Every once in a while, someone asks if we pay contributors — the person assumes we are making money from the ads that run under some posts. First off, wordpress.com runs these ads (and keeps all the revenue) to defray the cost of hosting free sites, such as ours. If a blogger wishes to remove the ads, it costs about $75 per year. To end this controversy, I have paid the fee — so, voila, the ads are gone (at least until next August).
Second of all, we feel that we “pay” contributors by offering them the opportunity to promote their work — their websites, publications, and books — to our nearly 10,000 followers (and 800,000 site visits).
Hope everyone enjoys our ad-free site!
IMAGE: “Zero dollars” (detail) by Keith Haring.
Silver Birch Press 
Silver Birch is a magnanimous source for poets and writers. Three cheers for SBP!
Never expected money. Just appreciative of the opportunity. Thanks. Neil Creighton
Thank you, thank you, thank you!! It is much enjoyed. Keep up the good work. Sincerely, Rosemarie Horvath Iwasa
Thanks for all you do! The community and exposure have been wonderful, and I love the range of responses to the prompts.
Thank you for being such a wonderful place for writers & readers! I’m one of your many fans! Thanks for all your hard work! ❤
Great the ads are gone. Thank you SBP for ALL you do!
Thank you, thank you, thank you for all you do!SBP is the best showcase of our work and a great literary community! I am eternally grateful!!!
Thanks to all who left notes of support — Joanie, Neil, Rosemarie, Betsy, Sofia, Garnett, and K.B.
Some people have asked what prompted this. We had several recent incidents. One author wanted to know when he was going to receive $25 for his poem. I explained that we made no money on our blog, and if we paid $25 per poem/story and ran a minimum of two posts per day, it would cost us $1,500 a month to pay contributors (of course, out of the question for most small presses). This author was not convinced and asked us to remove his poem (which I did). Another author got quite belligerent when I did not accept her 500-word prose poem (over the word limit) and started a counterattack, saying the only purpose of our blog was “to make money from the ads.” By the way, this woman’s poem was about spiritual energy and chakras. Over the years, there have been a few other incidents, which I won’t go into. I feel $75 to remove the ads is a small price to pay to eliminate any confusion about why we produce the blog.