Has Thai Visa Forum Lost The Plot?

[Doug]

Anyone else noticed that the forum is now all ads, and it's very hard to find any useful text?

Look at this, only 2 lines of text (red ellipse), the rest is all ads.

[Ulysses G.]

The other 3/4 of the page that you cut out is all text. I barely notice the ads.

[bino]

The ads allow the site owner to raise money that covers the costs of running a dedicated server and the bandwidth needed to deliver millions of page views to us every month for free.

I'd rather have the ads, which are Thailand related and sometimes useful, than a monthly bill for a forum without ads!

[Ratsima]

It's a business, not a charity. The ads are what make it possible. If you don't like them, learn to ignore them.

[TheWalkingMan]

I do not really mind the ads. Now, if there were pop-ups then I would go crazy.

TheWalkingMan

[britmaveric]

Ads make TV available to the masses. One should appreciate that this is a business!

[george]

Thanks for your support. If you are having issues with the ads in your particular browser, please email support[at]thaivisa.com

[Pattaya_Fox]

Anyone else noticed that the forum is now all ads, and it's very hard to find any useful text?

Look at this, only 2 lines of text (red ellipse), the rest is all ads.

I would have thought it was the "add reply" button that you have found difficulty in finding (20 posts in three+ years).

As has been said the advertisements provide revenue which enable this site to operate and provides almost 60,000 members with the best information and recreational topics that you could find in Asia.

[pop3]

It's a business, not a charity. The ads are what make it possible. If you don't like them, learn to ignore them.

Yeah we can try to but just look at the OP's photo, it's getting silly

[cluezo]

Business is business, man. You can't run on operation like this without revenue. Jeez!

[Kerryd]

The ads don't bother me (even if the Asian Friend Finder girls seem pretty sleazy, changing names and locations everytime I log on !)

I've even helped support a couple of the advertisers (and am just about to throw a wad of cash at another one in a few minutes).

It could be worse. I hate those "roll-over" ads that take up half the screen, and if they pop up just as you are clicking your mouse, you end up getting redirected to that site.

Besides, all those ads help george & company throw big parties for us now and then !

What more can you ask from a site that's free to use !

[britmaveric]

Speaking Parties I think end of Oct or early Nov might be a good time for a TV pissup. :D

[Camelot]

Don't forget to invite the GOM.

[cophen]

Speaking Parties I think end of Oct or early Nov might be a good time for a TV pissup.

Late November in Chiang Mai would be good

[slackula]

Ads are a relatively new phenomenon on a board such as this, which is basically a descendant of the old UseNet bulletin boards.

Personally I use certain tools to improve my browsing experience, and I think it is naive to presume that without ad revenue internet bulletin boards will all automatically disappear. The boards came before the ads, not vice versa.

JMHO

[toptuan]

Anyone else noticed that the forum is now all ads, and it's very hard to find any useful text?

Look at this, only 2 lines of text (red ellipse), the rest is all ads.

I believe you could reclaim up to at least a 4th of that page if you cleaned up your browser menus!

[Guest Reimar]

You have the choice of an AD free Thaivisa Forum! Just need to pay for it!

How to do? Got to My Controls and click on Paid Subscription and you get this Screen:

[dantilley]

You have the choice of an AD free Thaivisa Forum! Just need to pay for it!

How to do? Got to My Controls and click on Paid Subscription and you get this Screen:

Ah, so you mean the "beta testing" mentioned by George here has been completed then? I must have missed the announcement, when did it happen? When and where is the next Platinum Members meetup? What's in the Platinum Lounge Forum? Can we get the nice old blue skin back if we sign up for this premium service?

[Kerryd]

Ads are a relatively new phenomenon on a board such as this, which is basically a descendant of the old UseNet bulletin boards.

Personally I use certain tools to improve my browsing experience, and I think it is naive to presume that without ad revenue internet bulletin boards will all automatically disappear. The boards came before the ads, not vice versa.

JMHO

Yes, I remember the days of BBS's as well, and ran a small one myself for awhile.

But that was back in the day when it was run off my computer, and my phone line. Didn't need gigabytes of storage for huge databases. Only one person could log into the BBS at a time (unless you went out and bought more modems and stuff).

Back then, a friend of mine was running a really big BBS, 12 modems ! But the system he was using required a different computer for each feature (i.e. one for chat, another for games, another for picture/file storage, ect).

Of course, he had to charge a membership fee to pay for all that, because there weren't any ad revenues back then.

Nowadays it's (obviously) a lot more complicated. Servers, back-up servers, databases, back-ups of databases, hosts, 58,000+ users (that by itself requires a lot of Admin work I imagine. Not sure how many can be on at the same time, but the record so far is just over 12,000.)

Who's going to pay for it ?

In this day and age, a board would have to be offering something very special and unique, to be able to run on membership fees and no ads. How many boards like that are there out there ? Not many, as most people would simply surf away to a similar site that was free (but maybe had ads on it).

Looking at the screenshot of TV without ads, I'd almost rather have the ads !

[Jockstar]

Speaking Parties I think end of Oct or early Nov might be a good time for a TV pissup. :D

Sometime in December would be good for me.

[Mossfinn]

Speaking Parties I think end of Oct or early Nov might be a good time for a TV pissup. :D

Sometime in December would be good for me.

Mid-to late December and I might even join you

Moss

[Kerryd]

Perhaps if someone in Admin were to start a poll with potential dates/locations ?

Of course, we little folk would certainly appreciate a PissUp once a month, but that may be a little unrealistic !