About the ads[]
We (the editors) did not choose for them to be here.
We do not get to choose where the ads are placed. Wikia made this decision. See: Wikia's New Style
We cannot control the content of the ads. The ads come from various sources. Some are auto-detected based on the contents of the page. Some may be directly marketed. Wikia does not even have full control over them. However, Wikia can pull certain ones from the rotation for various reasons.
"Bad" ads[]
See Bad advertisements on help.wikia for the procedure on how to report an offensive or inappropriate advertisement.
No ads for logged in users[]
If you are logged in as a registered user, you will not see any ads other than on the main page.
What about ad-free hosting?[]
While there is support for moving the wiki to an ad-free host and several excellent options are available, moving the wiki would require the cooperation of all active contributors, otherwise we end up with multiple wikis. At this point in time, there does not seem to be consensus in moving the wiki. So while some of us would love to move to an ad-free host, that does not seem to be an immediate possibility.[1]
However, if the issue of ad-free hosting is important to you, please speak up and make your opinion known by posting on our forums. It may be that with enough encouragement, more people would be willing to make the transition.
The benefits[]
One benefit to being hosted by Wikia (even with the ads) is that Girl Genius is represented alongside some other very big fandoms and we may see more traffic as a result. Wikis for Star Wars, Star Trek, World of Warcraft, and some popular comics are all hosted here.