Advertising

[JohnMason]

Personally, I don't really notice the ads...

But why not offer ad-free membership for a small premium?

Free membership with current ads in place, with a £20-£30 a year "premium" membership with no ads?

[tom_newton]

Edugeek is about the *only* place we advertise, and even then, its basically an excuse to give money to the best forum on t'internet

[localzuk]

Personally, I dislike ad-blocking and do not engage in the practice. As someone who has ran websites, I know what ad-blocking does to the revenue stream that is needed to keep things running. And as a user, especially on sites like this one, some of the adverts come in useful, pointing me in the direction of companies that I may well use at some point.

[webman]

Originally Posted by tom_newton

Edugeek is about the *only* place we advertise, and even then, its basically an excuse to give money to the best forum on t'internet

Flattery will get you everywhere! Apparently

[GrumbleDook]

Originally Posted by metalmonkey

And also please understand, some of us use this forum to post responses only and never ask for help. Some of us have no interest in the Bett show or your conferences.

Please understand there are users of this site with different interests in it. As a result, they don't feel they need to add an exception to our adblocker.

If those people... like me, are then considered unhelpful, un-supportive or rude to the cause, then so be it. I'll delete my account right now.

Fine .. your choice to block ads.

I always find communities a bit like karma. Some people will only post advice on one ... but may ask on others ... and it all tends to come round in a big circle. Or you could consider that you may have gotten advice from somewhere else a few months / years ago and you are now help people out in return ... people have lots of different reasons for belonging to communities.

The figures for subscription have been done ... and the loss of members from the community against the revenue raised was not worth it. Ads have been the best option. At the moment the use of Google Ads has been a filler because actually, all we want to do is to try and give you adverts and access to offers that are beneficial to you as an IT professional working in a school.

Do you feel that the type of adverts are wrong or that adverts in general are wrong? If it is the former we can work to repair that ... if it is the latter then there is little we can do except ask people to be understanding and hope they help. If you prefer to block ads but contribute to the community in other ways (which many do) via help, advice, discussions ... then you are still making a contribution in my book ... just not a financial one. The financial one is just more tangible to most. We really do understand it but need to sometimes explain why we operate the way we do.

That's the wonderful thing about having hippy tendencies ... there is usually something positive about anyone who participates in a community.

Do you feel that the type of adverts are wrong or that adverts in general are wrong?

You've probably hit the nail on the head there Tony. Personally, I loath adverts and marketing in general. Why I should pay a subscription for Sky yet still get adverts within 2 minutes of a programme starting, or a Mothercare logo plastered all over a sun blind I paid £9.99 for my car to shade my 2 year old. (I took it back by the way. I'm not paying to be an advert)

And in the same context, popups, flashing GIF animations or intellitext are just slowing me down. An example; PCPro, traditionally has a large advert in the middle of an article. One time they had an animation - something to do with a crane picking up a box. The animation really caused me trouble. I'm a dyslexic reader. The animation caused me to lose my place in the text every time it restarted the animation. Where's the productivity for me?

It's a shame because it does affect the income of a website especially that started from DB's generosity - and i'm sorry. But adverts on a website are just a big no no for me. If it wern't for Adblock i'd still be reading an article about the release of Vista beta!!

[HodgeHi]

So you get money just for clicking on ads? Do i click on every one i see then or doesn't it work that way? I don't do pay pal or have a credit card so without those i don't send money across the web. But i will happily click on as many of those colourful boxes as you want if it means i can help in other ways.

[localzuk]

Originally Posted by metalmonkey

You've probably hit the nail on the head there Tony. Personally, I loath adverts and marketing in general. Why I should pay a subscription for Sky yet still get adverts within 2 minutes of a programme starting, or a Mothercare logo plastered all over a sun blind I paid £9.99 for my car to shade my 2 year old. (I took it back by the way. I'm not paying to be an advert)

And in the same context, popups, flashing GIF animations or intellitext are just slowing me down. An example; PCPro, traditionally has a large advert in the middle of an article. One time they had an animation - something to do with a crane picking up a box. The animation really caused me trouble. I'm a dyslexic reader. The animation caused me to lose my place in the text every time it restarted the animation. Where's the productivity for me?

It's a shame because it does affect the income of a website especially that started from DB's generosity - and i'm sorry. But adverts on a website are just a big no no for me. If it wern't for Adblock i'd still be reading an article about the release of Vista beta!!

How do you suggest sites such as this one make money then? As has been pointed out, a subscription model would force people out - a bad thing for a community. The site already has a donate button - which won't cover anywhere near the amount needed to even run the site on its own.

So how else?

[GrumbleDook]

Originally Posted by localzuk

How do you suggest sites such as this one make money then? As has been pointed out, a subscription model would force people out - a bad thing for a community. The site already has a donate button - which won't cover anywhere near the amount needed to even run the site on its own.

So how else?

The usual answer would be sponsorship (another form of advertising really) or other sites sell access to their membership ... I can really see that being popular.

Still, Metalmonkey puts his contribution forward via advice and helping others ... and we can never have enough of that.

[mark]

That we have the choice is surely the saving grace.

Does big have to mean bad? Can successful business in this modern world not be associated with exploitation in some form. It seems not.

I suppose what riles is; this community was formed on mutual, freely given help. Yet the bigger we get the more the opposite of our reason for being sneaks in and takes over. Someone gets to make a profit on all our work.

How do you suggest sites such as this one make money then?

Unfortunately thats not my problem. Thats the risk you run when you run a business. It's not easy.

My point is this; If I choose to block adverts, thats my right. Why put a sob story in their place trying to make me feel bad? If I don't care i'm blocking the Ads in the first place, a begging image won't work either.

[localzuk]

Originally Posted by metalmonkey

Unfortunately thats not my problem. Thats the risk you run when you run a business. It's not easy.

My point is this; If I choose to block adverts, thats my right. Why put a sob story in their place trying to make me feel bad? If I don't care i'm blocking the Ads in the first place, a begging image won't work either.

That's the thing - this, as far as i'm aware, is not a profit making business.

The money is needed for hosting and the other costs that edugeek incurs (BETT, conferences etc...).

Also, if you don't care about blocking the ads, then you shouldn't care about the image either. As you say, it is your right to be able to block ads (something which a lot of businesses actually contest, as the sites are the intellectual property of those businesses and as such, some businesses have claimed that filtering bits out amounts to an infringement on their rights). But it is also the right of the owners of this site to encourage people to not engage in that activity.

Also, it *is* your problem - and the problem of every person who uses the site. Without income, no site can be run - regardless of how helpful you are on the forums.

[dhicks]

As is so often the case, we can simply program our way out of this problem: someone just needs to write a better add-blocker, one that the site can't spot (and therefore still gets paid for add impressions) but that still efficiently blocks adds. If at first you don't succeed, cheat.

--
David Hicks

[Edu-IT]

Originally Posted by dhicks

As is so often the case, we can simply program our way out of this problem: someone just needs to write a better add-blocker, one that the site can't spot (and therefore still gets paid for add impressions) but that still efficiently blocks adds. If at first you don't succeed, cheat.

--
David Hicks

Adblock does the job, just block the entire frame.

Also, it *is* your problem

Really? Are you sure? Try Google.