the privilege.
So to my fellow users, turn off those ad blockers. They keep this site available to us 24/7 for free and they offer some really fine products to-boot.
Kevin,
I love the fact that this site is free and the ads are just a price to pay for the content that you provide.It is a bonus that you keep the adds relative to the subject of this site. I would be willing to pay for premium content.
You raise some great points, Kevin. Even though it’s delivered electronically, PipesMagazine.com is a magazine, and has costs associated with it. It’s free, or almost free to put up a simple website, these days, and anyone can create a blog if they want to explore self-publishing, but a real magazine, no matter how it’s delivered, must offer more, including diversity and breadth of content, opinion, style, frequency of updates, reliable bandwidth, and so on, and all of these things come at a cost.
As both a reader of PipesMagazine, and a member of the editorial staff, I appreciate the fact that the ad content on the site isn’t invasive, and that includes the short ads that appear on some of the video segments. There are no unwelcome, pushy, always on, noisy ads that begin running as soon as a page is opened, no clown blathering at me from the corner about hemorrhoid creams or weight-loss supplements, and for that, I, for one, am very grateful. I’ve seen no NEED for an ad-blocker, so I don’t have one. Nor do I find it necessary to turn the sound off when I’m on the site. These are all good things.
What I see on the page is tastefully presented, and not at all annoying. I have a hard time understanding why anyone would feel that these ads are intrusive, but the issue of advertising is a delicate one. So many sites DO bombard their visitors with both visual and auditory noise that we’ve probably all become hyper-sensitized to it.
Keep things as they are, Kevin, for as long as you can. The site continues to have visual appeal and interest, provides diverse content delivered regularly, and lots of good reasons to visit frequently. And, readers, *do* visit frequently, support those who advertise, and let them know you saw their ad here. That’s likely the best way to keep things going as they are.
-glp
… and to think, I’ve been sending monthly subscription money to Bob for the past year! 🙂
Kevin, what I find quite ironic is that the old print media world is attempting to wedge itself into the Online global economy and they are chock full of ads. Thank goodness. Otherwise, I would find my opportunities to freelance in my dotage would be greatly decreased.
And as most are aware, the print world of newspapers is hurting for circulation (that’s actual readers), which in turn determines ad revenue. And, wow, even newspapers that do not charge for their Online stuff are considering tacking on a cost. And why not? The Online staff is not free.
The only thing that is holding many newspapers in check in charging you for its Online news is that once the genie is out of the bottle, in this case the freebie Online presence, it is difficult to hand her a buck or two and instruct her to return to her bottle.
In other words, newspapers, even the majors, are finding it hard to reconcile charging for their Online product since they have allowed it to be free for so long. That was no forward thinking, if you will.
Also, you can bet your last enchiladas those Online pages are paid for and supported by ad revenue. No way is that precious space and commodity going to be given up for free.
So, coming from the print world as I do, I say bring on the ads. They make life better for everyone.
I don’t know what an ad blocker is, and would not own one. In my pup days on an early newspaper, my first editor made it a rule that his reporters read everything in the newspaper. That included the display ads and the Classifieds as well (long, long before there was a Craig’s List).
So, for me, advertising ads to my pleasure, my knowledge and information.
And, besides, I always worry that my old editor is out there somewhere in the ether, looking over my shoulder. I miss an ad, and I’ll get a cold wind on my neck.
To me the ads are only helpful! I love that ads all point us towards furthering our hobby and don’t point us to a “free credit check” or to a “guess your IQ” ad. The ads on this site allow us to see what is new out there and I use them to my advantage, as I am sure many of us do.
I think most of us forget how easy it would be for Kevin to just start pulling in random advertisers, he could be making all kinds of money from them, but he doesn’t because it would take away from this wonderful site that we have here.
Jeremiah
The question about charging a subscription was rhetorical, but I think it came off as serious to a lot of readers. I wanted to use it as sort of a wake up call that this stuff doesn’t just magically happen all by itself.
People have ad blockers because there are a lot of annoying ads and crappy sites.
Most sites suck because of the low barrier to entry of putting up a site. Most people do not have the energy, skills, knowledge and experience to create a site that actually makes money.
They think it is easy and find out it is not.
It’s probably safe to say that my site is the only informational site about pipes and tobacco that makes money.
Again, I was only being rhetorical to make a point.
I will NEVER charge a subscription for this site.
Thank you everybody for all of your comments and participation.
I thank you all for being here and helping make this site what it is.
An thanks Cortez for making me laugh as usual.
Now, I leave you with just the first sentence and last sentence of my blog post:
1. HERE’S WHY YOU SHOULD TURN OFF YOUR AD BLOCKER
2. If you’re using an ad blocker, please turn it off before we block YOU.
I love the site Kevin, and I think that Greg and Jerimiah nailed my opinions. So, there is no real need to reiterate them.
I would say, however:
Visit the advertiser’s sites see what they have to offer, order if you so desire, and be sure to tell them how you got there… “Yeah I saw your great advertisement on Pipesmagazine.com.”
Continued here:
https://pipesmagazine.com/forums/topic/pipesmagazinecom-what-you-need-to-know
I would pay to subscribe to this site – not a lot, but $20/year or so. I also would still not care if there were advertisements on it. Perhaps a freemium model would work – some general areas that are free with a subscribers-only section? In any case, I really like what I read here. I think this is a must-visit site for pipe smokers.
I’m delighted with the progress the site has made over the last two years. I’m also happy that the quality of writing is so high. I’ve no problem with the ads, great to see the trade getting a good place to advertise. A small annual fee would be exceptable, but I’d rather see the ad revenue do most of the hard work. Keep up the good work.
Dub
Hey man I like the site just as. I’ve never had a problem with adds that appropriate to the type of site it is. The type products mentioned above are not appropriate even though we do spend alot of time on our butts, but weight loss, gender enhancement nd such, NADA~!!
As a matter of fact the visuals of pipes, tobacco, cigars and all other things save cigarettes and snuff seem to add some class to the material and character of the site.
Subscribing to a site? Nah.