New Advertising Bar

[Bull Martin]

What's with the new advertising bar on the side?  It's driving me nuts.

Brad, Do we have any other options?

[Jihme]

wow i didn't even notice it was there until you said something lol.  i think I'm blind.

[Cow Pie]

It sucks for small monitors, looks better on my big one at home...

[Brad]

What's with the new advertising bar on the side?  It's driving me nuts.

Brad, Do we have any other options?

Sorry to be so late in seeing this thread....does it look any better for you nowadays?

I'm going to make an announcement on the ad bar in the near future.  I'm still testing some of it out.

Bottom line is that for us to grow we need more space and speed.  With the help of some donors, the site has been paid for out of pocket by me for about 9 years.  With our increasing volume, it's time to look at converting some of that traffic to dollars so that we can afford bigger and faster servers as well as other features and functions.

Brad

[No_Willie_Jokes_Yet]

I'd like to make a motion that the word "Bar" never be used to describe anything other than a place where I can get a drink. I was SO disapointed in this thread.

[postmortem]

I'd like to make a motion that the word "Bar" never be used to describe anything other than a place where I can get a drink. I was SO disapointed in this thread.

Seconded.

[Bull Martin]

What's with the new advertising bar on the side?  It's driving me nuts.

Brad, Do we have any other options?

Sorry to be so late in seeing this thread....does it look any better for you nowadays?

I'm going to make an announcement on the ad bar in the near future.  I'm still testing some of it out.

Bottom line is that for us to grow we need more space and speed.  With the help of some donors, the site has been paid for out of pocket by me for about 9 years.  With our increasing volume, it's time to look at converting some of that traffic to dollars so that we can afford bigger and faster servers as well as other features and functions.

Brad

I know there's a certain sentimental aspect to the old posts, but couldn't we just dump all posts older than 4 years, except of course for those in the Hall of fame?  It would give the hall of fame thread more meaning as well.

It would reduce space and help the servers.

--------

Since the original post I've gotten more used to the side advertisement, but I still don't particularly like it.  I was just hoping to find other ways to help out other than advertising.

It's not that I'm against advertising, but couldn't you just mash it onto the bottom so it doesn't mess up the screen?  I'm sort of OCD and it bothers me to have the message board not centered on my monitor.

[Velcro]

The old post quantity is of minimal impact.  The quantity of posts reads per minute is more important (ie concurrent viewers) and has grown tremendously.  Bandwidth is and server RAM/CPU speed are much more important and expensive than HD Space which costs very little.

I like the new method of advertising.  It uses the right most portion of the browser window, which has minimal impact to anyone using a monitor that isn't an ancient crt set to 800 x 600 or less and since it is still highly visible, the revenue stream it creates is much bigger than if it were just a little bar at the bottom.  Advertisers HATE their ads being at the bottom.

This setup is a perfect blend of everyting and is a neccessary evil in order to grow the site (IE allow more concurrent viewers).

[Brad]

I hate advertising too...but as Velcro knows I hate paying out of pocket all the time too.  Monthly expenditures for a public forum are a pain.  But we have to be able to run it.  Unless we can get a grant from a local politician, we're gonna be stuck with advertising.