Why are full screen adverts back on Bit-Tech?

advertising is one thing, intrusive advertising is another, i had no problem with the normal adverts around the borders, but the recent adverts have been intrusive and annoying, resulting in me and other employing adblockers.

listen to the readership, you will lose them if you dont

 

Thought so, since it didn't have a GD thread prefix

 

We're very much aware that bit-tech depends on ad revenue, and i think that's exactly why we make it a point to mention that we started using adblock. From what i've seen we've been more than accepting of the traditional banner ads, but excessively intrusive ads such as this can't go without a response. This is the third time i've had to enable adblock on bit-tech just to be able to browse the site, and this time it's not going to be unblocked unless we get some sort of assurance from your marketing guys that this type of advertising will stop.

 

Exactly. The last time I checked we were the readership of this site. We aren't paid to devise marketing schemes for the site. Therefore we aren't required to come up with alternatives that will do the current department's job for them so they can go home early. As the readership however we are perfectly within our rights to give feedback and complaints if the service being delivered falls below the standard we are promised.

Sounds a little harsh, I appreciate, and I do not intend it to sound this way, but this is not OUR problem to fix, we are just affected by it.

 

It would also be nice if Dennis applied some restraint with the type of adverts they forced on us, if they did we wouldn't need to use adblockers

 

I hear your concerns, posted on this free forum. Oh, did I mention that it is a free forum? Where you can chat and network with your buddies, like, for free?

Come on, guys. Adverts can be annoying but are a trade off for enjoying this forum for free. Bills need to be paid somehow. It doesn't run on fairy dust you know?

 

forums dont cost a huge amount to run, especially when the moderators are unpaid volunteers

i pay a firm £30 a year to host one forum, and currently host another forum on one of my machines, which costs me next to nothing, as the machine already hosts other websites, adding a forum was no big deal.

i know you have staff costs, but the forum, with the free moderators mostly runs itself

 

No one is saying NO adverts at all but when you get adverts like these then we have no choice but to block them, Up to now I've been happy to click on some but when they are in your face like that then no way will I.

 

True, but this is a pretty large forum, bolted to a website with free content.

 

The "its free" argument doesn't work though. Just because its free doesn't mean it should be riddled by disabling ads and it also doesn't mean we should accept it. Plus, at the end of the day if people start leaving the forum you are losing a large user base, and I dont know how much revenue the current amount of users gets you, but im pretty confident I know the value you would get for a 0 user base. If you are going down the "its free" argument, then you can also go down the "lets remove the feedback forum" argument, and the "lets get some stamps that say 'sux2bU'" argument.

I dont know how many complaints you had before disabling ads, but im sure it cant have been this amount

 

Actually it does. As I said: bills have to be paid somehow, which means that advertising is inevitable. Of course it benefits all parties for there to be a balance, and that is what we are trying to achieve here. Although I must admit that I rarely come across intrusive adverts myself.

 

You dont get the ones that block you from actually clicking on anything? It was [before adblock] on practically every page for me. Ill disable it in a few days to see if its gone for me, too

Im also done with this then if we you are playing the "its free" argument, just like I dont participate in the evolution vs god debate anymore because the "god made it that way to test our faith" argument is just as tiresome

 

Most forums strike a decent balance, bit is just ridiculous at the moment with the full screen adverts.

I am a member of another forum which isn't attached to a review site and it funds itself on donations and contributions from most of the classified sales.

 

I'm just mentioning it to adjust our expectations a bit. It's good that we all feel an ownership of this site and feel protective towards it, but sometimes realekonomik must intrude on our lives a bit. The trick is to achieve balance by feedback of our relationship to this forum that also acknowledges that reality.

 

Sorry Nexxo... I understand you're a moderator, and for a very justifiable reason, but that post stinks. Your posdt suggests that we are complaining about thevery fact that there are adverts, yet every single one of us has said numerous times we have no problem with, and in fact encourage reasoned adverts that will benefit our user experience and simultaneously generate revenue for the site. What we have a problem with is the indiscriminate use of adverts not targeted correctly or that prevent the normal use of the website, such as clicking anywhere at all other than the intrusive advert.

And please don't play the "I haven't hardly ever seen any of these 'intrusive' adverts" card. We aren't all just making it up to keep you mods busy... That sentence makes you look like a 'Yes' man, when we all know you aren't.

Funny how BT staff steer clear of this thread like it's got VD though...

 

years ago it did , and worked well from what i remember . i am sad to see the state of this place , when bit was independent it was my trusted source ... but fair play for stepping up and saying it nexxo

tell dennis to get them selves on here and start talking to us , let them know of the hatred for the advertising we are forced to endure !

 

Probably because there is nothing that BT staff can do about it, except get shouted at, and that is not fun.

I'm not saying that you are making things up, or are against adverts on principle. What I am saying is that we are talking about compromises here, not entitlements. Years ago this place ran on fairy dust, but years ago it was a lot smaller place on a lot smaller internet. It could be run by a group of volunteers off someone's old PC. That, unfortunately, has changed. Now, like it or not, this place has a huge membership traffic, runs on a pricey vBulletin package, is professionally hosted and floats on a commercial enterprise.

 

The enjoying this forum part kind of goes out the window when up to half of your screen is obstructed and you can't click on anything for 5-10 seconds after each page load. I'm all for compromises but these ads strike me as rather uncompromising.

Can't we just have banner ads on the sides instead?

 

I know this was posted before but I can't find the post to quote it. Why cant it be that only the guests gets the adverts the vast majority of people on the forum at any given time are guests not logged in members as the picture below shows.

 

This ^

I hate IE9 because of that advert which will not bloody go away!