Advertising on Railroad.net

[Jeff Smith]

Unless Jeff has split personalities or a secret identity, he isn't the owner. Though, Jeff Smith with a secret identity would be pretty cool.

Shhhh, don't give away my secret identity. I change the part in my hair and take off my phony reading glasses when I put on my railroad.net cape!

I gave the owner a link to this thread. He advised me that they've enabled for a month's trial "pop-unders", which when using IE generally isn't seen until you close all your tabs and windows. They are also limited to one-per-day.

While I find pop-ups mildly annoying, for what it's worth, I don't think they are nearly as bad as the gum-gum picture ads and highlighted words. Of course, to each their own; everyone has a preference. I understand that the owner needs a return on his investment. As for the traffic, the owner does get a monthly report regarding first visits, average time logged in, etc. If he detects a decrease that adversely affects the site, I'm sure he'll make adjustments.

I think we have a great site; I would hope a single pop-up a day won't drive anyone away. If it was a constant thing every minute, yeah. But one a day isn't bad at all.

Nevertheless, keep the opinions coming; the owner has been responsive.

Thanks all.

Jeff

[MEC407]

Jeff, I absolutely agree: the highlighted word ads were completely over the top, and probably would have driven me away from the site if they had been kept in place (that's saying a lot, considering my loyalty to this site); the ads that inserted themselves on top of people's photos were pretty bad too (I definitely wasn't a fan of those, and at a minimum would have stopped posting photos here).

The pop-ups (or pop-unders) aren't as bad, but they're still annoying... especially since they don't seem to be working in the manner intended by the site owner. None of mine have popped under; they've always popped up, on top of whatever I'm doing at the time. I don't know enough about HTML/Javascript/etc to understand why this happens, but perhaps it's because they're using some kind of aggressive tactic to defeat the built-in popup blockers found in most modern web browsers.

I'm disappointed that we'll continue to have to deal with these, but I greatly appreciate your time/effort in looking into the issue, and I'm glad that the owner chose to go with something marginally less obnoxious than the other types of ads we discussed above.

[charlie6017]

There was a post on here earlier, kind of asking why the owner wants to be "hidden" and now it's not
here. I think that's actually a good question........why is he absentee? He does all this "stuff", for lack
of a better word, and Jeff has to be the go-between.

I think it's wacky!

Charlie

[prr60]

I'm not sure why it is considered a secret here, since the owner proudly identifies his ownership of Railroad.net on his website. The owner is ResourceWebs LLC, a web properties ownership firm, headed by Evan Britton.

ResourceWebs

[MEC407]

I got two pop-ups this morning, one after another.

[rslitman]

Perhaps that bit about different strokes for different folks is true here. I would much rather see the underlined words in text than to see a pop-up ad. On Internet Explorer 8, these DO NOT pop "under". They are front and center. They show up even when I have the pop-up blocker set. But at least they are easy to get rid of. On a Nook eBook reader's web browser or a Smartphone running Android, it's hard to find the X to click to get rid of. The first couple of times it showed up on my Smartphone, I had no idea what was happening.

Even a month is too long to endure this. I hope this is deemed a failure by the site owner, and they will be gone soon.

Also, I much prefer the little ads that appeared under the photos. If we have to pick our "poison", please give me those ads under the photos instead of the pop-ups!

[MEC407]

But at least they are easy to get rid of.

Which is why I'd prefer popups if I had to choose between those and the other types of ads. I can close a popup; I can't do anything to dismiss the other ones.

[rslitman]

But at least they are easy to get rid of.

Which is why I'd prefer popups if I had to choose between those and the other types of ads. I can close a popup; I can't do anything to dismiss the other ones.

Easy to get rid of, but still a nuisance, on my desktop computer. Hard to get rid of on my Nook browser and my Android smartphone. I consider the underlined text to be non-intrusive.

[MEC407]

I agree that it's nonintrusive, in terms of the browser "experience" -- I guess my objection is more to do with not wanting my words to be seen as an endorsement of a particular product/service/scam. Less-savvy users wouldn't be able to tell the difference between a link that I was providing and a link that was inserted by the ad system, and I have a major problem with that.

I hope that whole thing is [dirty] water under the bridge.

[Jeff Smith]

Not sure why sometimes they pop up rather than under, but again, I consider it to be a minor annoyance. I'll keep you posted of developments.

[ApproachMedium]

The pop unders are very annoying We are tired of the unnessicary advertisements. If the site is really that desperate for extra money to run maybe we can come up with a donation system? I would be glad to contribute if it means we can keep our ads to the normal level they once were.

It seems like we lost the annoying ones in the photos and now gained these annoying pop unders. If i happen to close my google chrome window and thats under it, then i close the pop under my next new broswer window is the pop under. VERY ANNOYING.

[charlie6017]

ApproachMedium and others:

I have been using Mozilla Firefox browser and Mozilla also has "Pop-up Blocker" as an add-on.
This tool works very well and whenever I use this browser and have the pop-up blocker enabled,
I do not get any pop-ups and pop-unders. I know full well how annoying these ads are and have
complained loudly. But since they are still there, I think this is a great way to avoid them. I do
like being a member here despite the owner, so I use this browser every time I am online here.

So do yourself a favor and get this browser, it is better than the others, IMHO.

Charlie

www.mozilla.com

[MEC407]

Charlie, are you using Firefox's built-in popup blocker and an add-on popup blocker, or just using one or the other? I have the built-in popup blocker enabled, and usually it works, but not always. Often when I visit railroad.net, it'll alert me that it blocked a popup, and then when I go to a different thread, a popup will manage to get through. In every case, they pop UP rather than under.

[Patrick Boylan]

I use firefox, and have popup blocker enabled. Who knows how many popups I would get if I didn't have it engaged, but I do get some, probably 1 out of every 2 visits to rr.net. Yes I find them annoying, but not nearly as annoying as other types of ads, for example the ones that used to come with photographs in posts.
For what it's worth:
1. I never bother to read anything in a popup, I just close it right away, so although rr.net must be getting ad revenue, I give the advertisers very little bang for their buck beyond whatever advantage they deem they get from the fraction of a second I subliminally view their ad before killing it.
2. What causes me to limit my rr.net participation is not the advertisements, but rather the seemingly moderator encouraged abusive posts, particularly in the NJ transit forum. Forgive me if I'm mixing up messages from Jeff with those from the moderators, but the theme I've seen has been "Don't respond to insults, if you do we'll blame you, not the guy who started the trash talk". I agree that the best way to handle flamers and trolls is to ignore them, but I don't like what I perceive to be a ' blame the victim' mentality. Also at some point ignoring to respond cab become self censorship, and can result in detrimentally lowered participation.

These purging therapy sessions often do me so much good. I feel a lot better now.

[Jeff Smith]

I appreciate everyone's patience. I don't own the site, so I don't make the decisions. I know some of the "hard-core" members (and I mean that as a compliment, truly, I do, no winks or smilies to insert) find the pop-up's annoying. The worse to me were the gum gum picture ads, followed by the pop up words. Others have different preferences.

My opinion, in all seriousness, is I get one pop-under a day, and it doesn't bug me. I use IE, so I get the message at the bottom, and the request for an XML add-on from Microsoft. Not sure if the add-on would help the pop-up blocker or not, but fact is, I know when the pop under happens, and I close it from the IE menu on the bottom bar immediately.

I appreciate the suggestions on alternate browsers and blocker add-ons. I suppose the owner could tell me to delete those, but he doesn't, and I don't, because I think he appreciates the input. That said, he still makes the decisions.

Approach, it's your view that the pop-up's are unnecessary. Who's this "we" you're talking about? While I'm sure there are others who find them annoying, I don't think you should speak for them. How do you propose the new owner make his money back on the site? I have no idea what he spent to buy the site, but as I've said, he deserves a return on his investment. As you've noted, the most annoying ones are gone, so the owner is responsive. Do you wish to deny him all opportunity at making his money back so you can avoid one or two mouse clicks on an x a day?

I think a donation or pay system would be unwieldy. I'd much rather he make his money through advertising. And I'm sure there are market studies out there that will tell you what the drop-off in membership would be.

Patrick, I'm going to dispute you on the moderation. We've had the discussion either in threads (and I discourage the discussion in threads on RAILROADS at all costs and am guilty of engaging in myself; part of the admin learning process) or via PM. There is guilt on both sides. I generally no longer openly discuss my moderation tactics (and I'm only doing it here because it's the general forum, even if moderation is off-topic to advertising, I'll answer it), but there is stuff that goes on behind the scenes you're not privy to. So don't think I just pick on the complainers. Most of us are grown-ups, and most of us don't know each other. It's an internet forum. Sometimes you just have to get over it. If you think someone's a jack-a$$, there's not much I can do about it. As a parent is wont to say, "I don't care who started it". I've got a "cut the crap" thread in NJT for just that purpose. Frankly, some of the stuff that gets posted is meant to provoke. I go through NJT threads with a slash and burn mentality on the silliness and off-topic stuff, which is started as often by a foamer as by a railroader, because I don't have time to deal with it.