Blog piece: Ads, Supporters, Endorsements and Bandwidth Throttling

[freddy_farnsworth]

Go for 250k, 500k 1mb, unlimited, as perks. the way you were thinking about it, was to close to what we get as a unlimited, on a busy day (which is most of the time).

I have been down to 50kb on the premium servers, alot...

 

freddy

Edited February 5, 2013 by freddy_farnsworth

[Zalpha]

I feel bad because I use AD blocker, I really can't stand how the ads change the format of the site. I also feel bad because I can't download more that 200kb/s anyway so the changes wont effect me, so it feels like I have opted not to turn off AD blocker, which I guess makes me feel okay.

[AngelOfPassion]

Just to clarify:

If we purchase the supporting member rank for $1.00 permanently AND use the endorsement system we will be getting 1.5MB/sec correct?

Edited February 5, 2013 by AngelOfPassion

[ScytheKnight]

Just going to add that I've ponied up the $62 AUS for a lifetime premium membership as well.

 

As someone just starting a Bachelor's in game design and looking to create games, it is people like you Dark0ne and sites like this that make me want to make the best games I can. Not for the money, not for the awards, but for the gamers who play and enjoy them.

[lemon13]

Again another really interesting article. I had no idea how the advertisement side of things worked. Never click on ads and thought that was the only way to earn ad dollars. I love the nexus and will always support it as much as i can, additional perks or not.

[Surliman]

I do use adblocker and noscript after spending more than a week trying to get rid of a pesky Google Redirect that installed itself through a nasty script attached to an advertisement. That wasn't the first time I've had to do that, but so far, it was the last time. This little bugger passed by my antivirus's scanner too so thus the added protections. No matter how diligent a site may be about their advertisers, there is no practical way for you to insure every ad is bug free. This also relieves my frustration levels with two types of ads that drive my insane...auto start videos and pops ups. I can understand the need for revenue but too many sites have gone so completely overboard that it gives us surfers little recourse if we wish to browse the web in safety and in peace.

 

Never really think about turning them off on a per site basis. But, I can do that here as long as the advertisements don't bother me with auto-start videos or pop-ups. Otherwise, they come back on.

 

I think, in the years that I've used this site, I've endorsed a few mods. Not many, mind you, but a few. The problems with endorsing is A) I downloaded, installed, and use the mod but at this point never think anymore about where it came from. B) I downloaded and installed the mod but never used it as it conflicts with another mod. C) I downloaded and installed the mod but never encounter it in the game as everything goes to crap and I have to reload the primary game and start fresh and this time around it doesn't get included.

 

I have no problem with endorsing, just needs to be more convenient. Once I use a mod and know it's worth endorsing...there's the problem of coming back here and tracking down it's page. The use of Nexus Mod Manager should make this easier and I'll try to remember to endorse for those I use and like. :)

 

[Nudge]

@ Dark0ne

 

Is there anyway you can make a deal with "some company" using the Cost Per Action model and make their advertisement into a mod of some sort? Nothing that needs to be downloaded, but rather takes you to a page where you fill out whatever information is needed to meet the ad requirements.

 

Give it the same functions as a mod ie.. A description similar to what you've written in this post, and how much $ you get per person that fills out the info. Have it show in the Total Downloads area how many people used it so that we can total up how much money you are making from it. A picture or pictures of the ad. Be able to endorse it so it gains popularity, or just stick it on the main page somewhere.

 

If it's in mod form then it can't be blocked by any ad-blockers. You could tie it in with your throttle system that gives the kb/sec bonuses for successfully filling out the information, and more for endorsing it also. With as good as you write I'm sure you could convince a lot of people into using it.

 

No money transactions by the user, and no ad-block problems. Just lots of money in your pocket, and a better nexus experience for all of us.

 

To you and the rest of the team - Great work on the site. I've enjoyed it for years. I fully support anything you decide to do.

 

 

[DrakeTheDragon]

Interesting design.

 

I must say though, reading the last couple pages of comments *facepalm*, you should've just stated it turned out the site cannot uphold the 1MB limit for everybody and it had to be lowered down to 750KB to cope with the server struggles. "Then" everybody would be praising the "raises" for doing good things, and nobody could feel "penalized". Just saying.

 

Nevertheless, I detest the endorsement idea. I think that's well-known. I pay them no mind. I prefer to comment and give my honest feedback. And if it's praises, it's praises put into words, it means something. I wish I could turn off the endorsement feature throughout the entire site I'm seeing, but as it's used internally even, behind the scenes, for also-meaningless-to-me statistical measures and such, I know this will never happen.

 

So I likely won't be benefitting from any endorsement speed-up anytime soon. But on the other hand I'm currently unable to play any game anyways and as such also will not be downloading much, if at all, and I'm still completely skipping Skyrim on all counts, so there's not much I even "could" endorse, if I wanted to anyways. And a loss in download speed due to this won't bother me, as there's no sense in downloading anything right now either, anyways.

 

I welcome the new ideas from a neutral point of view, as I don't care about it personally, but I can see the benefits for others and the site, and that's a good thing. Keep going as you always did! I'll be here, supporting the site my own way (which is not much).

[brokefoot]

I'm sorry, but just not feeling the new endorsement idea. Unless I'm a complete idiot - the reason for the low download to endorsement ratio is because of UPDATES to mods. Each time you update your mod, a new download number is tacked on to the total (is it not ?).

 

What SHOULD be done for the endorsement system is allowing users to add additional endorsements per version. So if they loved the v1, endorsed it, came back a few weeks later and noticed a v2 and liked it even more than before than can tack on another endorsement. Can't tell you how many comments I've read that say something like "Love the update so much, wish I could endorse this mod twice !". How hard would it be, really, to implement endorsement per mod version ?

Edited February 5, 2013 by brokefoot

[Windyplains]

Like many who've commented here I had no idea how the ad system worked. I never realized that the blocker actually cost you income beyond simply not creating revenue by my clicking it. I'm still not a fan of ads, but I'm quite a fan of Nexus and as such have shift to premium membership. Thanks for the informative blog and keeping the site focus that you have.