'Sneaky' adverts added to posts

bluetracker

Posts: 21   +0
Hi,
I'm a newbie on these boards and must say that I'm dismayed that you find the need to summarily insert hyperlinked adverts into postings that are generated on a user posting a 'keyword' a'la mainboard or other tech phrase.
I realise that you may need to generate funds to pay for the site's upkeep, but surely you could refrain from defacing a posting by use of 'back-door' advertising techniques?
:suspiciou
 
Would you rather have the ads and this wonderful site or neither?

How are the adverts sneaky? The ad links are green and double underlined - surely you can tell the difference between a normal link and an ad.

You could also try using a proper browser like Opera or Firefox - no ad links there.
 
When I first posted and viewed my post I saw certain words hyperlinked...and thought "Hey nifty idea, auto generated explanations of techy type words for the newbie"...but alas not...just adverts..each time my cursor hovers over an hyperlinked or if you (like I) navigate via the keyboard and leave the cursor in a static position, as soon as the page scrolls over a linked word ..up pop the ads obscuring the text...quite annoying.

I am using FIREFOX...and the links look like any other link at my end of the line, no double underline and they are BLUE! But then again I have configured FF to block pop up windows so perhaps that's where the difference lies in what you see and what is shown on my screen.
Quite difficult to totally block itxt from vibrantmedia.com altogether(without adding a load of lines to your HOSTS file or disabling javascript etc) so I guess FF is compromising a bit in my case.

Sneaky? Well I deem sneaky to be something that occurs to which no forewarning was given...didn't see anything resembling a warning that itxt would be used when I signed up :confused:

Edit= HOSTS file now adjusted and can read posts without interruption :approve:
 
bluetracker, I'm amazed that you find something so small so bothersome. The simple answer is to keep your cursor off the adds. I'm surprised that you haven't seen this before, as it quite common at a lot of sites. It's just another source of revenue that, as Nodsu said, helps keep this great and wonderful site, up and running. Remember, you didn't have to pay to come here and get whatever information you need, it's free, to maybe help you and for your enjoyment.

Oh, and I also use Firefox and Opera, and there are only single lines and the print is blue for me also, not green. And I do get the ad link popups.
 
Not bothersome anymore thanks to the HOST file tweak...if I'd known prior to the 'happenings' I could've modded the host file accordingly...my main gripe was that there was no info of the ad service being in use from the outset...anyway no big deal, prob solved lets move on huh?. :cool:
 
Hmm.. Those things do show up in Opera and FF? I suppose it's the Spybot's immunizer doing it's magic then..
 
I think this has been discussed before and from all the feedback I have got over the past few months, there is a big majority that actually supports the use of IntelliTXT ad format. The fact is that from all newer online advertising formats IntelliTXT is the least obstrusive, hyperlinked words that should be easily identified as ads and not normal links... in the worst of the cases you may not notice it at first instance but on a second visit to our site you will see they have double underlines (I think Mozilla shows only one for some reason) and use a different color than normal links.

A whole lot of sites, from enthusiast to corporate seem to have adopted other new formats that include an even more intrusive kind of pops, full page, take-over and interstitial ads... none of which are to be found on this site which BTW is also 100% free, so you should be able to draw positive conclusions about the usage of IntelliTXT and the fact that we are satisfied with the revenue it brings to the site (we have found them to be quite effective).

We can not guarantee that we will not adopt other of the aforementioned formats in the future, you never know what could happen, but to give you a final conclusive example, pop-unders which is the oldest of the intrusive formats is currently reduced to some 3% of our traffic, we practically don't show them anymore.

As a final note I should add that we do not endorse the use of any software that blocks advertisement shown at TS, if you block ads you should not be using this site. (pop blockers being the only exception ;)).
 
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