The Ramblings of an Incoherent Administrator

The full page ads are going to be gone completely, they just aren't bringing in enough revenue for me to be willing to take the hit on how they affect the site. It's going to take a few hours for them to cycle out of the rotation, but they will be gone by the end of the day.

Thank you all for your feedback and willingness to have a civil discussion. We are still looking at and testing several different ad networks. Please let us know if you start to get warnings from your virus protection or start to see more ads that have auto start video or audio.

After the testing over this weekend and the feedback we've already received. We have decided it's in the best interest of the site to no longer continue using full page ads on entry pages. These ads have been disabled, though it may take a few hours for them to stop showing on the site.

We are, however, going to continue having them on profile pages for the time being.

In addition we are looking into a different ad network, as we aren't totally happy with the one we are using. Hopefully we will be switching within the next week.

In addition, about the virus warnings. I have looked into these, they are not alerts about actual malware being installed on your machine. Apparently AVG has a database of sites that they deem to be unsafe, one of the full page ads has been pointing to a site that AVG determines is a "Social Engineering" risk. This means that the site is potentially trying to convince you to give away personal information, not actually install a virus or tracking cookie on your PC.

Please understand that InsaneJournal would never knowingly accept any ads that would install harmful software on our users' PCs. That is just counter-intuitive to the business we are trying to continue to build.

Please feel free to use this thread for any further feedback.

Thanks

If the ads on the site are triggering your virus scanner, please post more information about it here. Such as the message your virus scanner is giving you, a screen shot of the ad and the error, and, if possible, the URL the ad is trying to bring you to.

I know a lot of virus scanners will alert about certain cookies, and I want to make sure that the alerts you are seeing are due to that or actual malicious code in he ads.

If we can track down whatever sites are causing this, we can eliminate these ads.

Also if you come across a talking ad, please let us know so we can remove it.

Thanks,

Guys,

I am hearing your complaints and I am looking for yet another different ad network. The one we are using is obviously not going to cut it. I have to leave these ads on for the time being as we cannot afford to not have ads, but we are actively working to replace them as soon as possible.

Due to the mostly hesitant yet positive comments we have received, we have decided to go forward with the full page ad test on journal comment pages. We will start them asap and then shut them off first thing Monday morning.

At that time I will open a new thread so we can discuss their impact to your experience and how we should go forward with advertising space in the future.

Thank you all for your civil discussion and understanding as we go through this rough but unfortunately necessary transition.

We are having an open discussion on ads on InsaneJournal, and I have updated the latest post. Join the conversation By Clicking This Link

Guys,

We are looking at doing full page ads, you know those ones that pop up occasionally while you are browsing. How much of a pain do you see these causing. Should we only integrate them in profile pages, but not journal pages.

These pages are a big revenue boost, and if they provide enough boost, we will reduce advertising elsewhere as a consolation. We do NOT want to be become over laden with ads, we are just looking at a way to replace lost income from our previous ad provider who has blocked us.

If I don't get enough feedback here, I will just do a trial run and see what feedback I get then, unfortunately that seems to be the only way to get real feedback. Please get the word out about this post so we don't have to resort to that and I can get the feedback I need here.

Thanks!

** Edit **

So monetarily the full page ads are a success, I may even remove some of our other ads and just keep these.

Now I would like to test how they affect your day to day functions by putting them on the comment pages of journal entries, but I totally understand the hesitation and general dislike around this.

Would everyone be okay to a 48 hour test to see how they perform and to see what the actual user experience is like and then an open, honest, and frank discussion around their use after that?

I honestly see the possibility of these ads supplanting 2 of the ad spots that are currently on site themed entry pages, but the last thing I want to do is alienate users just for increased ad revenue.

Please comment below and let me know how you feel about this so I can decide if its even worth doing a 48 hour test.

Thanks so far for your honest and civil discussion to this point.

Due to forces outside of our control, we have had to change our ad provider. Our previous ad provider decided that we no longer were a fit for them. I was very very happy with this provider, but now have been forced to move onto our second choice.

While this may cause some pain to our end users, ads are an unfortunate necessity to keep the site up and running. If you run into any problems with the ads on the site (i.e. spyware, crashing, or pornographic ads), please let me know so we can resolve this ASAP.

Thank you for your understanding.

It's that time of year again boys and girls. InsaneJournal is going to be putting all of our account types on sale for the entire holiday season. Our sale prices will be discounts of 20% on select items!

Permanently Insane Accounts - $40
12 Month Self-Committed - $20
12 Month Extra Userpics - $16
Rename Tokens - $4

We will also be selling our unique Insane Userpics option for $150. This rarely offered item allows you to upgrade your Permanently Insane account to 5,000 Userpics with no expiration.

This all kicks off Friday, November 25th at 12:00AM (GMT)

WAIT, THERE IS MORE!

For the first 24 hours oftne holiday sale, we are going to discount all of our prices even further. These extremely low prices are going to be so low that we aren't even going to advertise them. The only way to see these prices is to visit http://www.insanejournal.com/pay and see them for yourself once the sale has started.

Set your alarms now here are some local times that the sale will be starting.

Sydney, Australia - 11/25/2011 - 1:00PM
Tokyo, Japan - 11/25/2011 - 11:00AM
Moscow, Russia - 11/25/2011 - 4:00AM
Madrid, Spain - 11/25/2011 - 1:00AM
London, UK - 11/25/2011 - 12:00AM
Eastern Time, US - 11/24/2011 - 7:00PM
Pacific Time, US - 11/24/2011 - 4:00PM

https://www.thinkgeek.com/brain/contests/enter.cgi?cid=4117e

If anyone would like to nominate me for sysking over at thinkgeek, I wouldn't be offended.

An old co-worker of mine, who ended up getting casted on "The Real World: Brookyln", has started her own YouTube channel where she talks about Politics, News, Gaming, and Geekery. I suggest that everyone check it out.

http://www.youtube.com/user/k8mnstr

I think all of you guys are great and I've read some of the stuff you've posted, but this picture is hilarious.

Anyone here going to Comic Con this year? There is something that is going to be on sale there that I NEEEEEED, but there is just no way for me to make it out to San Diego. If you're going send me an email or a PM o we can discuss.

http://www.gamepro.com/article/news/209699/final-fantasy-vii-comes-to-ps3-and-psp-with-new-improvements/

and

http://store.steampowered.com/news/2552/

I am totally going to get both, I let my brother in law borrow my FFVII years ago and never saw it agian, I am totally excited to get to play it again.

And L4D2 .. chainsawing zombies .. like totally awesome!!!! insanity is more excited about getting to use a frying pan on zombies .. but like seriously .. chainsaw!!!!!

Tonight the new season of "The Real World" debuts. And a person whom I used to work with, and a very strong and inspirational woman is going to be on this show. Her name is Katelynn Cusanelli and her blog can be found over at LJ, her username is indigochildkate. Google her if you want to know more about her. And tune into MTV tonight to watch the show, it is bound to be entertaining.

Happy birthday to my beautiful and wonderful wife insanity. I love you and hope you have a wonderful day today!

I am going to take a break from the comment rot issue over the next few weeks to work on other problems that have been plaguing the site. I have kind of hit a wall on that issue, and I know it's a big one. I figure if I work on some other problems for awhile and then come back to comment rot maybe I'll have some fresh ideas on how to fix it.

Thanks for understanding.

insanity and I are heading to visit my Family in VA in a few hours. We will have laptops if anything goes wrong, but if the site is just running a bit slow, please bare with us. Chances are its doing the backups and such and will clear up in a bit. We will be near the Lynchburg (specifically Blue Ridge) area of Virginia. Anyone got any suggestions on things to do or see?

http://www.designtoscano.com/product/garden+statues/fantasy+statues/assorted+creatures+outdoors/the+zombie+of+montclaire+moors+sculpture+-+db383020.do

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