Question about the forum software

[BlueAU]

Just for the record, it is not only this website that has flash ads (I pay for AFF membership so I don't see them anymore), but News Limited, Sydney Morning Herald all seem to have advertisements that PLAY movies. Now that is a real bandwidth sucker. I think it is just the way the 'advertising market' is going to try and get us in this stone age.

 

[Dave Noble]

If everybody blocked adverts and nobody was prepared to contribute to the running of the site , how would this site be expected to survive?

Hardly extortion to offer an alternative to adverts at a relatively small fee ( $35 a year )

Dave

 

[BlueAU]

Hardly extortion to offer an alternative to adverts at a relatively small fee ( $35 a year )

I think given travel costs, I think $35 is a great investment. Should make it part of anyones 'travel budget' but it does come down to what a person wants to spend. Everyone does have different priorities. For me, AFF Gold is right, even saved me money on QP.

 

[Dave Noble]

I think given travel costs, I think $35 is a great investment. Should make it part of anyones 'travel budget' but it does come down to what a person wants to spend. Everyone does have different priorities. For me, AFF Gold is right, even saved me money on QP.

For me the $50 saving on annual travel insurance is a cool benefit of Gold membership. Indeed, different people have different priorities; $35 may well be better spent for many elsewhere, but then should be happy to accept that the site needs to be funded somehow

Silver membership gives people an alternative to advertising , but no one is forced to or being extorted to take it out

Dave

 

[k_sheep]

I'm 100% in agreement with JohnK. Now I'm a newbie and can't contribute nearly as much knowledge as him, but I'm still outraged. This site is first and foremost, a forum - and thus, needs members regularly contributing or it will just fall over.

The ridiculously huge qantas ads that were on until recently were almost enough to drive me away (for those who don't have them, these ads were so big you couldn't even see any of the forum, you had to scroll down quite a way). These horrible noisy video ads ARE enough to drive me away.

Now, I'm a poor student. $35 is a lot of money for me. This forum does not give me anything I can't get from elsewhere. There's FT for the forum. I have my own QP corporate plan. I'm happy with my credit card travel insurance. So no, I will not pay money for something I can get for free elsewhere.

There are plenty of other forums which exist happily with just google adsense, as long as they have a thriving community. So goodbye AFF! I'll check back soon to see if the stupid ads are gone.

 

[dragonman]

I'm 100% in agreement with JohnK.

Now, I'm a poor student. $35 is a lot of money for me. This forum does not give me anything I can't get from elsewhere. There's FT for the forum. I have my own QP corporate plan. I'm happy with my credit card travel insurance. So no, I will not pay money for something I can get for free elsewhere.

There are plenty of other forums which exist happily with just google adsense, as long as they have a thriving community. So goodbye AFF! I'll check back soon to see if the stupid ads are gone.

Don't let the door hit ya on the way out. Dave has made the point I was trying to, but much more eloquently. This debate was confused earlier by a question of "morals". Its not morality, its a financial choice.

 

[samh004]

k_sheep you must be really poor to meet the minimum requirements for a credit card and corporate QP. I'm given an allowance of $800 a month and managed to save for my membership still.

But whatever, this isn't about comparing and I think is well off the original question posed already.

However, on another topic, I did think the $35 and $50 tiers were a little steep, when you compare to FT's $12, but they do have a much bigger user base, so can see why the difference. I do hope that as this place grows though, more members might push down the price a little.

 

[JohnK]

Don't let the door hit ya on the way out. Dave has made the point I was trying to, but much more eloquently. This debate was confused earlier by a question of "morals". Its not morality, its a financial choice.

Absolute rubbish. Last time I checked this website was free to join and accepting flash ads to start automatically without permission was not part of the agreement when I joined.

You can believe what you like but you cannot tell me I "have to" contribute financially in order to be accepted and be part of the community. You and I have nothing further to discuss. Please stay away from me....

 

[dragonman]

Absolute rubbish. Last time I checked this website was free to join and accepting flash ads to start automatically without permission was not part of the agreement when I joined.

You can believe what you like but you cannot tell me I "have to" contribute financially in order to be accepted and be part of the community. You and I have nothing further to discuss. Please stay away from me....

The quote you respond to was not directed at you - as you know. The point above is a nice attempt to confuse the discussion. I merely asked you why you made the decision to not pay. You choose to obfuscate and not tell me - that is your right. As it is mine to respond to your posts.

 

[russ]

If everybody blocked adverts and nobody was prepared to contribute to the running of the site , how would this site be expected to survive?

I'd expect it to survive because it doesn't cost much money to run.

The biggest cost is in labour, and with moderators such as yourself presumably providing that for free, I don't think there are any major costs.

 

[BlueAU]

I'd expect it to survive because it doesn't cost much money to run.

The biggest cost is in labour, and with moderators such as yourself presumably providing that for free, I don't think there are any major costs.

Some things off the top of my head that I can think of

1. Forum Software Licenses and Yearly Maintenance (It isn't free)
2. Domain Name charges and hosting (Bandwidth is expensive, especially in Australia)
3. Server Disk Space (Forums require alot of space so we can refer back to old threads)

99% of the forums that I access (Not just flying ones) also use vBulletin and have advertisements too....

I would say that the Moderators here are volunteers and we should be thankful for their time to read every post even if they aren't interested in it. Monitoring many lengthy (and informative) threads is a big job.

Some of the benefits that come with silver and gold, would be organised by the administrator/owner of this board, and would be time consuming to setup and maintain.

It is not safe for anyone to assume there are low costs, as we do not know, and will probably never know as it is commercially sensitive information...

That's just my 2 cents as someone with a technical background ... I think this is now getting OT and we should all focus on how to get more miles and travel and have fun around the world Without prejudice to anyone ...

 

[admin]

With regret, I am now going to close this thread. Generally, I avoid doing this as I genuinely believe in an open community and the freedom of speech. But, after the last few posts, I now feel that this thread could degenerate into a flaming war.

Some of the postings on this site have really surprised me. Nobody is "forced" do do anything. Memebership, with full functionality, is and always will be free. The site costs significantly more

than $1k pa to run

Anybody who knows anything about running a busy website with a dedicated server (which needs to be managed) and licensed software (which needs to be maintained) will be well aware of the scale of the costs involved.

Finally, this is an open forum. No member has the right to expect others to "stay away" if they disagree. Every member is perfectly entitled to respond (provided the response is not offensive, vulgar etc etc) if they disagree. There is no place for the

You and I have nothing further to discuss. Please stay away from me....

mentality on AFF.