If you actually care enough about my projects to be reading this page, then thank you.

I don't want to exploit you or anything absurd like that.  

I don't want to do anything that will cost you a bunch of time or money or anything of that sort.

Your time is valuable and your cash is valuable.

You are valuable.

So as far as my shops are concerned, I am trying to provide outstanding service and high-quality items that are actually worth purchasing.
I'm also trying to take the cash I raise from those items and pour it into a lot of cool things online, many of them free.

Not just free, in the tainted 'free-to-play' or freemium sense where the game is essentially a broken grinding mess unless you spend money, but genuinely free.

I've even removed most unfiltered third-party ads from my sites recently. You'll see some ads at the bottom of the pages - usually for my own stuff anyway - but that's about it.

It makes sense to replace the ads that used to be here with my own shop links regardless; 96% of my web-network revenue is from selling items, not from ads anyway, so it makes a lot of sense to double down on what is actually working.

Anything I'm making as a result of my shops, I will do my best to give back to others, whether it's my online audience who are looking for entertainment, the actors and others who contributed to my projects, my family members and parents who raised me, or just people who need help (even though I'm on a tight budget, I do a bit of charitable giving to charities that have a verifiable, measurable impact on peoples' lives.  I use a couple of recommended ranking systems like GiveWell that accurately assess the impact of different charities.) You can learn more about my values, beliefs, and weak spots as a vendor and human being in this part of the articles section.

That said, I've assembled a [newly revised] list of fifteen different ways that this web network can take off in the next few months, with your help.

IDEA #1:

 Joining my newsletter.  I have four email lists I send updates to via MailChimp - Friends, Family, Troop 4, and Online.
The Online email list is for people all over the world who I've never met in person but who are interested in following my projects. If you wish to be added to my mailing list, use this link:
I want to join the Triumphant Artists mailing list.
I'm also making my own email address accessible on the Triumphant Artists forums, so you can reach me.  It isn't a 'one-way street' communication wise. You absolutely can begin a conversation on those forums!

IDEA #2:  

FOLLOW ON SOCIAL MEDIA.  Again, I've got the social media links on the social media page.  You can follow me and share my better posts, if you so choose.  Try following me on Facebook, Twitter, or Pinterest.  I also have a YouTube channel you can subscribe to and a DeviantArt page.  These are great ways to keep up to date with what I'm releasing.

IDEA #3:

BOOKMARK MY WEBSITES AND BLOG, AND FOLLOW MY BLOG'S RSS FEED.
You could bookmark this site and check it occasionally, and that's a great idea, though not as good as being a follower on social media or on an email list, simply because if you're on those lists you can be notified when a major release occurs, and not be just guessing, dropping by at random times in hopes that a new game or video was recently posted.  I also have a WordPress blog, which you can subscribe to via RSS.  That lets you be notified of new posts.

IDEA #4:

 Contribute comments, questions, suggestions, or ideas on the forum & blog and forum, so long as they aren't spammy.  It is looking very empty there lately and interactions there might be worthwhile.  YouTube comments are welcome too as long as they aren't overtly nasty to anyone.

IDEA #5:

BUY SOMETHING COOL I AM SELLING from eBay, OR HIRE ME FOR A SPECIFIC CREATIVE JOB.  I often work for under $5/hour, and it kind of varies based on how much demand there is for my work.  As I gain a reputation on eBay, which is starting to happen, my rates will generally tend to go up slightly.  This means that if you make it a point to buy something or hire me to do something, in the next few months, you'll get an extraordinary bargain, whereas a year or two from now it'll still be a great deal but not AS GOOD.

IDEA #6:

Browse my Etsy shop.  There's been some great handcrafted content there in the past, and despite a long hiatus, I'm giving it another shot - more is on the way.

IDEA #7:

 Become a contributor of content to this website.  There's a possibility of reaching out and becoming a social connection and acting in one of my videos when that's going on if you are in the Pittsburgh area, and I'd like to have a few more people - especially friendly, reliable people who can show up on time, on a list that I could contact if a role comes up that fits.  I will warn of course that unless things grow substantially here, the pay will be minimal.  But then again, I am paid very little myself per hour, and most of what I earn goes into projects like these, so I'm not asking you to do anything I don't do myself. Check the forums on HornbostelProductions.com for contact details, and further information.  If you're an expert in some field such as game design or video production or web design, it's also possible you could submit an article for inclusion on the articles page, or you could submit a visual artwork (or a set of 3-5 artworks in image form, for inclusion in some subsection of the Still Art section.)  In all of these cases, pay is minimal unless the site takes off, in which case whatever revenue the page featuring your content raises, goes mostly to you.  We can discuss this sort of stuff but it helps if you are either a personal connection or someone who produces work that I think is generally credible and good quality.  If you can send me an email and you are willing to submit content that's fairly good, and relevant to art and not excessively self-promotional, I will probably create a page on this site to showcase it.

IDEA #8:

Embed videos from my YouTube channel somewhere else, or link to them from elsewhere. Or you could link to my videos page or some other page on TriumphantArtists.com.  Your blog, your social media feed, etc.  Right now I mostly just have 'vlog' entries but in time I'll be posting a bunch of old and new videos that are genuinely entertaining (and visually impressive) scripted content.  The more that video content is disseminated and the more people like it, the more viable my video channels become in general and the more video material I'll be able to release.
I also am launching a site, HornbostelVideos.com, with even more fun video content!

IDEA #9:

 BROWSE MY WORDPRESS SHOP.  I am posting a lot of shop items on a WooCommerce-based SSL-secured shop integrated with WordPress.  You can buy items from my shop on Wordpress, and you can also become an affiliate of my shop and claim 7.5% of all sales you deliver to my shop, or join my rewards program while shopping and earn points by shopping on the shop, or sharing the shop on social media.   

IDEA #10:

Buy my stock media on indie gaming & game development portal Itch.IO. TONS OF IT. Lots of it is not available here for free, but is on Itch.IO cheap, plus there are a few clips - little one-off things - on Itch.IO that are free and aren't on this site. So check out what I've got on Itch.IO, especially given that I have indie game releases planned there too!

IDEA #11:

Advertise on my network for a month, in those rotating banners at the base of the page. You'll find I'll auction off ad space across my network soon... sold in 3-month, 6-month, and one-year increments. Each type will have a 12% probability of showing up on any given page load. So 36% of the time, the base of the page will have a third-party ad, and the rest of the time, a random ad for one of my sites. This is a smart place to publicize your shop, product, whatever, given the fact that A) people are used to the banner slot just showing stuff of mine, so it has built up a bit of familiarity and trust and B) My total web network is expected to exceed 10k unique users this year, and C) The opening bid will be 5 cents. The auctions will be held every three months on HornbostelProductions.com, with the first set of ad spaces going live on June 1, 2019 and the auction running in the ten days before then.

IDEA #12:

Buy a book. I'm publishing a 'Miniature Multiverse' artbook later but also a big artbook focused on my broader story creatively, including inside looks at over 40 of my projects since the year 2000. There are over 60 images in this PDF ebook that nobody's ever seen posted online, it's quite extensive, plus there's a printed variant in the works as well which I can ship to anyone who wants it either on 8.5x11 ordinary paper size or a premium ledger format 11"x17".

IDEA #13:

Bypass the Itch.IO Stock Media sales and buy all my Itch.IO stock packs for one price on DVD, shipped to you. That'll be on eBay and HornbostelProductions.com soon.

IDEA #14:

Play/buy my games when they're complete... Vortex, Panoramic Worlds HD, Vivid Minigolf 2, Miniature Multiverse... I'll have project-specific artbooks in some of these cases, as well, when they get close to release. Or just, make it a point to bookmark something of mine you think is cool, and check back in every now and then to see any news or updates. Any repeat traffic from visitors arriving here through bookmarks, search engine searches, shares on social networks, etc, does help increase the visibility of my websites as well in general, so long as it's real, genuine visitor traffic and not bots/blatant search engine spamming.

IDEA #15:

 BUY STUFF ON AMAZON.COM, SONY.COM, MICROSOFT.COM, OR GAMESTOP.

I'm an Amazon.com affiliate, and a LinkShare affiliate.  This means that if you buy things you were considering buying somewhere anyway, from Amazon.com through the Amazon.com link, or one of the other retailer banners on this page right below here, I am paid a tiny - usually around 2-4%, percentage of that purchase value as a payment for 'advertising' Amazon.com and delivering a sale to them.  Same with the Sony, Microsoft, and GameStop links via the LinkShare program.

AMAZON.COM:

LINKSHARE STORE LINKS:

#16, EBATES/SWAGBUCKS:

Create an eBates account!
(Or a Swagbucks account)

Ebates and Swagbucks have been around a while, they both offer cashback programs and a bit of cash back for referrals. Each of them offers cash back from retailers such as Amazon, eBay & Walmart that you likely buy from online frequently anyway. Sometimes the cash back amount you'll get goes as high as 8 or 10% even on those big stores! (I myself have made $37 from Ebates cashback, and over $50 from Swagbucks, just using the Swagbutton and Ebates browser extension - these will automatically pop up a notification if the store you're shopping at can get you cash back!  You can verify for yourself elsewhere that none of these programs I've selected are scams. They're the real deal. I will warn you though, the Swagbucks site also has a bunch of video playlists that generate additional cash *slowly* but they will ban you if you try to stream video continually across more than two devices. So don't do that, and don't bother with the surveys section at all, they're a waste of time as people won't qualify for most of them generally. But the cash back stuff there in both of these places is pretty great.