I see that the London OpenGuide now has Ads by Gooooogle on it. Comments?
Kake
On Tue 16 Nov 2004, Roger Burton West roger@firedrake.org wrote:
It was nice while it lasted. It's a pity I can't withdraw my material from the site.
Well, I was hoping we could persuade Earle to take them off. Earle, how much money do you expect the ads to make, and would you take them off if I could raise the same amount from donations?
Kake
This one time, at band camp, Kake L Pugh wrote:
Well, I was hoping we could persuade Earle to take them off. Earle, how much money do you expect the ads to make, and would you take them off if I could raise the same amount from donations?
I honestly don't find them obtrusive, even when I turn off the ad block. In fact, they're often quite useful.
It's not like he's using evil bastards like Doubleclick and creating pop-ups or anything. I really don't have a problem with it, and would consider using it should my Open Guide require a server upgrade.
This one time, at band camp, Roger Burton West wrote:
It was nice while it lasted. It's a pity I can't withdraw my material from the site.
Using the Firefox ad blocker, I have this wildcard: http://*.googlesyndication.com/pagead/ads
Funnily enough, I don't see no ads.
On Tue 16 Nov 2004, Rev Simon Rumble simon@rumble.net wrote:
Using the Firefox ad blocker, I have this wildcard: http://*.googlesyndication.com/pagead/ads
You can also avoid seeing them on the London site by using the kakemirror: http://london.openguides.org/ with kakemirror/ stuck on the end
But that isn't the point really.
Kake
On Tue, Nov 16, 2004 at 12:55:58PM +0000, Rev Simon Rumble wrote:
Using the Firefox ad blocker, I have this wildcard: http://*.googlesyndication.com/pagead/ads
Oh, sure, I block them in my local proxy. That's not the point. Advertisements mean the site's no longer independent or done as a hobby, but suddenly trying to be a paying concern. If the site owner is happy to do that, great for him, but it's not a site to which I'm going to contribute. (I get paid for writing; I'm happy to donate it to non-commercial venues, but if the publisher gets paid so do I.)
A donation option would have been entirely acceptable to me...
Roger
This is a multi-reply message.
Roger wrote:
Advertisements mean the site's no longer independent or done as a hobby, but suddenly trying to be a paying concern.
No, they don't. That's completely and absolutely wrong. They mean that the site owner is unemployed, living on benefits, and paying for keeping the server running out of his own pocket. If it helps, I've just written this, and put a link to it under the ads:
http://london.openguides.org/money.html
A donation option would have been entirely acceptable to me...
Good suggestion. I put one of those on the money page. However, given that the audience of london.openguides.org seems to be a regular group of people that can be counted on the fingers of both hands, I doubt that there'll be many donations regularly, as it would make the regulars feel like they had to be paid subscribers to the site. Am I right?
Ivor wrote:
Can Earle please clarify if Lon.OG has entered into some contractual arrangement with Google...
No. See https://www.google.com/adsense/
The alternative is a fork: "The Free guide to London".
It already is free. I don't recall asking anyone to pay to read it. Nor does the site license preclude commercial use (which this isn't, anyway).
Kake wrote:
how much money do you expect the ads to make, and would you take them off if I could raise the same amount from donations?
I haven't got a clue, to be honest, and I probably would. However, I feel that having the PayPal donation button somewhere more prominent is crass (even more so than the adverts), and looks amateurish. Suggestions of layouts, wording, or what-have-you will be gratefully received.
Bob wrote:
a) They arnt displaying properly so it just looks crap.
They look OK to me. Your browser's mileage may vary.
What has annoyed me most about this is that the list was not asked before it was implemented
Sometimes things like poverty force you to set your principles aside. I'm not asking for your sympathy, but nor am I asking for your forgiveness.
Kake wrote:
how much money do you expect the ads to make, and would you take them off if I could raise the same amount from donations?
On Tue 16 Nov 2004, Earle Martin openguides@downlode.org wrote:
I haven't got a clue, to be honest, and I probably would. However, I feel that having the PayPal donation button somewhere more prominent is crass (even more so than the adverts), and looks amateurish. Suggestions of layouts, wording, or what-have-you will be gratefully received.
Earle, just tell me how much money you need to pay for the site and I will make certain you get it. I can 100% guarantee that. No need for Paypal buttons.
Also, Bob has told me that after Christmas we can move the Guide to his server. This has two advantages - the machine is less heavily loaded, and it won't cost any money.
Sometimes things like poverty force you to set your principles aside. I'm not asking for your sympathy, but nor am I asking for your forgiveness.
I do think it was wrong of you to do this without consulting people, and I also think an apology _for that_ would go a long way towards restoring people's faith in you as a suitable person to head the London project. If you'd only just _said_ there was a problem, all this ill-feeling could have been avoided.
Kake
On Tue, Nov 16, 2004 at 10:08:33PM +0000, Kake L Pugh wrote:
Bob has told me that after Christmas we can move the Guide to his server. This has two advantages - the machine is less heavily loaded, and it won't cost any money.
That's very nice news. Thanks, Bob.
I do think it was wrong of you to do this without consulting people.
Very well - I apologise for not asking first. It wasn't my intention to cause bad feelings.
By the way, for people's information - Roger decided to unsubscribe rather than reply. Go figure.
On Tue, 16 Nov 2004, Kake L Pugh wrote:
I see that the London OpenGuide now has Ads by Gooooogle on it. Comments?
a) They arnt displaying properly so it just looks crap. b) they just look crap anyway c) One suspects the amount of money generated from them wont outway the loss of:- i) contributors ii) goodwill from other people d) if money is really needed to cover something a donation drive may have been better. At least people will then know what the money is going towards and it would proabably raise more money.
Kake
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On Tue, 16 Nov 2004, Kake L Pugh wrote:
I see that the London OpenGuide now has Ads by Gooooogle on it. Comments?
Kake
kake suggested on irc that a preferences option "show me ads" that's off by default would be a decent compromise solution. ( This would need coding and not by kake btw)
However while it may be acompromise i dont actaully think its good idea. Who in their right mind would turn on ads. You may as well just have them off completely full stop.
There are many other ways to generate money. And if we want money to cover things this shoud be stated specifically. In this vein i think t0shirts would be great but hey.
What has annoyed me most about this is that the list was not asked before it was implemented. Changes in look and feel i dont mind not being consulted about. However the addition of ads is something that the "community of contributors" should have been consulted on. As Roger has suggested he is no longer willign to contribute stuff if their are ads.
If we as a group had decided on ads so be it. Democracy does crazy things like that.
openguides-london@lists.openguides.org
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Bob Walker -
Earle Martin -
Kake L Pugh -
Rev Simon Rumble -
Roger Burton West