The Google ads are gone on this site for the forseeable future. I did it mainly as an experiment, firstly in doing some server-side hacking on the javascript, which was later negated by them offering color choices, and secondly to see how they would do. The response was good, but the ads never seemed really relevant to my content, they slowed down page loading, and they wrote semi-invalid markup to the browser, which is violating standards but through javascript so the validator couldn’t see it. I am tempted to leave them up until I hit the $100 mark and get a check (I’m about halfway there now) but the response has been waning as I suppose my audience has gotten used to them and/or the relevancy of the ads has decreased. All of that, and I’d much rather put the Photo Matt endorsement on items I have personally reviewed and recommend, such as the two books that have returned to their place at the top of my page.

What I’ve decided to do is when I get a new CD or electronic toy that really strikes my fancy, I’ll make a small banner for it and put it at the top there. That way you get home-made “ads” of things I use myself and enjoy. This seems like a much more personal approach, and one that seems better suited to a personal site such as my own.