/Edit - good topic btw bkkmadness... some feedback and suggestions from you senior members is most welcome.

So before anyone starts moaning it's Jai Dee's fault for this new topic!

This is something I thought of last night regarding why I now find this forum now a waste of time. Let me explain...

When I first come to this forum I didn't post a great deal, I only really started posting a lot more when I had my Thailand website up and running as I could leave my website address is my URL and it brought a little bit of traffic to my website. Only a very small amount, but enough to make posting worthwhile. It was a major reason for me to come on here and give advice because whatever good advice I gave would look good for me as a representative of my website.

But after all URLs were wiped from people's sigs it just cut out the main reason I posted here and now I get a lot less back from the TV forum. On other forums I use such as bootsnall and TD I can leave my URL in my signature (it's even clickable) and when I post on those sites I get traffic back for it. Not much but even a little free traffic is nice. It's a shame these sites weren't a little busier really as I would spend all my time over there and far less here because I get something back for my efforts to help people out on them.

An example: There is currently a thread in the Bangkok forum about some dude looking for a month rental apartment and I know a perfect place for him but to explain all that takes me a bit of time and I just can't be bothered. What do I get back from helping this chap out apart from a thank you (and often you don't even get that) and a general bit of respect for being known as a guy who tries to help out someone? Really for me that isn't enough, but if I could have my URL in my signature I would end up getting traffic from making these posts and I would have helped the guy out be now, the benefits to TV are obvious of course.

At the stage I'm at now when I rarely need advice and don't come on here just for fun I feel I don't seem to get much back from the TV forum even if I give a lot to it. I can't even get a little promotion for my website which I would get as standard on many a forum.

And I guess it isn't just me who thinks like this, we had another poster 'backpackthailand' that also used to offer great advice in the Kanchanaburi forum (and really helped keep people up to date with that backpacker shooting there a couple of years back) but since his signature URL was wiped out several months ago he's hardly been back.

If you go onto the bootsnall forum which is a general backpacker/traveling forum where you can have your signature URL theres a ton of people over there with all sorts of Thailand related websites helping out and offering great advice in the Thailand section. You can be pretty sure this advice is good and accurate because these people obviously have a bit of knowledge of the area if they have a website about it. Quality posters really. Why don't they come here? Because they get no benefits back from TV, why scratch someone's back if they aren't willing to scratch yours in return?

Added to this there are quite a few people on this site that have great websites and nobody knows about them. You'd have to be an older member to know that Chanchaou (spel?) has a great website reviewing restaurants in Chiang Mai, a really nice web resource but none of you know about it because he's not allowed to have that signature URL. There's plenty more people like that as well.

So someone please tell me, why aren't we getting our backs scratched, why aren't we allowed URL sigs? We work to benefit this website greatly but we get very little back and it results in fewer posts from those with websites to promote.

I'd like to be able to display mine for the dog center, as well. Who knows what help might come through to us (the dogs) if people could see with every post what I do.

I'd like to be able to display mine for the dog center, as well. Who knows what help might come through to us (the dogs) if people could see with every post what I do.

And I never even knew you had a website for the dogs center, a prime example thanks NR.

I found a 'loophole' which seems to be allowed in my signature ... not direct, not clickable - but anybody able to log in to this forum should be able to visit my site.

Maybe you could do the same, bkkmadness ????

Peter

For that I'd have to change either my username or website name and that's not happening and I don't see why I should have to really. Why not just make it easier and allow us to have the URL in our sigs, they of course will not be clickable and there's reasons for that but just to have it there would be enough of a benefit to me.

I suppose it's because it would be (and has been) abused by people spamming not only sites like yours, mine, and other legit places, but unsavoury sites, ebay listings, and scams.

However, there's a difference between a new signup and a member of some time. If someone is a longtime member in good standing and behaves there should be some compromise available. Maybe a pre-approved non-clickable link would be fine? Anyone abusing it not only loses the privilage but gets a short holiday as well. But I doubt established members would be a problem with that anyway.

This would get rid of the problem of people signing up just to promote themselves.

On a related note, George, you should split your forum and main TV site into separate adwords channels, as the forum chews through CPMs so fast its not worth buying them. The main site is a different story.

I have looked and found the following under Forum Rules:

Domain names and email addresses are not permitted for usernames.

and

12) Due to potential spam problems, email addresses are not permitted in posts or signatures.

I can understand 12) -- nobody wants any more spam than they get at the moment. One solution would be to have a signature along the lines of:

My Thailand Life: bkkmadness at whatever dot com

AFAIA the web spam spiders which harvest email addresses are not able to detect the above as an email address.

Peter

I'd like to be able to display mine for the dog center, as well. Who knows what help might come through to us (the dogs) if people could see with every post what I do.

You should ask George if he'd include a blurb about the dog rescue centre on one of the newsletters that get sent out to 50,000+ people. It might be a good idea if they could donate by paypal.

No pressure George

PS: I got links to you now NR, but I'm a bit slow on putting the banners together.

Bloody hel_l cdnvic, I was waiting 20 minutes for your reply because I thought you was going to explain some tech reason why it is not possible but I'm pleased to see you only mentioned the obvious spamming problems which makes me think there is not much of a problem with non clickable links in sigs.

And like you said, easy to cut out the spammers, put in a minimum post count of 1000 of 2000, maybe make websites allowed only Thailand related or personal homepages as well.

edit: Just to add I got a pm just now from someone asking for my web address, so even having it in your profile isn't obvious enough for some people. Admittedly it was Terence though.

Only joking Tel, glad to see your back!

Bloody hel_l cdnvic, I was waiting 20 minutes for your reply

I got distracted and forgot to click "add reply"

Bloody hel_l cdnvic, I was waiting 20 minutes for your reply because I thought you was going to explain some tech reason why it is not possible but I'm pleased to see you only mentioned the obvious spamming problems which makes me think there is not much of a problem with non clickable links in sigs.

And like you said, easy to cut out the spammers, put in a minimum post count of 1000 of 2000, maybe make websites allowed only Thailand related or personal homepages as well.

edit: Just to add I got a pm just now from someone asking for my web address, so even having it in your profile isn't obvious enough for some people. Admittedly it was Terence though.

Only joking Tel, glad to see your back!

yes well i was looking at that maddy, but i thought you were only joking and taking the piss.

anyway,

just had a gander, put it in my favorites and will read it later.

it better be bloody good maddy or im going to get that homeless dude on the bridge to kick your arse.

rolleyes:

thank you very much

I would be interested to see fellow posters' websites. I have visited NR's dog centre site, but that's not going to make her money for dog care. I still think that as a charity, she should be able to post her events and info (your site is on another forum's dog rescue listing, NR!)

Pls pm your site info, BkkM.

I would be interested to see fellow posters' websites. I have visited NR's dog centre site, but that's not going to make her money for dog care. I still think that as a charity, she should be able to post her events and info (your site is on another forum's dog rescue listing, NR!)

Pls pm your site info, BkkM.

Just curious if she ever asked? That's what it takes. Ask first.

I would be interested to see fellow posters' websites. I have visited NR's dog centre site, but that's not going to make her money for dog care. I still think that as a charity, she should be able to post her events and info (your site is on another forum's dog rescue listing, NR!)

Pls pm your site info, BkkM.

Just curious if she ever asked? That's what it takes. Ask first.

I think NR is too modest to ask.

I am far too modest to ask! However, if you look at the BKK Post's Outlook Section (Pet's Page) today, you'll find a big article about us & photos of some of our dogs. How's that for self-promotion?

Alright, NR! I am proud to bits of you for finally posting a story! (Just read it on the BKK Post website.)

Good on you for going for it! I'm making money now and will send a donation for your pwupper wuppers when I can figure out the sending details. Hope your article attracts attention and funds, too. I now feel good today.

Well, NR, modesty won't get you very far. If you really want to do this, contact George directly. I am not sure how much help you will get from members, but if you don't try you'll never find out. Good to hear about the Bangkok Post article. Hope it helps

No reason to complain about a request not being met when the request was never made, eh Jet?

Thanks for posting the story on the HH sub-forum, sbk.

No, it's not really modesty. I just feel a bit uncomfortable asking for special favours on here. I mean, there are many members who do really worthwhile things, voluntarily & don't ask to promote them. Look at ColPyat & the other guy that does a similar thing (Marco something?), or elfe, or Nienke, or many others. Having said that (& getting back to topic), a URL in my signature, would, with every post, let people know what I do, and those interested could take a look.

I think BKKmadness has a very good point (but I can understand the reasons why they aren't allowed, also). It would tell other posters so much more about us, without looking at profiles. How many times do you look at someone's profile? For me it's only if I really like their attitude, or really dislike it. Most profiles, I have never visited & I would assume that most members are the same.

Here's a pre-internet-bubble-burst idea - Link exchange...

You can only have a link to your site in your signature providing your site is already linking back to TV? Providing the link on your site remains, so does the link in the signature.

This is one of the reasons as I see it with not allowing URLs in signatures..

Leaving URLs in the signature file is advertising, and free advertising does not keep thaivisa running. Forum sponsors are the only members who are able to leave a URL in their signature.

Everyone else can display their url on the profile page..

Another thing to consider.. think of the time and effort it would take to keep an eye on signatures to make sure the the links are not malicious etc..

Just my 2 pence worth

totster

Leaving URLs in the signature file is advertising, and free advertising does not keep thaivisa running. Forum sponsors are the only members who are able to leave a URL in their signature.

Everyone else can display their url on the profile page..

So how is that not advertising then?

If people could have links in their signatures it would just make things easier for everyone and reduce one extra click in the process of finding out more about a poster.

Another thing to consider.. think of the time and effort it would take to keep an eye on signatures to make sure the the links are not malicious etc..

This is easily remedied by only giving this privilege to people with a certain number of posts. Say it was 1000 posts, then for starters you'd only have a maximum of about 250 URLs to deal with, and perhaps half of them are either mods or established enough members to know to be trusted 100%. Thus leaving you about 100-150 URLs to be monitored - and even then that's on the assumption that every single 1000+ user wants to put a URL in his/her signature. So I reckon there would be about 50 URLs to keep track of: not such an insurmountable task, works out as about 2 per mod. And if someone puts in a dodgy link, they will be reported pretty quickly I imagine and then the link can be removed.

Also, of course, as it stands people can still put dodgy URLs in their profiles and are still at the risk of being found out, reported and banned (or whatever).

Here's a pre-internet-bubble-burst idea - Link exchange...

You can only have a link to your site in your signature providing your site is already linking back to TV? Providing the link on your site remains, so does the link in the signature.

I'd be more than willing to do that. Reciprocal advertising

Leaving URLs in the signature file is advertising, and free advertising does not keep thaivisa running. Forum sponsors are the only members who are able to leave a URL in their signature.

We are obviously not talking about removing sponsorship, adwords or hotel bookings from the site.

What does also help keep TV running is posts from members and you might get a few more posts from members if they are allowed there URL in their signature, hence the starting of this topic.

Other forums don't seem to collapse when doing this and with 45000 members a high profile forum like TV should also be able to fill every sponsor space and still allow some free advertising of it's members websites or personal home pages.

You would have a lot more small bars and restaurant businesses owners in Thailand posting on this website if they could get a little free advertising back, think of the boost to the farang pub section with those kind of people on board.

Plus if you have those kind of members then it would be easier to bring them over to paid for sponsorship in the future as they would have already seen the benefits of the small amount of advertising they have. Look at DaveThailand, he plugged his bar in here for years, saw the benefits and eventually become a sponsor.

Everyone else can display their url on the profile page..

Not enough though is it, even when I have said on here I have a website two members have still asked me to pm the address to them.

Another thing to consider.. think of the time and effort it would take to keep an eye on signatures to make sure the the links are not malicious etc..

That would be a problem if you allowed newbies to put links in their sigs but surely if you make it so you need for example 1000/2000 and/or a certain length of time for membership before you allow sig URLs then that would not be a problem whatsoever.

edit: Just noticed your post Dantilley. Excellent point about links in profiles as well, do they check those to make sure they are not malicious? Of course not.

Here's a pre-internet-bubble-burst idea - Link exchange...

You can only have a link to your site in your signature providing your site is already linking back to TV? Providing the link on your site remains, so does the link in the signature.

I'd be more than willing to do that. Reciprocal advertising

TV will not do that I'm afraid, they own reciprocal link/advertise with high ranking websites.

Simple fact is they are too greedy about it. They want us to post post post and earn them money but are not willing to give much back to the posters.

As I said before, on many other forums URLs in signatures are a standard benefit for the posters. Why aren't we receiving those standard benefits on this board?

Do you know what ThaiVisa costs George? Until you run something of this magnitude I suggest you think again before using the word "greedy"

As for the idea of older members using reciprocal links, has anyone ever asked george?

personal home pages.

links in profiles as well,

Well "bkkmadness" I have had many a visits on my Web Page "Thailand as I see it "or google win13 , from members of ThaiVisaDotCom going into my profile which is where I wish members to see who I am and what I am about. I like this much better than as you propose direct linking into ones signature.

If members wish to see me, they are more than welcome, if not, why stick it in there face each and every time they look at some ones signature?

Yours truly,

Kan Win

Closed for discussion of forum moderation, pending admin review. Concerned members can make suggestions regarding this topic to: [email protected]