About
Ooma
My grandmother liked little yellow smiley faces.
That undersells it. Her house held thousands of them. Plates, picture frames, shower curtains, her clothes, the license plate on her car. She had smiley face moccasins she wore around the house.
We called her Ooma.
She was funny in a way that took people a second to catch. If you didn’t know her, you might have thought she was being serious. She never was. If she didn’t like you, she wouldn’t pick on you. She picked on everybody. When she wasn’t giving you a hard time she was the warmest person in the room.
She kept a big M&M statue out on her porch. Not for herself. For the kids getting off the school bus, so she could watch them jump and wave at it. The neighborhood kids called her Ooma too, or Grandma, and she would stop whatever she was doing to talk to them. She saved the teasing for teenagers and adults. To the little ones she was an angel.
If you get quietly insulted by an old woman somewhere on this site, that’s her. Or my best attempt at her.
What this is
A small arcade of small games. All free. Nothing to sign up for, nothing to buy, nothing locked behind money, and no way to pay your way past anything. If a game here isn’t fun on its own, it isn’t finished.
The site runs ads. One hundred percent of the gross advertising revenue goes to Cure Alzheimer's Fund. Not some of it. Not what’s left over. All of it.
Hosting and the domain come out of my own pocket, and they never come off that number. Nobody takes a salary here, including me. This isn’t a business. It’s somewhere to put something.
For Oompa
I’m putting this up on my grandfather’s birthday.
He loved her more than I have ever seen anyone love anyone. He is the best example of a genuinely good man I have had in my life, he is my number one role model, and I wish I were a lot more like him.
Happy birthday, Oompa.
The honest part
Ad networks pay 30 to 90 days after the ads actually run, and they don’t pay out at all until the balance reaches $100. So the number on the ledger is going to be small for a while, and probably zero at first. That’s the timing, not a sign that nothing is happening.
Everything gets published. What came in, what it cost, what went out, and the receipts.
Little Yellow Arcade is operated by a for-profit Arizona limited liability company. It is not a charity, and payments to it are not tax-deductible.