No more adverts..

[ste12000]

Hi Admin, i know that hosting fees are not overly cheap but please, please, please no more adverts.. Its starting to distract from the content and appears tacky and less proffessional than the last site..

It appears that its becoming a commercial site rather than a hobbiest based site! that does worry me!!

 

[slimbolen99]

Agreed. I cannot think of anyone I know who clicks on adverts on a website on purpose.
There used to be a way a person could, if they chose, donate a few bucks to help run this thing. Not sure if that's possible now, but it's a thought.

 

[Josh]

I do appreciate your concern and I would like to reassure you that this site will always remain a hobbyist site. I would prefer to have solely aquaria-related advertisements and donations in exchange for an ad-free site is definitely something that this new software makes possible and relatively painless.
If there are any vendors who would be willing to sponsor Apistogramma.com so that we can at least have more relevant ads, please contact me at [email protected]

 

[ste12000]

Agreed. I cannot think of anyone I know who clicks on adverts on a website on purpose.
There used to be a way a person could, if they chose, donate a few bucks to help run this thing. Not sure if that's possible now, but it's a thought.

Ive seen this in the past, the members all donate a few pounds(Or dollars) to cover the admin fees.. I would certainly be willing to do that to get rid of these adverts!

 

[hedylogus]

have you looked into phpBB or SMF......both of these software packages are free, which might help reduce costs and thus avoid excessive ads.

 

[Josh]

The software itself isn't an issue... And Xenforo, the software we're on now, is far superior to PHPBB and SMF, in my opinion.

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,
I agree with the others, I want to carry on being an active member here, I have learned so much from the people here and I want to give something back if I can, but I can't say I like the new look, because I don't.

cheers Darrel

 

[Josh]

Thanks for the feedback Darrel. What is it about the new look that you don't care for?

 

[Josh]

How many of you would donate a small annual membership fee for site expenditures if you were able to enjoy an ad-free Apistogramma.com?

 

[slimbolen99]

< -- this guy

 

[tjudy]

I think that offering a membership to access an ad-free skin is a good idea, and I will participate as well. I would also like to ad a bit of historical perspective to this discussion....

Apistogramma.com has almost always had advertisements, especially in the six or so years that I owned it. I tried various different systems including affiliates, Google ads and direct banner ad sales. In the year or so prior to selling the forum to Josh, the entire right-hand column was tower ads run by Google. The purpose of the ads is, of course, to try to offset the cost of operating the forum. In the end, I chose to sell the forum because after six years of bank rolling it I could no longer support to expense.

We have made use of the Donation button in the past as well, always in an effort to fund something special, like helping to offset the cost of a dwarf cichlid speaker at the ACA convention or to upgrade the forum software. Some members of the forum are always generous and support those drives; but the total number of donors has never been more than about 1-2% of the active users. The hard truth is that maintaining a slick forum is not free. Josh is able to reduce some of that cost by hosting the site himself, but he has the cost of maintaining the technology to do it. Apistogramma.com is, by the nature of the subject content, a small forum community. The donation system depends upon getting members to participate, and only a small percentage will do so. Once a forum reaches a critical mass, the site can actually make money. MFK (Li and I have talked about this in detail) has 100,000+ registered users, and still the percentage of members that voluntarily donate to that forum is less than 5%. BUT... 5% of 100K is 5K donors per year... 5K x $10.... you do the math.

So the challenge for Apistogramma.com has always been how to pay the bills with a small community when only 1-2% of the users will voluntarily donate money. If Josh chooses to offer this model of forum support, we will need more than 5% of the users to participate, or try to grow the forum up to 25-50K users (which I think would be great!). If we (the users) do not support the forum through donations, then about the only option open to Josh is advertisements (as it was when I was in charge). The option to offer a membership without ads may do the trick. I never tried that (but only because I did not have the technical knowledge to set it up).

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,

Thanks for the feedback Darrel. What is it about the new look that you don't care for?

Read more: http://www.apistogramma.com/forum/index.php?threads/no-more-adverts.12498/#ixzz1uNSgqATK​

Josh,
I appreciate the work you are doing to improve the forum, but I find it less readable than it was partially because of the colour scheme and unused black space. I didn't like the points idea, most people who visit are here for a reason, or because they have a specific question they want to ask. I don't listen to Mark, Steve, Tom, Gerald, Mike or Ted's advice because they have made loads of posts, or have lots of points, or don't have lots of points etc, I listen to it because they are knowledgeable and offer good advice.

Again the same with adverts, I realise they are a "necessary evil", but I think if they become too large and obtrusive they detract from the content. I know it is more difficult for us, because we are a small, widely dispersed community, but one of the forums that I belong to (UKAPS <http://www.ukaps.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=13887>) has a "Society Donations from Sale/Swap/Wanted forum" and a Paypal donate link at the bottom of the pages.

I don't ask for any money when I send people plants, grindal worm cultures etc,, I just ask them to make a donation. I don't know if this would work for us?

cheers Darrel