Follow up - Adverts on LES

mikho

@MichaelCee said:

@imok said:
I need thumb up/down buttons for ads 😜

LES+ProPremium, $7/Month to remove ads

Its kinda already there. Buy all squares and make them blank

Advin

@mikho said:

@MichaelCee said:

@imok said:
I need thumb up/down buttons for ads 😜

LES+ProPremium, $7/Month to remove ads

Its kinda already there. Buy all squares and make them blank

This would've been really funny but I don't think it has a practical effect since ad spots are seemingly unlimited. The only way would be if you purchase an unfathomable amount to the point where the chances of getting a real ad are almost none, but the amount of money that would take would be insane.

Neoon

@davide said:
Actually the ad got 4 clicks in 12 hours, measured by referer: 1 from www.lowendspirit.com and 3 from lowendspirit.com. The past few days have got little to no sales, weekends in general are worse than weekdays for VPS sales. Mornings are terrible too for any given month. Afternoons are also quite bad. Night website activity is lower than daytime. I'll try to focus on the positive side of it

Skill issue, the "Rick Roll" got 40+ clicks already.
You just have to figure out what people desire.

AnthonySmith

@Advin said:

@mikho said:

@MichaelCee said:

@imok said:
I need thumb up/down buttons for ads 😜

LES+ProPremium, $7/Month to remove ads

Its kinda already there. Buy all squares and make them blank

This would've been really funny but I don't think it has a practical effect since ad spots are seemingly unlimited. The only way would be if you purchase an unfathomable amount to the point where the chances of getting a real ad are almost none, but the amount of money that would take would be insane.

It's capped at 120, I worked on the assumption that maybe 30 would be paid for and probably not all 120 would be used, and that covers costs, expansion and projects.

msatt

Currently (will likely change), I like seeing the adds as they are sometimes comical / entertaining or have a point. Having them interspersed with 'real' adds is good.
I agree that double adds should be grouped and mixing singles and doubles just makes a mess.
Also rounding of corners either do it for all or don't, as again it makes things look messy.

AnthonySmith

@msatt said: I agree that double adds should be grouped and mixing singles and doubles just makes a mess.
Also rounding of corners either do it for all or don't, as again it makes things look messy.

I will see what I can do about the aesthetics, but I won't be grouping by size, as they all have the same relative cost and as such all get a completely fair view distribution above the page fold and location-wise

I don't like the way the blanks show either now i can see it at more than dev test scale I will need to have a think and make a decision on that.

ialexpw

@AnthonySmith said: I don't like the way the blanks show either now i can see it at more than dev test scale I will need to have a think and make a decision on that.

Could they just be dropped to the bottom to make it look flush? As it still reduces the overall ads on the page. Otherwise I like how it's laid out and how you configure it, I've got a couple of spaces!

AnthonySmith

Also just tweaked it so adverts end before the pagination line

So, with a max of 120 squares available, that means we have a nice, even 40 squares that can display, so that's a 1 in 3 at capacity, which seems ok and I don't expect to hit capacity and time soon anyway.

For clarity the large ones = 4 squares equivalent.

AnthonySmith

@ialexpw said: Could they just be dropped to the bottom to make it look flush? As it still reduces the overall ads on the page. Otherwise I like how it's laid out and how you configure it, I've got a couple of spaces!

HA! we posted at the same time, I do see now as I reply to this though

So maybe I need to drop it a bit more

AnthonySmith

that should be better (Hard refresh)

ialexpw

Ah I mean about the blank spaces (inc the singles) e.g.

Then you still have less overall on the page (so the blanks are doing as they should) - but it looks neater.

davide

Wouldn't it be cool to have public stats for ads? Maybe a page of tabulated stats or a mouse-hoover tooltip for each ad tile.

AnthonySmith

@davide said:
Wouldn't it be cool to have public stats for ads? Maybe a page of tabulated stats or a mouse-hoover tooltip for each ad tile.

I am waiting for 30 days then they will be available in the lessquares page. But I can drop them here in the meantime time on occasion

AnthonySmith

@ialexpw said: Ah I mean about the blank spaces (inc the singles) e.g.

>

Ah ok yeah working on that now

AnthonySmith

ok that should be a bit better now.

ialexpw

@AnthonySmith said:
ok that should be a bit better now.

Yes looks much cleaner!

msatt

@AnthonySmith said: ok that should be a bit better now.

Yes - your change worked, it looks much better.
I mentioned rounded corners - I think the problem is the "Buy this LES space" is rounded and everything else is square corners.
Agreed any provider could use rounded which messes things up again, so my suggestion is all squares should be automatically rounded.

AnthonySmith

@msatt said:

@AnthonySmith said: ok that should be a bit better now.

Yes - your change worked, it looks much better.
I mentioned rounded corners - I think the problem is the "Buy this LES space" is rounded and everything else is square corners.
Agreed any provider could use rounded which messes things up again, so my suggestion is all squares should be automatically rounded.

yeah its just the image I had to hand quickly, they were just there as examples and links initially, they will vanish soon enough, if i get a minute I will unround the corners on the image rather than mess with the css again, i dont have much time today.

WSS

Jesus those ads are obnoxious.

treesmokah

To be honest, these ADs are awful and I wish it was never added. When using dark mode, getting flashbanged by some bright shitposts isn't too pleasant.

And even if they weren't bright shitposts, I'm not a fan of ADs on the side in general and have been blocking them since forever on OGF too.

For those using uBlock, If you wish to block it add the following rule in "My filters" tab
lowendspirit.com##div.LesOffersPanel-section:nth-of-type(4)

I get LES has to make some money, but I would be much more willing to purchase a shiny badge next to my name eg. "Supporter" rather than this crap. You mentioned you cannot take donations, but just selling a badge next to the name should be fine. Call it LES+, give it nothing but a badge you can disable and have users contribute to the finances of the site, rather than providers. Of course nothing is stopping providers from contributing too, but I feel like it follows the spirit of LES more than having ADs.

Just my two cents. I do not want to sound pessimistic or ungrateful, and I really appreciate that LES is getting work being done on it - but I liked it the most without any of these changes, and especially these fucking up/down buttons like on Reddit.

msatt

Following on from @treesmokah comments - while I don't feel so negative about the ADs, I do understand the complaint.
As LES allows people to use karma for 'purchasing' squares, why not let users purchase AD blocking with Karma?

treesmokah

@msatt said: As LES allows people to use karma for 'purchasing' squares, why not let users purchase AD blocking with Karma?

What about the people without accounts? I wouldn't register on the site if it had ADs this awful tbh, Its just not a good look for the reputation of the site nor visually.

msatt

@treesmokah said:

@msatt said: As LES allows people to use karma for 'purchasing' squares, why not let users purchase AD blocking with Karma?

What about the people without accounts? I wouldn't register on the site if it had ADs this awful tbh, Its just not a good look for the reputation of the site nor visually.

Apologies if I am wrong, but didn't you register on OGF ?
As far as newbies - there is a 'cost' to join (the ADs) and of course a way of stopping them.

treesmokah

@msatt said:

@treesmokah said:

@msatt said: As LES allows people to use karma for 'purchasing' squares, why not let users purchase AD blocking with Karma?

What about the people without accounts? I wouldn't register on the site if it had ADs this awful tbh, Its just not a good look for the reputation of the site nor visually.

Apologies if I am wrong, but didn't you register on OGF ?
As far as newbies - there is a 'cost' to join (the ADs) and of course a way of stopping them.

Of course I did, but I knew what I was getting in to, and didn't have an ounce of respect to staff or Biloh.
LET is a soulless money printing machine, where money can buy you anything you'd like. When I use a forum, I want to use a forum - not a product, or like in the case of LET, also be the product they can sell to advertisers.
LES was supposed to be the more "ethical" version of LET.

As far as I'm aware, LES became what it is today mostly because of CC scams and provider tags for $ on LET. ADs is one step below paid provider tags.

While ADs doesn't make it anywhere near as commercialized as LET, it's not a step in the right direction in my opinion.

msatt

@treesmokah said: Of course I did, but I knew what I was getting in to

Newbies can 'see' what they are getting into on here as well.
As far as the history of OGF and feelings about it, I agree with you however LES is not 'free' and certainly not the OGF. There are costs (excluding Ant's time - which we should not) and ADs are one way of supporting it.
You have already provided a way of blocking them and Ant has said he understands that some users will block them - so just block them. Problem solved (not trying to be rude).

Edit
You edited your comment.....
So my reply is slightly out of context but still accurate.

AnthonySmith

@treesmokah said: While ADs doesn't make it anywhere near as commercialized as LET, it's not a step in the right direction in my opinion.

I understand your point of view entirely, but I should also point out that this place started with adverts too; they were there from almost day 1, and then removed due to the complexities of taking payments/donaition.

Give it a chance, you have them blocked anyway, when the good deals start pouring in as a result of them, maybe you will consider switching them back on.

Even a charity needs a budget.

treesmokah

@AnthonySmith said: Even a charity needs a budget.

I totally understand and agree with that, I just don't necessarily like the way in which its being raised right now.
As I mentioned before, LES+ could be something fun to try - if the users themselves somehow managed to sustain the site financially, there wouldn't be the need for ADs.

ADs won't make me stop using this site, I'm just giving my take on what an "ideal" LES would look like in my eyes.

mikho

A spin on those suggestions, that you can buy badges for real money, not only Karma?

AnthonySmith

Morning of day 4, update

Once we get to 30 days these will be published on the actual squares page.

dbadude

@AnthonySmith 8 dollar for a small square per month? thats a bargain compared to that other lowend site.

AnthonySmith

@dbadude said:
@AnthonySmith 8 dollar for a small square per month? thats a bargain compared to that other lowend site.

$7 or free if you contribute and get lots of upvotes

Might be $8 after local tax and XF I guess.

ahnlak

It'll be interesting to see if the number of squares drops off once folk have burnt through their spare karma

mikho

@ahnlak said:
It'll be interesting to see if the number of squares drops off once folk have burnt through their spare karma

It's like 70 Karma / month, keep posting good/interesting stuff and that wont be a problem getting enough to cover the cost.

dgc1980

I must admit, the limit of two frames is a great decision, I really hate it when adverts look like they will give someone an epileptic fit.

AnthonySmith

@dgc1980 said:
I must admit, the limit of two frames is a great decision, I really hate it when adverts look like they will give someone an epileptic fit.

I am going to see how that goes, I almost did not allow mitiple frames at all, but so far, not so bad.

cmeerw

@dgc1980 said:
I must admit, the limit of two frames is a great decision, I really hate it when adverts look like they will give someone an epileptic fit.

Some site are unusable without blocking those animations (I am using the "Animation Policy" extension with Chromium)

AnthonySmith

I really like this one, for me its a really perfect advert, tells you what and where, and has great brand recognition imagry while looking really professional.

I need to find a reason to use @oloke in some capacity, been to the website 20 times, just not quite found the perfect fit yet.

ionut

uBlock origin is doing fine by creating custom filter.

AnthonySmith

@ionut said:
uBlock origin is doing fine by creating custom filter.

Thanks for your support!

AnthonySmith

day 4 or 5, stats idk lost track.

AnthonySmith

day 5

davide

Are you aware of the click thru ratio between registered/unregistered users? Each time I changed the ad image I got clicks for the first day then a drop thereafter, I suspect first-time visitors coming from Google are ad-blind and the only clicks are from members checking out the novelty of a new ad image.

AnthonySmith

@davide said:
Are you aware of the click thru ratio between registered/unregistered users? Each time I changed the ad image I got clicks for the first day then a drop thereafter, I suspect first-time visitors coming from Google are ad-blind and the only clicks are from members checking out the novelty of a new ad image.

No but let me look into it

AnthonySmith

day 6 (more like 6.5)

AnthonySmith

day 7

davide

I'll change my ad image later today, that should help with the stats!

Joking but it would be interesting to have a breakdown between registered and guest clicks.

AnthonySmith

@davide said: Joking but it would be interesting to have a breakdown between registered and guest clicks.

>

2nd top on my LES list for next week!

AnthonySmith

day 8 I think.

I did not get much work done today, not feeling well, I will probably stop posting these now< iguess you get the picture, they will be live at day 30 is and then show a constant rolling 30 days.

As a point of clarity, the blocked count % is going down (not as many blocks), and is expected to be closer to 20% by the end of 30 days. Initially, I was accidentally counting the adblock presence false flag (AdGuard, etc. detector) as a block, which is incorrect, but since it was only a few days, I did not bother purging them.

davide

Crosschecking from VPS Price Tracker:

But you got an appreciable side income nonetheless, some of the brands that booked your sidebar are booked in every other corner of the internet, they won't drop out easily from renewing IMHO.

AnthonySmith

@davide said:
Crosschecking from VPS Price Tracker:

But you got an appreciable side income nonetheless, some of the brands that booked your sidebar are booked in every other corner of the internet, they won't drop out easily from renewing IMHO.

Yeah, I mean, 3 clicks per day for a VPS search engine that most people here probably already know about, is not that bad if you ask me, given the overall state of "ad exhaustion" in 2026 the tierhive adver by comparison had 6 today.

I tried to make it very cost friendly and many use karma anyway which is cool, I really do encourage that, costs are covered and in 30 days I will have a small budget to start buying some low end servers and having a play/review