Affiliate Disclosure
This affiliate disclosure exists because Sports By The Balz believes in straight talk — even in the fine print.
Some articles on this site contain affiliate links, which means if you click a link and make a purchase, we may earn a small commission. It costs you nothing extra, and it helps keep our independent newsroom caffeinated, curious, and stubbornly committed to telling the truth as we see it.
We only link to products, books, tools, or resources that are relevant to our reporting or commentary. No paid endorsements. No secret sponsorships. No corporate whispering in our ear. If we recommend something, it’s because it genuinely connects to the story — not because someone bought our affection.
Our mission is to build a community grounded in healthy debate, hope, and a belief that America works better when we talk to each other. Affiliate revenue helps us keep the lights on while staying free from paywalls and partisan puppeteering.
If you ever have questions about how we use affiliate links, reach out. Transparency isn’t just a policy here — it’s part of the brand.
Transparency matters to us because trust is the only real currency a newsroom has. If readers can’t tell when money might be influencing what they’re reading, everything else we publish becomes suspect. So we’d rather over-explain our affiliate disclosure than leave anyone guessing about how The Hairy Times actually makes money.
How This Affiliate Disclosure Works
Here’s what that looks like in practice. When an article mentions a book, a piece of software, a subscription service, or a physical product, the link you click may be an affiliate link. That means a retailer or platform pays us a small referral fee if you buy something after clicking through — at no extra cost to you. The price you pay is the same whether you use our link or type the website address in yourself. The only difference is that a small percentage of that purchase comes back to support this publication.
This affiliate disclosure also covers our approach to what does not get recommended. We turn down partnerships that don’t fit our editorial standards, and we won’t feature a product, service, or affiliate link simply because the commission is generous. If something feels like a stretch for our readers or contradicts the reporting we’ve done on a topic, we leave it out — no matter what it might have paid.
We also want to be upfront about the scale of it: affiliate revenue is a supplement, not the foundation, of how The Hairy Times stays running. It helps cover hosting costs, research time, and the occasional cup of coffee that keeps the newsroom lights on late at night — it doesn’t drive our editorial decisions, and it never will. Advertising and affiliate income exist so that this site can stay free to read and free from a paywall, not so that any single sponsor gets a say in our coverage.
This affiliate disclosure applies site-wide, across all sites and every section of Sports By The Balz and The Hairy Times — The Library, The Arts, The Classifieds, and every article in between. If a piece of content includes a monetized link of any kind, that link falls under the same standard described here, regardless of which writer published it or which section it appears in.
If you notice a link that seems out of place, or you’re simply curious why a specific product showed up in a specific story, ask us directly. We’d rather answer that question honestly than have a reader assume the worst about our motives. Straight talk about affiliate disclosure is part of the same commitment to transparency that shapes everything else we publish. Thanks for reading this far, Andrew Hahn