How do you feel about advertising?

[Anodyne]

Evil Genius, I don't follow your reasoning. You say that no one should object to advertising as we are all using adblock anyway and don't have to endure it. But then you ask us to turn it off to allow the ads. It doesn't work both ways!

Jox, I think the proposal is just a fee for ad-free membership (along with free memberships which include ads), rather than a fee to join. I don't think ads alone would stop anyone from joining, as everyone says, they're pretty ubiquitous.

[Jox]

Yeah mate, sorry for the misunderstanding, I meant the fee might discourage people from wanting to become members not the adds, that is why I was saying there could be a free "trial" period before paying an annual membership fee.

[Foo]

If your going to go down the road of adds and an option for add free membership maybe also consider:

Reducing the amount of space available to host images/blogs for free members

increasing inbox storage space for paid members

[Evil Genius]

Anodyne, it all comes down to a decision. To support a community that we all love and profit of in some way or another, or not to. I have no doubt that it is absolutely not Torstens intention to make SAB a paid Membership site and i am pretty optimistic the website could still be somehow earning a large Part of its yearly cost, only with pay per click Advertising like google.

But the online PPC Business is changing and since more and more people use Adblockers, more and more Websites ask their Users to turn the Adblockers off on the sites they really love, if they want to keep them alive. I am not Psychic and i don´t know if the CPC Income would be enough, despite most people are running Adblock but I have a feeling it would make a dramatic difference if our Users turn Adblock out on SAB. No one will force you and everyone is free to use this kind of software, but I would personally appreciate if our members would turn it off. And i don´t mean that our members should intentionally click the Ads to earn us some money; just to turn Adblock off. Pages like Reddit are suffering from the rising Use of Adblockers and many of them will cease to exist at a certain point. Simply because they lack support.

SAB has been always free of Ads and Torsten spent a whole lot of money just to keep this website up and running. And provided a great Trading Forum that not only our members profit from because they can sell off Plants and earn some extra cash every month. It also gives people the opportunity to get EXTREMELY rare Clones, seeds and Plants for free.

Besides, the Trading forum gave commercial sellers the opportunity to sell their Products as well. And that, FOR FREE. In the world of Internet Forums, this is rather rare. And yeah, i think it wouldn´t be too much to ask our members to add an Adblock exception to Adblock in order to keep SAB alive. Because, if Torsten would stop paying the costs out of his own pockets, no one else will. I am still WAY too broke to keep a forum of this data size online and so are most others. One worst case scenario would be that SAB might end up in the hands of an Ethno Company or worse, goes offline forever. It has a reason that so many ethnobotanical forums die or just turn into living graveyards... Because the ethnobotanical Sector is difficult to monetize.

I also think that it might be worth to think about creating some kind of Subforum of the Trading forum for large scale commercial sellers who profit from SAB on a regular basis and pay a small yearly fee to be able to do that. 15 Dollar or so. I would never even think about changing ANYTHING about the members' privileges to use the trading forum, because it is one of the most important forums we have. But it may be an option to ask commercial Sellers who earn substantial amounts of money with the SAB Trading Forum for a supporter donation. Again, this is just my personal opinion and i don´t even know if there would be enough commercial Sellers around here to make a system like this interesting but i just want to put this thought out there. And again, i am SO not talking about users who sell a cutting every once in a while or give away things for free. But there were quite a bunch commercial sellers who earned good money with SAB. What is fantastic and very well deserved; but 15 Dollar a year is not too much if they earn a thousand bucks a year or so using the SAB System, while the site costs Torsten thousands of dollars per year. I mean, just think about this for a second...5000 thousand dollar per year! That is crazy and you can do a lot of things with so much money! In my opinion, to be ok with a few ads here and there on the page is a small price to pay in order to support the forum. Since Adblock exists and no one is forced to see Ads if he doesn´t want to, i just don´t see any valid argument against it. bye Eg

Edited July 5, 2014 by Evil Genius

[Anodyne]

Jox, sorry I may not have explained that very well, as you still seem to be misunderstanding? The proposition is for each membership to have EITHER a fee or ads, not both. So it would be totally optional to pay the fee, but if you declined, you would be exposed to the ads. Which most if us are used to anyway - that's all i meant when i said ads won't scare new members away. I suppose this could be described as a "free trial", but only in the sense that our current memberships are also "free trials", i.e. no time-limit or hidden content for those who can't/don't pay. Compulsory fees are fairly evil, somehow I can't picture Torsten allowing them.

Anyway that was just my interpretation of things, corrections happily accepted.

[Evil Genius]

I would be surprised if there would be something like having Free Trial Accounts for all members. If at all, i rather think it might be that Torsten could offer the Option to become a supporter with or without additional Rights, Features, Options,whatever in exchange for a small fee. Again, i can only speak about how i see things and that´s absolutely no official statement. Just am pretty sure Torsten would not do something like that.

And I am not even sure if this is something that necessarily has to happen. PPC Advertising would be something that is a lot less difficult to do and has very little influence on the general user experience on SAB. A few targeted google Ads don´t change anything about the value of the forum and would be a great way to ensure the survival of the community. This is not about making a membership site out of SAB. It´s about financial survival and to ensure that, a few ads left and right are hardly too much of a sacrifice.

Edited July 5, 2014 by Evil Genius

[Evil Genius]

Another way to ensure long-term survival might be to give ethnobotanical businesses the option to have Banner Ads linking to their shop, in exchange for a small monthly or yearly fee. I am very sure there are many shops that would LOVE to advertise here! SAB is all over google and everyone who has the chance to advertise on the oldest Ethnobotanical forum can increase his Traffic GREATLY! So yeah, maybe it would be an option to offer handpicked ethnobotanical businesses Banner Ad-Spots instead of google Ads. Or maybe a bit of both. As long it´s not something intrusive like Pop-Ups, that would not really influence the user Experience in a negative way!

Edited July 5, 2014 by Evil Genius

[myco]

im all for anything to keep the forums going and growing

whether its paying an annual fee a lifetime fee or ads

i would suggest though that the content of the ads be not anything that would suggest illegal things

it probably wouldn't look to good if we had ads for say kronic or maybe psilocybe spore vendors and things like that

that may just look bad for us in general if you know what i mean

[Auxin]

Just, if ads are implemented, be sure to very blatantly mention it.

Between firefox, peerblock, and my modded Hosts I never see ads unless I explicitly allow them for a site (and some times not even then, lol)

I only get ads on a few porn sites I made exceptions for. I've never even seen a single ad on facebook and supposedly its one of the worst?

So, yeah... I'll make an exception for ads to load here if I'm told when there are ads <___base_url___>/uploads/emoticons/default_newimprovedwinkonclear.gif

[-YT-]

my 2cents is meh for ads lol rather see a paid membership like idea or grassroots fundraising (although knowing such as been done in the past and kinda hit n miss)

[Darklight]

After 15 years, dozens of 3am server crash rescues, the mediating of a gazillion personal online arguments, some of which have involved some right old space cadets, a few persistent though tragic stalkers, personally chasing up dodgy trades on behalf of members and trying to remain somehow available and consultative with the membership here I feel like I have nil right to tell you how to run this place. Nil.

We haven't always agreed. We probably never will. Big fucken deal. I have not done any of the hard yards keeping the place running and it is a testament to your dedication and generousity that the place has continued to function and keep a good standard of discussion going

You've done this pretty much single-handed over the last 15 years. Yes you have had help and good advice. Yes the mod teams have been gorgeous. But not one of us could have done this the way you have. And no-one else has managed to do anything remotely similar without it crashing to shit after a few years

Thank you

This place changed my life. It has focssed my attention, allowed me to pursue my own work and follow the common threads in others in many disparate fields. In 1999 I would have never dreamed that there was academic excellence to be found, and valid scientific enquiry to be pursued, in a field which was then regarded as suspicious and disreputable. In a different world now it is only slightly remarkable to be pursuing a PhD in say, neuronal stimulation of Ayahuasca in a clinical setting ( I made that topic up, but there are many like it ). 15 years ago it was unimaginable. I believe this site, along with Erowid, has been a part of this change

I've been an addict here, recovered, grieved, celebrated, condemned various of you to censure and taken the living piss out of not a few, copped some pretty funny shit ( we miss you CS ) and sacrificed a few randoms to the infernal gods. But throughout it all I've been a researcher, able to communicate my work and share my skills and learn from some simply wonderful people

In addition to this I have made many good and long term friends here. I have been to their houses and shared food and drink with them and have tried not to subject them to the food preparation at my place. We have tended each others hangovers and fixed each others vehicles and talked some high quality 3am shit around campfires. There are some lovely, clever, talented people here

The rest of you suck, of course. I didn't say I learned to play nicely ;) Nah, kidding

So do whatever you've got to Torsten. I know ethically it's not an easy decision for you. And I know you won't care if you get some flak for it once you make your mind up

But can we have strippers as well?

Edited July 6, 2014 by Darklight

[☽Ţ ҉ĥϋηϠ₡яღ☯ॐ€ðяئॐ♡Pϟiℓℴϟℴ]

i forfeited my vote sneak peeking last night <___base_url___>/uploads/emoticons/default_tongue.png and only 5 had voted then

but wanted a maybe option for question 3

1. yes

2. first post banner

3. maybe but probably option ...c

[Auxin]

But can we have strippers as well?

I like this idea.

It could be combined with fundraisers.

We could have video in chat and people could tip purchased tokens, MFC style, for the strippers to show off their areoles and do innovative things with despined columnar cacti.

The chatlog would be classic, like an orgy of academics well versed in latin

"yeah baby, work that Eriocereus, show daddy what that parenchyma can do!"

[someone]

Ethnobotanical girls gone wild!!!

Edited July 6, 2014 by someone

[Torsten]

Thank you so much for the detailed explanations

.

I don't mind if the poll votes are low - the feedback has been exactly what i was hoping for. I think it is pretty clear that what I think is acceptable is also acceptable to many members here.

SAB will always be free. I have no intentions to introduce a membership fee. However, I see no problem in setting some sort of fee to make the site ad free. It seems this is how most feel about it anyway. I am actually pleasantly surprised at how many members want this option.

Ad revenue comes from showing the ads and/or from people clicking them. Obviously there is a lot more benefit if the ad is clicked, but simply showing them is enough for some revenue. This does not rely on members strangely enough, as over 70% of page views are direct links from google searches. Most of these are not members nor will they stay on the site, but they will still contribute to the revenue.

My preference would be advertising contracts with advertisers I have selected, ie showing banners that I have approved. Ethnobotanical products is big business overseas because they can trade ayahuasca herbs, mushrooms, etc, but in australia it is at best small family businesses. So while banner advertising is easy to find overseas, in australia this might be a bit more difficult and would certainly involve big business like kronic [which was mentioned as being undesirable]. Though the changes in the legal situation have pretty much crippled those companies too. Any ideas of who to approach for advertising like that?

If private banner ads are not an option then there are ad companies where you can set pretty strict limits as to what is acceptable. eg we could make it strictly religious advertising so that we get to waste bigot dollars ;)

So members with adblock don't really have to do anything - most of the revenue will come from non-members.

Cost reduction was also mentioned, eg removing media files. One of the things I really like about this forum is that a lot of old content is still 'whole'. On most other sites images are linked rather than hosted so when the image host goes down the thread becomes useless. I can't stop members from linking files, but I can encourage those who want to build future reference threads to keep all media on this server so that their thread stay whole. I even still maintain two old gallery scripts to make sure the images stay where they are supposed to and the integrated gallery is one of the main reasons why i opted for IPB forums. I used to download all images that were over 1 year old, resize them to below 500kb and then reupload. With the advent of smart phones a few years ago that became wayyyy too time consuming.

Obtuse, with the inline ads, I would only do one location. It seems the most popular one is between first and second post. That way everyone knows where the ad is and can immediately skip it. And regular members would never mistake it for content.

This is all still in the early stages of thinking about it. I'll post details as I learn more about it.

Great quote in this thread that really sums up how I feel about cautiously placed ads is "People are great at ignoring stuff" <___base_url___>/uploads/emoticons/default_smile.png

[Foo]

It shouldn't be very hard to setup different adds for AU members.

I imagine there would be good money for US ethno stores. Do you have the stats on viewer origin?

[Torsten]

US stores won't be interested in advertising here. They hate sending stuff to oz and we don't have a huge inernational membership anymore. Maybe 15%. Then again, random google traffic is almost all from overseas. hmmmmm.....

[C_T]

tbh, simply having a members only section will get enough donations. i think you'd be surprised.

don't need to adv if you didn't want to. start from there?

edit: i would suggest btc donations too

Edited July 10, 2014 by C_T

[Torsten]

I am surprised at the many recommendation of a private members forum. I remember that the 'ivory tower' was one of the most reviled ideas. And after seeing the content of the private forum on gomaos' forum it really put me off the idea for life.

Has there been a change of heart?

[Foo]

I for one think a private forum is a terrible idea. Except if it served a very specific purpose.

What i meant T was to have dynamic adds. US adds are shown to US costumers, AU adds for AU.

[Darklight]

Has there been a change of heart?

No, that idea sucks arse, just like it always did :D

[Kent]

Ads don't bother me as long as they don't try to sell me something by saying there's a problem with my computer when there isn't. Also ads that I look further into and won't let me exit. An annual fee is fine by me as well. I like to pay for services. You shouldn't be paying anything. I was donating $10 per month to another forum but left because of the abuse!.

Good luck, Kent.

[Dale]

This is what I am thinking would be cool, keep in mind I'm relatively new to the forum, but I've known about this place for quite a while. IMO the trade forum should be private and you should need a certain number of posts and to have been around for say 30 days, then if you have paid the five dollar annual membership fee you get access to a private discussion forum, chill space style, plus the seed and plant exchange forum. If you had to pay even a small fee we could probably avoid situations like those recently with people creating fake accounts as well as decreasing the likelihood of people abusing free trade threads and similar. Just an idea, also I'm not opposed to advertisements, really we could have both. I just think this could be beneficial for seed and plant exchange, being the only trade thread of its kind in Aus I would hate to see it get soured by scammers and manipulators. /rant

[Auxin]

No, that idea sucks arse, just like it always did :D

Hey now! As someone who enjoys sucking arse I take offense to that comparison <___base_url___>/uploads/emoticons/default_tongue.png

I, for one, still feel the same T. I loathe and abhor the idea of a members only forum and think it would degrade our image as well as our social structure and would be the first step to our demise as a viable and worthwhile community.

[obtuse]

Yeah, re: the private area on Australian ethnobotany (gomaos' forum), yeah that was a bad idea. it became a bitching area for some of the mods and could get nasty sometimes, particularly gomaos who would air all his dirty laundry.

The problem with private areas is that they can get "ivory tower", but also very (or not so) subtly changes that aspect of sharing information, and for me that is what forums are about, is free and easy sharing of info. keep it "open source" lol

i can see the reasons in the suggestion to hide trade threads and whatnot, but i think just limit ability to write to those threads rather than hide altogether.

re inline ads: i guess my suggestion was to make use of some more of your real estate. In a site i work on, we had this same dilemma, with multipage threads so the decision was to have an ad after 1st post, then 5th post and then 10th. per page. As mentioned people stop seeing them after a while and get used to where to expect them. but if your like me, as i sometimes read threads backwards, you miss them. i know its about page views, but i personally dont have a problem with ads as i appreciate the cost of running large websites, and because SAB covers my interest areas i would probably take notice of the ads as an indicator of what else is out there and available.

I'm loving the response to paid membership though it really shows a strong community support for this forum. like others im happy to contribute, but i need nothing in return.