Adverts in sig's

[fredheim_holm]

Just a small debate is what I'm looking for really, gauging peoples views on whether or not posters on here should be allowed to advertise there business in there signature.

I see reasons for both for and against this, as I state below:

For:

• It's a public forum, why do we have to patrol what people put in there signatures as long as it isn't offensive or rude.
• If people post on here, they should have the right to use small adverts in their signatures, if they didn't post then there wouldn't be an advert, so surely it encourages the forum itself?
• If people can have pictures of semi clothed women on here (not directed at anyone in particular, I just find it distasteful and derogatory to women) then why can't we promote Southend fans companies?
• Surely promoting SUFC fans companies is a good thing, something we should look to endorse rather then stamp out.

Against:

• It could retract from the advertisements placed on SZ main page
• It could clutter the forum with advertisements, but what if there were a small pixel limit placed upon them?

 

[Mr. Benedict]

You've been told off about it then eh, Fred? ;)

I've no opinion on this myself, as it's the business of the forum owners what restrictions they decide to enforce on the content of avatars / signatures.

 

[Napster]

You can't promote. Simple as. The owners pay money tokeep this going, so why should you have free advertising?

 

[MK Shrimper]

How about if a small fee was paid to Szone to help with running costs?

 

[Pubey]

i think the only adverts allowed on SZ should be ones where the benefit goes to SZ, many companies and businesses pay (and have paid) to advertise on SZ and so having personal adverts in sigs will undermine those that have paid for the privilege

 

[MK Shrimper]

What if my company sold pictures of scantily clad women?

 

[fredheim_holm]

You can't promote. Simple as. The owners pay money tokeep this going, so why should you have free advertising?

Fair point Napster and one that I thought may come up. I suppose the main debating point on this point, if that makes sense, is that as a poster on SZ you should have the freedom to increase how much your business' is known, in return for increasing the activity on the forum. It's quite a small point really, but one still worth keeping in mind.

I'd be interested to see you explain your point further as to clarify my mind on this area.

How about if a small fee was paid to Szone to help with running costs?

That may be something I may look into in the future, as I do love this forum and advertising may help out my business, but currently we do not have the funds as we are a trio of teenagers whom lay about in college all day :p

i think the only adverts allowed on SZ should be ones where the benefit goes to SZ, many companies and businesses pay (and have paid) to advertise on SZ and so having personal adverts in sigs will undermine those that have paid for the privilege

Indeed a fair point and a valid one, the only thing that could possibly counter this is that would business' still pay for the priveledge of having there adverts on the main site, rather then in an almost scuffy (from the business perspective) forum signature where it may well get over looked or ignored.

What if my company sold pictures of scantily clad women?

Personally, I'm not a fan of the porn industry or anything that comes close to it, such as images of scantily clad women that men can get an errection over and dream exciting dreams about. I wait upon DtS to give me bad rep and call me gay.

 

[Mr. Benedict]

Fair point Napster and one that I thought may come up. I suppose the main debating point on this point, if that makes sense, is that as a poster on SZ you should have the freedom to increase how much your business' is known, in return for increasing the activity on the forum. It's quite a small point really, but one still worth keeping in mind.

I'd be interested to see you explain your point further as to clarify my mind on this area.

I can't see how that argument works, Fred. If you're not paying for the server fees and the wensite maintenance then I'm afraid the only freedoms that you should be allowed are the ones that the owners grant you.

Don't take this the wrong way, but one user alone does not really have much of an impact on site traffic anyway.

 

[Napster]

Ok, well, FH, you post 4.5 times a day, on average. SZ has at any time about 120+ registered users, as well as all the unregistered users, I don't know how many. The point is that your sig is viewed could be viewed as many as 500 times, not to mention all the times the thread is viewed, so again your sig is viewed, I suppose there is no hard and fast way of saying how many times your sig is viewed, but it's a lot, and I think this should be charged.

Secondly, yes, SZ is a business, hence the merchandise sale and so on, the money to pay for the servers is donated by the owners.
.

 

[fredheim_holm]

I can't see how that argument works, Fred. If you're not paying for the server fees and the wensite maintenance then I'm afraid the only freedoms that you should be allowed are the ones that the owners grant you.

Don't take this the wrong way, but one user alone does not really have much of an impact on site traffic anyway.

I wont take it the wrong way at all Benedict, I suppose what I'm doing is gauging peoples views on this and creating food for thought.

I totally agree the only freedoms I should be allowed are the ones the owners grant me, hence this post to share my opinion and receive feedback from mod's and posters.

I'm not trying to fight this to the death, I'm very certain that I wont be having a signature advertising my business in the near future and am just having a debate on the matter, as that is what forums are for, right?

I also realise that I do not create much traffic for SZ if any at all, but the posters make the forum so therefore we all contribute in a small way, however small that may be (which is probably your point right there).

 

[fredheim_holm]

Ok, well, FH, you post 4.5 times a day, on average. SZ has at any time about 120+ registered users, as well as all the unregistered users, I don't know how many. The point is that your sig is viewed could be viewed as many as 500 times, not to mention all the times the thread is viewed, so again your sig is viewed, I suppose there is no hard and fast way of saying how many times your sig is viewed, but it's a lot, and I think this should be charged.

Secondly, yes, SZ is a business, hence the merchandise sale and so on, the money to pay for the servers is donated by the owners.

Fair points Napster, I suppose the main downfall of my argument (if you could call it that) is that the forum has expenses and has to meet them with income so therefore is not in a place to be able to allow free advertisements.



How much would a signature advert cost? Would it be a monthly fee, or a one-off payment?

Also, would you ever place an advertisement at the bottom of the page, say a 600x90 advert? You could do it so it's on chances as to which advert of a select say, 5, appears, and each business that wished to advertise would pay a certain amount dependant on the chances of his/her advert coming up each time a page on SZ is visited.

The reason I'm asking is that I may one day be in a position to afford this.

 

[The Flying Scotsman]

I have no qualms about anyone having ads in their signature, although I feel a contribution to SZ would be fair. I don't think you need to worry about them being any particular size as you can always do what I do and disable signatures.

 

[Pubey]

I have no qualms about anyone having ads in their signature, although I feel a contribution to SZ would be fair. I don't think you need to worry about them being any particular size as you can always do what I do and disable signatures.

woah be careful there Shags... when I mentioned about disabling sigs it was just when MtS had got some people to advertise in Moderators signatures, and he wasn't too happy!:(

In some ways I kind of understand the general debate about advertising and guaranteeing SZ a decently revenue stream, but I personally feel that Freds whole arguement is a non-issue really. There have been paid-for adverts in sigs before and there are adverts on the main page and so there should have to be a charge for any adverts for personal ventures/businesses. I personally like that the forum is uncluttered and advert free, and if loads of big signatures popped up with adverts I would just disable them, and so it's important that SZ do everything possible to maintain their existing clients that pay for adverts and don't let them be undermined... I would also suggest that in general staying away from adverts in sigs in general is probably smart.. going back to my first point!:minger:

 

[The Flying Scotsman]

The only reason I disable it is so that it looks a liitle bit less obvious that I'm surfing the net, as you can only see a load of text.

 

[cockles is back]

I think sometimes its mCore interesting
trying to sell your prodOuctes in a more
simple term, and that eMnables you to
get into no trouble at aEll with the
sites moderaters, who IT think do a
fantastic job of keepingO this site clean
from any hidden messagMes that people
seem deemed to put onA this fantastic
site. I wonder what othYer people think
about the ins an outs oHf trying to advertise
there products in there E signature space
I would be really interesMted in hearing your
opinions?.........

 

[Smiffy]

Very Good Andy!

 

[fredheim_holm]

I think sometimes its mCore interesting
trying to sell your prodOuctes in a more
simple term, and that eMnables you to
get into no trouble at aEll with the
sites moderaters, who IT think do a
fantastic job of keepingO this site clean
from any hidden messagMes that people
seem deemed to put onA this fantastic
site. I wonder what othYer people think
about the ins an outs oHf trying to advertise
there products in there E signature space
I would be really interesMted in hearing your
opinions?.........

:hilarious:

Took me a while to cotton onto that one :minger:

 

[Cricko]

I think sometimes its mCore interesting
trying to sell your prodOuctes in a more
simple term, and that eMnables you to
get into no trouble at aEll with the
sites moderaters, who IT think do a
fantastic job of keepingO this site clean
from any hidden messagMes that people
seem deemed to put onA this fantastic
site. I wonder what othYer people think
about the ins an outs oHf trying to advertise
there products in there E signature space
I would be really interesMted in hearing your
opinions?.........

That would just cause Mayhem ...;)

 

[Aberdeen Shrimper]

I think sometimes its mCore interesting
trying to sell your prodOuctes in a more
simple term, and that eMnables you to
get into no trouble at aEll with the
sites moderaters, who IT think do a
fantastic job of keepingO this site clean
from any hidden messagMes that people
seem deemed to put onA this fantastic
site. I wonder what othYer people think
about the ins an outs oHf trying to advertise
there products in there E signature space
I would be really interesMted in hearing your
opinions?.........

Jeeezzz, to much like hard work

 

[Firestorm]

I think sometimes its mCore interesting
trying to sell your prodOuctes in a more
simple term, and that eMnables you to
get into no trouble at aEll with the
sites moderaters, who IT think do a
fantastic job of keepingO this site clean
from any hidden messagMes that people
seem deemed to put onA this fantastic
site. I wonder what othYer people think
about the ins an outs oHf trying to advertise
there products in there E signature space
I would be really interesMted in hearing your
opinions?.........

and how bleedin' long did that take you :D