Why are full screen adverts back on Bit-Tech?

Rep to Simon and Harry for doing what they can. I know you're both stuck between a rock and a hard place most of the time, but credit to both of you for engaging with the readership on these issues.

Keep up the good work

 

I'd just like to say I like the new ad formats on the front page Slightly instrusive (but that's what an ad should be) but doesn't affect browsing or viewing. Happy bunny here

 

Thank chaps much appreciated.

 

I agree, it's not awful, but I think it should wait to see if we click before downloading the video...

 

Adverts...

Hi

Bit-tech and the associated forums are fantastic, really, this is my first stop of reviews, and I understand you need money to for food,shelter and other, more miscellaneous things...
The adverts recently have started getting a bit over the top though, forcing my screen to scroll down, popping up and doing animations all over the place.

So, how much money would it take to make these things go away for subscribed users?

 

That won't work I am afraid. Dennis want the advert revenue and they don't seem to care about the effects it has on the forum. I'd pay a fee to use the forum but that will be used to prop up the review site which required a lot more money than just the forum!

 

What I do is have adblock installed (let me speak!) and have bit-tech and forums whitelisted, but everytime some ad "steals the scene" I block it.
I know this is a gray zone but its like voting with your wallet.

 

Threads merged again

 

I have to say that imo there is no way that sacrificing the user experience to this degree can possibly be worth whatever money that ad is bringing in.

I just went to the homepage, had the video expand, waited for it to go away and thought 'wow, that's annoying'. I then clicked through to a news article, scrolled down to put the top of the article at the top of the page, had the video push the page down, scrolled up to close the video, scrolled back down to begin reading then accidentally had my mouse hit a green skim-link and had to wait for whatever completely irrelevant ad that appeared to go away before I could read the article.

I'm not opposed to advertising. If you want to put things on the site that compete for my attention then that's fine. When it has pictures of shiny hardware I might even bite. But when you demand that I spend time waiting for ads then I have a serious issue.

I can tell you 2 things for certain: I will never buy the game that is advertising in this manner and I will will never even read one of those skim link ads.

What I am uncertain of is how long I will continue to read the site at all if this continues. I feel quite loyal to bit-tech, I was reading custom pc from when I was about 16 till age 20 and then started reading here whilst more occasionally getting the mag. On the other hand there's only so much you can expect your audience to put up with when there are other sites offering very similar fare without these issues.

 

I must say that considering the video has "click to expand" emblazoned across it it's a bit cheeky that it seems to expand itself whenever it feels like it.

I'm starting to wonder whether the persons responsible for implementing the advert code might want to brush up on their skills a bit. Seem to have been a fair few "mistakes" recently which are responsible for a lot of the ire in this thread and others.

 

" Da ja vous "

I'm begining to wonder if the ad team arnt just taking the pi*s

 

On the other end of things, for those running Ad Blockers it's possible for BT/Dennis to completely stop you from viewing the site at all whilst running one. I experienced this the other day with another site. Quite a good idea IMO for a site that was solely driven by ads. Not saying BT should/would ever do that but it might be worth taking into consideration when you block every ad on BT.

 

Putting idea's in their empty heads then?

They could just ban anyone that didn't click on ex amount of ads each time they logged on, That would be a really good idea

 

To be honest I'm running the site with ads at the moment, I can just about put up with them because I only spend maybe 15 minutes a day on the front page at the moment anyway. The forums don't seem to be too bad.

Noiz I came across something similar the other day. I disabled ABP and it still told me I was blocking ads. I restarted Chrome and it still told me off. I uninstalled ABP and it still wouldn't let me pass. I gave up.

 

Well why not? If a person is completely taking away their source of income, why shouldn't they stop them from viewing their content? Got to see it from both sides.

Also, I find the ads on the front page only mildly intrusive. Yes they scroll the page down a bit, but does it really take that much effort to scroll a bit further?

 

If their ads wasn't so intrusive this thread wouldn't even exist I have nothing against them having adverts I even used to click on them but its gone silly now with them and they simply don't listen to the feedback they receive.

 

Whilst I agree in principle, there is very little unique content on the web especially in the way of hardware reviews. The differentiator is usually; do i trust the writer, how annoying is the site, how obtrusive are the ads. If you can't even see the page your hardly going to stick around to un-block the ads then evaluate the site, more likely you'll head back to Google and click on the next link down.

 

Let's face it, humans are habitual animals. We all still visit here, despite the sometimes annoying adverts, because of habit.

The issue will become if we start looking elsewhere, for whatever reason. If that becomes the habit, Bit will fade.

Personally, the Secret World thingy advert is fine by me. I dont mind the method, media or style. I generally have only objected to full screen or browser freezing adverts. As long as these arent present, Im happy to be marketed to.

And thats coming from one of the guys who has a claim to have been one of the most annoyed about this situation recently! LoL...

 

One thing I've noticed has changed since the skimlinks battle is the mods attitude towards people mentioning adblockers.

A few years ago such a mention could earn you a ban, now everyone is recommending them. Maybe I'm reading too much into this, but I think the mods and perhaps even the BT staff are as frustrated with this as we, the common users are, and are just as powerless to do anything about it. So now, rather than chastise or ban people for using the only available tool to solve the problem, they say nothing, and I suspect use them too, at least when no one is looking.

 

Without the use of a adblocker the adverts was as good as a ban, I wonder how many people was put off bt because of them ??

Mind since the last advert fiasco it does seem to be much better now