Thanks, Gill!

I haven’t got any sort of whitelist but for what it’s worth I’ve just sent an e-coffee your way..

well i add my favourite sites to whitelist
but my concern is
1- ssl.gstatics/graphs.facebook.com etc
just slow down the loading of the page on a limited connection
2- sharing integration, hate it, if i want sites in social network list i can like/follow them on my own , hate when people force

If these two problem are taken care of then i can let more sites in my whitelist but for now your site is in
Period

Hi all,

I just wanted to give you a heads up that the volume on the video news feed ad has been turned down. It should be much less noticeable now unless you have your system’s volume cranked way up high.

I just tested it and I could hardly hear it even with my volume set to maximum. So be much less irritating. I would prefer it be off all the way, but they have agreements with advertisers so it’s not possible to turn it all the way down. But the volume is significantly lowered from what it was before.

Thank you all for your helpful comments, I think they had an impact on my ad network. They sent me replacement code today and I have updated all of my blogs with it. Sorry for the annoyance, I hope this makes things better.

Hi Ryan,

Thanks for the feedback. The video player is from IDG Tech Net, they are a large advertising agency. Sites run it because it pays a high CPM (much higher usually than just banner ads). So that’s why you’ll see it on some sites (including other linux sites).

Did you notice the Print/PDF button after the social media badges? Scroll down and you should see it. If you click Single Page in the drop down menu and then click the Print/PDF button you can get the review with or without images. You can then print it or convert it to PDF format if you prefer.

I hope that helps. Yes, I do depend on the ads. Sorry that they are bothering you. I have passed on the feedback to my ad agency, and encouraged them to turn the sound off by default.

The ad you saw in an image is being tested. If you need to ad block, feel free. I’d rather that you stayed as a reader than worry too much about the ads not being shown in your browser. So do what you need to do.

Hey Jim, I think you remember me saying that I would whitelist your site from my Adblocker.

I eventually did, but I’m adding it back. The ads here since last year just gotten downright ridiculous.

I don’t know where the heck that video player is from (saw it on an another linux site!), but I DO NOT need a video that AUTO PLAYS when I am reading! I do not care about it! So I list this site on my Flashblock now..

But it gets worse. I scroll down your review of opensuse 12.1 and I see a freaking advertisement inside the PICTURE. Along with that when I try to copy some text for later research on the distro (I “distrohop”.) I see an ad popping up that has NOTHING to do with the word that I accidentally moved my cursor on.

This is all along the normal flash ads around the site that’s been there..

This is insanity. I wish to continue reading the content on this site, but it’s just crazy. I don’t blame Kubuntu for including an Adblocker by default. If you find a way to get those crazy things past my filter, I’m gonna just ditch your site honestly.

Also it seems the guy above me has the same concerns, sorry Jim, but donating money to you just doesn’t cut it as I have alot of bills to pay and a family to care for. Also Coffee costs like $1.00 these days. Do you depend on these ads THAT much? Besides I don’t like PayPal anyways lol

Sorry if this sounded like a rant, but these are just my honest opinions and concerns.

Hope these gets resolved or at least NOTED before this website becomes one of those annoying pages when a domain expires with ads.. only with a playing video, popups and flash content playing at the same time.

Hi Jim,

Thanks for the feedback, I will pass your comment onto my ad network. I’ve encouraged them to go back to having the sound off by default. It’s very helpful to have reader feedback to send to them.

Sorry you won’t be visiting the blog, I hope you reconsider at some point. You might want to consider something like a flash blocker plugin to mute the video feed. Or simply run an ad blocker if you really need to. You can always make a contribution to the blog by using the Buy Me A Coffee link.

Thanks again for the feedback.

Jim:

I’ll be frank…

I usually regret clicking on a link to one of your reviews from the latest reviews list at distrowatch.com (how I just got to your site when I noticed a new OpenSUSE 12.1 review listed there).

Why? Lately, there is always a video playing with sound blaring through my speakers when I get to a review on your site.

For this visit, I just disabled Flash Player to stop it. If I had checked where the review link was going to from distrowatch.com first (using a “mouse over”), I would have known not to click on the link to the review because it’s on your site. My bad (I didn’t pay any attention to where the link was pointing to, and sure enough, a video started with sound blaring through my speakers).

So, I’m going to take an extraordinary step now and just add the your site to /etc/hosts to make sure I don’t end up here by accident again. I may access your site from time to time to see if you’ve stopped that practice or not (videos starting automatically when users land on your site’s pages). But, for now, I’m just going to make sure I don’t accidentally get to your site from links on other sites.

Sorry Jim. Ad banners are one thing. Videos automatically starting and playing with Audio are something else entirely and that kind of thing is very annoying (to me anyway).

JimC

Ads pay the bills and I am fine with that. However you are so wrong with this one statement.
In-Text Ads: Not So Bad Once You Get Used to Them
WRONG. They are terrible and intrusive. AdSense is fine and I can live with banners as long as they are static. No video, animation or sound. Good ads that reflect the interests of the reader can be a win win. In-Text Ads means instant ad block.

Interesting approach Jim, i think I may adopt a slightly different but similar approach/site ad rules (can’t think of the right word). Maybe eventually there will be some sort of Jim Lynch’s Web Site Bill Of Rights ;-) The cookie blocker is interesting, know of any good ones?

Thanks, Ryan. I appreciate it.

Eh, since i enjoy this site i’ll whitelist it…

I’d rather pay for a subscription and NOT have to look at ads. But, unfortunately, by-subscription sites figure that since they already have your attention, they might as well make some more money by showing you ads. Originally cable TV was supposed to be commercial-free. Now the infomercial are interupted by commercials.

Hi Luke,

Thanks, and welcome to DLR.

Jim,

I appreciate you taking the time to explain your revenue stream and asking nicely that people think about it before blocking the ads.

I use an ad-blocker, always have done since I first found out about them many years ago (pre-firefox) and probably always will do, but if I end up coming back to your site regularly over the next month or two (today is my first visit) I’ll be sure to you buy you a cup of coffee.

WordPress, see the Meta widget in the right column. There is a link in it to WordPress.org. There’s nothing that says “powered by WordPress” though. If you know of where I can get a graphic or something like that, please post a link to it. Thanks.

Where is link to “powered by WordPress” ? They deserve their money and bandwidth as well, don’t they?

Thanks, Beelzebud. I really do appreciate that. The ads help pay for my rent, food, heat, health insurance, car insurance and all the other usual stuff.

If you enjoy the content here on DLR, you might also want to check out JimLynch.com. It’s mostly opinion columns on that site, though occasionally I do a review too. See the sidebar under the coffee cup here on DLR for links to JimLynch.com current articles.

Welcome to my whitelist. You’re in good company, as your site only shares it with a grand total of 4 other sites on the net. I find your reviews worth it.

I read your comment at Ars, and because you asked, came here to rate your adblocker policy. To be honest this isn’t my sort of site so I probably won’t be back, but it won’t be the ads that chased me away!

That said, I think your adblock policy is perfectly fine. It’s respectful. It clearly states your boundaries (the kinds of ads you WON’T show) and that’s a good thing. It explains how allowing the ads to show can help your site even if no one looks at them or clicks on them. It gives regular readers a way to use their adblockers and still help you pay the costs of running your site. Best of all it shows real effort on your part to reach a fair compromise.

But that probably doesn’t matter to most of the folks out there who use adblockers, as we see here (TheBuzzSaw’s comment) and as we definitely saw in the 50 pages of comments on the Ars article. Many of them will find any excuse to justify an attitude which I translate roughly as ‘Give me free stuff on my terms, or FOAD.’

It’s sad, but people of that mindset don’t seem very willing to walk in the other guy’s shoes for a moment. To take the time to consider that even if a site publisher wants to give away the fruit of his labors, that site publisher still has bills to pay. It strikes me as the ultimate in selfish to make up all these excuses for what is essentially the unwillingness to spend even the millisecond of one’s time required to simply look away from the ad. But there it is: those folks feel that way, they don’t want to hear anything else, and like it or not, they’re gonna do what they’re gonna do.

I’m especially dismayed by the “find a new business model” folks. They never seem to suggest one that works – often they seem completely oblivious to any requirement other than that THEY shouldn’t be bothered with such mundane concerns. OH well. Once again, they’ve found their excuse, it sounds good to them (whether it works in the real world or not), and they’ll be doing what they want to do anyway.

So in reality I think the only real answer to people like this is: give them what they asked for. If they block ads, show them a page kindly asking them to unblock or make a donation. If they don’t want your content, they’ll move on.

By the way, I had to write this comment in a text editor and then paste it into your comment box. Your site seems to refresh the page every so often and when it does, that completely blows away whatever the user has typed in the comment fields. REALLY ANNOYING. If you want thoughtful comments, you will need to fix that!

Hi BuzzSaw,

I see the link from the Ars article is working.

I’d rather not try to use a pay wall. I doubt many readers would want to pay for yet another subscription and I also don’t like the idea of having to force people to pay directly to read this blog.

However, you can leave a tip via Paypal if you wish rather than letting ads run in your browser. Just go to this link.

A voluntary monthly or whatever tip is something that any reader can do and I’m sure most sites would appreciate any kind of contribution you could make. That’s one way of helping to support the sites you read without loading ads.

As far as other business models go, that’s a tough nut to crack. I don’t think anybody has a good alternative that doesn’t involve forced subscriptions or fees. Maybe a per article fee? I’m not sure how many readers would really like that though.

So for now ads are still the main business model for web publishing.

Regardless of what the topic is, if you find yourself having to “educate your customers”, you need a new business model. The RIAA/MPAA have been educating for years. All they have done is annihilate their reputations.

I use an ad-blocker. I will continue to use ad-blockers. The Internet is a very pleasant place this way. If you don’t want my kind around, block us.

Seriously, it is time to overcome this mentality that “I have always made money this way, therefore I deserve to continue making money this way”. Well, I’m sick of ads. Put up a paywall.

Hi Tony,

Thanks for dropping by and sharing your thoughts.

In addition to the Google ads, there are also image ads that load on DLR. Between the two of them they help me pay my bills every month.

So blocking ads does hurt financially and it makes it harder for me to put more time into writing content for the blog. That’s why I ask that folks please consider turning off their ad blockers when they visit DLR.

If you prefer to block the Google ads then please consider letting the image ads load while you’re here as that will still help support the blog.

There is also an alternative way to help support the blog and that’s the coffee cup in the right hand nav bar. Folks who prefer to block ads can leave a tip once a month to help support the blog. I suggested the price of a cup of coffee as that’s pretty reasonable if people feel that DLR is providing some value to them.

Anyway, thanks again for the feedback.

I’d disagree with you over disabling ad blockers for your site – here’s why:

If I run an ad blocker, even if I were to let you show your ads I guarantee I’m not the kind of person to ever click on one of them.

Also, the ad ranking system with Google (and I understand some others) is more likely to give you higher paying ads if your click percentage is higher. So, even if I let you show your ads, it’s only going to reduce your ad revenue because I’ll be reducing your click percentage!

Just my $.02 worth that I’ve learned over the years of running ads on my own site.