Let me be totally honest. Time is very valuable to us. For a limited test like this, it took me around 3 minutes to put the code on the site. It would have taken a couple hours to write an opt-in that worked with the code. In that time I could have written and released the module like I have. Plus, the information I would have gotten would not have been as valuable, because most people would have opted out.
Anytime you access someone else's site, there is a chance for analytics to be gathered and scripts that you do not want to run, to be run. None of ours are nefarious. But users still opt to block everything, which makes it hard not only for shop owners, but owners of free products as well. That was a reason we developed our Google Analytics with a php fall back to track users. Because there is value there.
We all want to produce some awesome things with thirty bees, that is why we are looking at different ways to fund the project for the future. Like I mentioned in our Google Analytics article, around 30% off all users to the site block ads. So that is a consideration in figuring out funding strategies. At the same time, like I mentioned earlier in this post, I don't want us to rely on sales blog articles. What value does an article pitching a paid module that you can buy offer to most merchants? Likely none, if they needed the module they would have likely purchased it, or started shopping for it. But on the same hand, what value does an article that gives black friday tips that do not require any money spent offer? Or an article explaining how to do free a/b testing? These are the articles that I see as a real value to our merchants. Articles that can help them grow their store, increase their conversions, without trying to sell them on something. These take time to do. An amazing amount of time to be honest. The A/B testing articles took around 30 hours, just for the main article, the how to, and the changes to the module.