Money for old rope?

Yes, I had to give it a try: I've "monetized my content." In other words, I've got Google ads running on the blog.

It's actually Ana's idea, since she asked if she could put ads on her blog. I said I'd look into it, and got intrigued enough to give it a go myself.

The premise is too good to be true. All I need to do is let Google place ads on my blog, and hope my readers click on them. I'm not allowed to encourage people to click on them, since that would violate the terms of the program. I'm also not allowed to click on them myself, or do a whole bunch of other stuff. In exchange, Google will supposedly send me a cheque (or a check, since they're an American company) whenever my account reaches $100. Which, I suspect, will be every ten or twenty years or so. But still, it sounds like money for old rope, as my mum would say.

Of course, what I'm really giving up is a bit of control over what's on the blog and how it looks. I think I'll have to let it run for a while and see how much that bothers me. Or you. Let me know -- do we even see ads any more, or have we learned to filter them out completely?