mac266 27 Posted December 7, 2020 Report Share Posted December 7, 2020 The aggressive pop-up ads on this site are way too much. I have blockers installed and this thing is bypassing them. I click the "x" in the corner to kill the ad, and it doesn't go anywhere. I have to hit the "back" button and reload the page, then click on the thread I wanted to see and hope I don't get the ad again. I've switched browsers to one that has a better blocker for now, but your advertisers are always programming ways to get around those. It has become WAY TOO DISTRACTING and frustrating to continue using this site unless something changes. I know you make your money off advertising, so there always has to be some. But the ones you have made arrangements with are overly aggressive assholes. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
LMSANS 590 Posted December 7, 2020 Report Share Posted December 7, 2020 Not having this issue with Safari on my Mac (MacOS11). Quote Link to post Share on other sites
maven 4,871 Posted December 7, 2020 Report Share Posted December 7, 2020 I recommend the Brave browser. It uses the Chromium engine (same as the heart of Google Chrome), but it's faster and more private. It blocks all ads by default. I wasn't aware that this site had ads. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
MadMax 2,244 Posted December 7, 2020 Report Share Posted December 7, 2020 54 minutes ago, maven said: I wasn't aware that this site had ads. Pssssst... @Umpire in Chief... I call dibs on Maven's share of the Ad Revenue dividends then! Heh, I'd be just like an (most) assigner(s)... 1 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Umpire in Chief 1,645 Posted December 8, 2020 Report Share Posted December 8, 2020 @mac266 Question, would you say it has gotten worse since the update? Could you PM me some screenshots? Thanks Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Umpire in Chief 1,645 Posted December 9, 2020 Report Share Posted December 9, 2020 I'm temporarily removing the ads, and rebuilding the advertisement engine. This is only temporary, but I think you should find far few ads as some seemed to be doubled up. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
BT_Blue 1,561 Posted December 9, 2020 Report Share Posted December 9, 2020 I am not having any issue with ads on the mobile version. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Umpire in Chief 1,645 Posted December 9, 2020 Report Share Posted December 9, 2020 Reintroducing the ads. The issue is with the Google Ad Sense Auto Placement and my SW not meshing well. I'm going to continue to tweak it. I definitely need the ad revenue to keep operating at as little deficit / slight profit as possible but I don't want it to be obnoxious. I'm going to continue to tweak it until I feel the balance is there. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
mac266 27 Posted December 9, 2020 Author Report Share Posted December 9, 2020 On 12/8/2020 at 7:44 AM, Umpire in Chief said: @mac266 Question, would you say it has gotten worse since the update? Could you PM me some screenshots? Thanks 19 hours ago, Umpire in Chief said: I'm temporarily removing the ads, and rebuilding the advertisement engine. This is only temporary, but I think you should find far few ads as some seemed to be doubled up. 1 hour ago, Umpire in Chief said: Reintroducing the ads. The issue is with the Google Ad Sense Auto Placement and my SW not meshing well. I'm going to continue to tweak it. I definitely need the ad revenue to keep operating at as little deficit / slight profit as possible but I don't want it to be obnoxious. I'm going to continue to tweak it until I feel the balance is there. I haven't been on the site for a few days, but it would seem you no longer need the screen shots? Thank you for addressing this. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Umpire in Chief 1,645 Posted December 10, 2020 Report Share Posted December 10, 2020 I did a few more adjustments to the ads Not quite optimal, but much better and the best I could do while at work... Quote Link to post Share on other sites
BT_Blue 1,561 Posted December 11, 2020 Report Share Posted December 11, 2020 I didnt notice the ads to bad in the past. But these are pretty invasive. On Android mobile version of the forums main page. There is an ad at the top. Then in between each forum grouping. Then 3 at the bottom of the page plus the normal Ump-Attire ad. Then every so often one of those pull down ads at the very top of the screen. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Aging_Arbiter 1,591 Posted December 11, 2020 Report Share Posted December 11, 2020 whatever you did, ads are now showing up in my "reply" box. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
BT_Blue 1,561 Posted December 12, 2020 Report Share Posted December 12, 2020 I hate to say it. But with the ads the way they are. If I was new to the site I wouldn't come back. They are extremely distracting and make it hard to follow along with the page. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
HokieUmp 475 Posted December 12, 2020 Report Share Posted December 12, 2020 I'm assuming this discussion is again aimed more at the mobile version than the browser one? Because I use the Adblock Plus add-on with Firefox (v 83.0), and the only ad I've seen lately is the one Aging used as an example. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
BT_Blue 1,561 Posted December 12, 2020 Report Share Posted December 12, 2020 1 hour ago, HokieUmp said: I'm assuming this discussion is again aimed more at the mobile version than the browser one? Because I use the Adblock Plus add-on with Firefox (v 83.0), and the only ad I've seen lately is the one Aging used as an example. Thanks for the recommendation. That cleaned it up really nice. I used AdClear on Samsung Internet on my Android. 1 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Umpire in Chief 1,645 Posted December 14, 2020 Report Share Posted December 14, 2020 I'm continuing to adjust and will be working on it tonight again. On 12/11/2020 at 4:30 PM, Aging_Arbiter said: whatever you did, ads are now showing up in my "reply" box. I see that too. And with the google automatic ad insertion, I can select places for it not to be, but I'm trying to figure out hot to remove from there as I find that one annoying too. I will turn them off again later today and start from scratch. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Umpire in Chief 1,645 Posted December 14, 2020 Report Share Posted December 14, 2020 The ads are off again while I play with it. I thought I would put my goals of ads out there gust as an FYI... This site will never make millions of dollars and that's fine, I've operated the site at a complete loss, and have over the past 5ish years or so have actually made more than it costs to run. Nothing crazy, just enough to maybe take my family out to 2 maybe 3 nice dinners out. But I would and continue to operate with no revenue from the site, just because I like doing it and it's fun for me on multiple levels. I do not want the ads to be an annoyance. I personally dislike sites that are as much ads as content. And I want everyone to have a pleasant viewing experience. Here are my goals with the ads... 1. Make a little money. It's a lot easier to sell to my wife when there is at least some income. 2. Use the ads to encourage people to register. My "goal" is to have guests see more ads than registered users and having fewer ads will give people incentive to register. I intend guests to see 8-10 ads per page depending on the size of the page. This is one of the issues I'm having with the Google Auto Insertion right now. I believe I've defined the parameters well but It doesn't want to seem to differentiate between guests and members. 3. Registered members I intend to see 3-5 ads per page in a least intrusive method as possible. Bear with me and I'll get this to an area where everyone will enjoy the site. 2 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Umpire in Chief 1,645 Posted December 23, 2020 Report Share Posted December 23, 2020 Just an FYI I'll be playing with the ads again this weekend. I don't think we'll have that much traffic. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
wolfe_man 904 Posted December 23, 2020 Report Share Posted December 23, 2020 1 hour ago, Umpire in Chief said: Just an FYI I'll be playing with the ads again this weekend. I don't think we'll have that much traffic. LOL I noticed they were back. Main page has a big FESTIVUS banner. Made me laugh! Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Vegas_Ump 52 Posted January 3 Report Share Posted January 3 Mac: You may have maleware that snuck onto your computer! This will literally seek advertisers' web sites, and even some unsavory ones! "Aggressive Pop-up ads" are symptoms of malware! Suggest you run your virus detector often and get a VPN that will make your computers and phones "invisible" to evildoers. Good luck! Mike Las Vegas 1 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
BT_Blue 1,561 Posted January 4 Report Share Posted January 4 11 hours ago, Vegas_Ump said: and get a VPN that will make your computers and phones "invisible" to evildoers. Good luck! Mike Las Vegas I've been thinking of getting one for my family as I am on the road a lot as a truck driver (not over the road, but still all over the area I live) as well as being able to watch shows from other countries (its been really frustrating to have to wait for the second half of Bluey season 2!). Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Umpire in Chief 1,645 Posted January 4 Report Share Posted January 4 I've been on a privacy kick lately and got a VPN for the family. I chose Surfshark. No complaints. I do need to go into the settings and adjust one thing that bugs me, but that's more me than it. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
BT_Blue 1,561 Posted January 5 Report Share Posted January 5 I'm on a bunch if different youtube channels and they advertise a bunch of different ones. You would say a VPN is worth having? Quote Link to post Share on other sites
kylehutson 586 Posted January 5 Report Share Posted January 5 14 hours ago, BT_Blue said: I'm on a bunch if different youtube channels and they advertise a bunch of different ones. You would say a VPN is worth having? Speaking as an IT pro... most likely not. I use a VPN to connect to my workplace(s) - that's perfectly valid and another issue altogether. Using a VPN so you can get to Netflix in another country - perhaps moral (and legal due to their "terms of service") issues, but I'm not going to point fingers at you, if that's what you want to spend your money on. Generic VPN for "privacy"? - probably not. Here's the thing, most communications are already encrypted with SSL (so "secure" - that happens whether or not you're connected to a VPN. What isn't encrypted? The names of the sites you're visiting (facebook.com, netflix.com, etc.). They can tell that you're getting to those sites and how much information you're getting from them, but not the contents of that data. Now you use a VPN. They can no longer see what sites you're going to, but the VPN company can. So you've really only traded one potential bad actor for another. I really don't care if my grocery store can tell that I'm visiting Facebook and Email while walking through their store. They can't actually see my Facebook feed or email. IMHO, who cares? 3 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
BT_Blue 1,561 Posted January 10 Report Share Posted January 10 On 1/5/2021 at 12:02 PM, kylehutson said: Speaking as an IT pro... most likely not. I use a VPN to connect to my workplace(s) - that's perfectly valid and another issue altogether. Using a VPN so you can get to Netflix in another country - perhaps moral (and legal due to their "terms of service") issues, but I'm not going to point fingers at you, if that's what you want to spend your money on. Generic VPN for "privacy"? - probably not. Here's the thing, most communications are already encrypted with SSL (so "secure" - that happens whether or not you're connected to a VPN. What isn't encrypted? The names of the sites you're visiting (facebook.com, netflix.com, etc.). They can tell that you're getting to those sites and how much information you're getting from them, but not the contents of that data. Now you use a VPN. They can no longer see what sites you're going to, but the VPN company can. So you've really only traded one potential bad actor for another. I really don't care if my grocery store can tell that I'm visiting Facebook and Email while walking through their store. They can't actually see my Facebook feed or email. IMHO, who cares? Thanks. I'm more a little concerned about the fact that I am on the road and in and out of places all the time for work. I guess it is just one of those things that one worries about because you are now thinking about it (thanks a lot, stupid youtube!) Quote Link to post Share on other sites
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