Today i want to talk about Cryptojacking which is a rising revenue model for websites, why you may ask? With rise of ad-block its pretty much impossible to run a journalist website with paid writers when up to 80% of your readers are using ad-block (Depends on genre its very high among gaming and technology sites). Is Cryptojacking ethically wrong? Well we can discuss that bottom of the article how to combat against it, but for now lets proceed how to enable cryptojacking on your website.
So first you have to choose what service do you want to use first, to make search easier i'm going to list couple services that offer Cryptojacking plugins and scripts that you can install to your website.
Crypto Loot- One of the services ive been using myself is Crypto-Loot they offer wide range of different things from link shorteners, Hashrate captchas and also Cryptojacking via your website. All payments are done in Monero (XMR)
JSECoin - This one is new crypto that is about release its ICO, JSECoin is 100% safelisted by major malware & site scanners so using it in your website is fine and it works type of a simulation so its not real mining, but you are still getting paid for the process. Also the script informs the viewer that its ongoing.
MinerAlt - Another option for Monero Website mining service that offers multiple payment methods like Sumokoin, Electroneum & Monero among Fiat exits like PayPal & Webmoney.
Coinpot - This is less stealthy way to mine on the website, since you have to attach a script somewhere and people will see it when it starts to mine, but if you already have a consent well then its not really a problem. Right now it supports 5 different coins Dash, Litecoin, Bitcoin Cash, Bitcoin Core & Dogecoin.
There are obviously also option to go with Coinhive but big issue with their service is that they take 30% cut of all mined earnings, which is very much given the fact these other alternatives don't take same amount. Then there is CoinImp, but according to some reviews its been deemed as a scam. Some of these miners do have wordpress plugins so you should search on plugins menu.
After you have registered to the service you need to usually generate a "public key" which you need to add into the Wordpress plugin (in case you are operating WP site) you can find Crypto-Loot Plugin here. In other cases they might just require a script
Insert the script into the website, this can be added via a widget or just going directly yoursite.com/wp-admin/theme-editor.php and going to Theme header which is likely to be the location where you need to insert the code.
After you have inserted script just hit save and its now running on the website and crypto is dropping to your wallet.
In case you are looking for a wallet to store Monero or other currencies please look here.
If you are consumer who doesn't want to help websites generate revenue you are within in your right to block Cryptojacking. First of all you need to verify whatever the website is cryptojacked or not, there is a website created by Opera known as Cryptojackingtest.com where you can conduct a simple test.
So how do i block these things? Well if you are using any chromium based browsers or you are unethical motherfucker who uses Chrome, there is an extension called No-Coin, which is simple tool that blocks mining on all websites you visit, it also has whitelist function that lets you disable block for 1 minute or 30 minutes or just whitelist website completely.
Obviously i would just get a Browser like Brave that has all in-built protection from malware, trackers and cryptojacking out there. In case of Opera they already have in-built protections in place to combat cryptojacking on mobile and desktop.
Speaking from a perspective of a content creator i have to say that since ad-block numbers have surged and making any Ad Revenue from Google Adsense, YouTube or Twitch are pretty abysmally low. This has resorted websites, journalists, content creators to do following...
Affiliate links & Sponsorships - this sometimes leads into misleading audience or promoting product that the content creator don't much about or didn't spend time researching pros & cons. Some people have standards when it comes to these things like me where i dropped Amazon, because i didn't share their values and sometimes have turned down Gambling sponsorships as well.
Paid Editorials or Opinions - this is probably worst outcome of Ad-Block culture many respected news outlets just have turned into shills and getting endorsements from big companies or think tanks. While i know there is lot of moral faggotry involved too and getting bunch of non-journalist people writing stuff for sites as well. I would argue if the ad revenue would've been as it was before or similar levels the fake news stuff wouldn't be as bad.
Donations - I generally never asked for donations (unless it was maybe a tip in crypto) well for two reasons, i don't find it classy and also its illegal in my country to collect money without getting authorization from police. Some content creators do this a lot and websites are kinda doing that as well to certain extent, but most have steered away from it because it doesn't look very good when a major paper is asking donations.
So you can see why some people would have issues with the 3 methods above and would decide to go to cryptojacking route instead. Given the fact that it actually pays semi-decent compared to adverts today and it's not technically making people lose anything on the consumer side of things. There is always the question should i put a disclaimer that i'm mining on the site and should i ask a consent from the reader whatever i can mine with their PC or not?
Well my conclusion its not unethical, its your website you do what you want with it. Please look out Crypto section in the website for other methods making money with Crypto and how to operate in the whole market.
