Sponsored posts....
 

This must be a brand new feature on this board. I've seen this type of imbedded advertising on other forums in the past. Hopefully it doesn't get so bad that the first half of the page is filled with advertising posing as threads.

Yes. That could really be the death of this board.

I've squawked it. Hopefully it's remedied shortly.

I always thought the sponsored post are only there because the owners of the forum sell the space.

Sponsored threads...
 

Are you serious??
Ghetto.

Would you rather just pay an annual fee for this website?

Not a good argument. They haven't needed them to this point.

Just clicked one.
My response - ***? Nothing at all to do with us. Great, we have SPAM! Ignore them all.

This spam clickbait is annoying as hell. It's already turned into a billboard for regionals flashing all over the page, and starting a few weeks ago there is these stupid PSA pop up ads that block the page when I log in. Now these spam sponsored posts are imbedded in the forum trying to trick you into clicking on it?

Ad blocker app, FTW.

I use Crystal on my iPhone and iPad. Blocks banner ads, pages load faster and cleaner, saves data usage, overall annoyance minimalized. Worth every penny.

Unfortunately- this is a sign of the beginning of the end of APC. It will wither and die, much like flightinfo has.

I agree. This is indeed a sad turn of events. I actually got a lot of good use from this place so I didn't mind all the ads everywhere. But if the posts become commercialized then they loose what value they had. Sad. Maybe someone else can make a place to go to get the real industry gouge if this place tanks?

I participate on a bunch of Internet forums. None of them charge a fee to be a member yet none of them have ads to the extent we're now seeing on APC.

This level of advertising is not necessary. Somebody is getting greedy. It'll kill the site if the policy isn't reversed soon. Too bad, really.

If you use Firefox with the AdBlock plugin, you won't see any of the adds. I haven't seen one of the sponsored posts yet, so don't know if they are affected by AdBlock.

Pro pilot world is $15/yr I think and worth it. Way less dbags.

I dont knock the guys who run this for trying to gain extra coin. Can we please make sure that these sponsored threads:

1) Show up in a different color as we dont get confused.

2) get pinned to the top. As of now they are underneath the most updated thread which is confusing and frustrating.


thanks!

I am using chrome and don't see any ads. I have "adblock" and "ghostery" running.

Looks like to sponsored posts have been removed..... For now.

Not here....

must have spoken too soon. The sponsored posts must work 9-5

Advertisements
 

Whats with the stupid advertisements showing up? I hate New Zealand.

I agree. This website already has tons of banner advertising along the top and the right-side margins doesn't it? Isn't that enough already? Now they need to stick advertising in the form of an unread new thread, as total lame trickery? *******ing marketing. Enough is enough. :mad:

No wonder APC decided to start FedEx's and UPS's own threads... for meta-deta banging us. What a joke.

I obviously have spent time on here over the years, but this is a good time to exit this website if the advertising will continue to grow. Hopefully we can find some other venue. Is there some other forum FDX guys/hopefuls are using, other than facebook?

They're on the cargo forum as well. This is why APC recently decided to give each individual airline it's own subforum. What a lame marketing strategy, on top of all the advertising already all over the page. It seems like the end of what was a great airline forum.

Just checked. They're in all the forums. I bet after a few weeks of this there will be an offer to pay X amount a month/year to not see the ads.

It's a test to see if you are smart enough to recognize and ignore new threads that you don't need to open. Some will fail as they feel they need to open everything they see.

Seriously though, do you have any idea how much hosting costs can be for a website? No matter what you may believe, the internet isn't free.

This was a surprise for the Mods, too. We have universally voiced our displeasure.

Some are saying that certain ad/pop-up blockers work.

Stay tuned...hoping this lapse in judgement will pass.

Thanks Phlyer. Hopefully it was a momentary lapse of good judgement.

Surprised Frontseat hasn't posted "What airline" on all of them.

Hey guys!

Thanks for all your feedback about this feature.

The director has decided to suspend the sponsored post campaign for a few days.

The campaign with the sponsored posts is part of a larger plan to streamline the ad experience on APC and to improve your time on the site. We would like to gather everyone's feedback about your current experiences and your thoughts about the future of APC, so we can better serve you.

Also, if you have any ideas how we can improve the sponsored posts - in regards to placement, content, etc, we will be glad for any feedback you might have there as well.

You can post them here or send me a direct message, and I will gather the information to pass along to our director.

We appreciate all the time you spend giving us your feedback and hope that moving forward we can do better.

Thanks!

Thanks,

The banner ads on top and bottom of the page aren't that big of a deal.

The sponsored ads imbedded in the forum are really terrible though. They are disguised as the 2nd and 3rd post down to look like new posts so people click them but they are really advertisements. The 1st post is real, then the 2nd and 3rd are fakes. This is a pretty underhanded tactic.

The Pop up ads when you log in that block the entire page are annoying, especially when you try to close them out and you miss the "x" and go to that webpage instead.

I have ran several websites with forums and it isn't that much. I guarantee the paid advertising on this site by all the regionals and all the pay per click ads more than cover it. I was making quite a bit on a much lower volume site. The owners are making quite a large profit already probably with this much traffic. I sold my sites for a decent chunk of $$ to someone looking to make money off it. A site like this with these traffic numbers would be worth a LOT.

I wouldn't be surprised if the original owners of this site sold this one to someone who is running it strictly for profit now. They probably have nothing to even do with the aviation industry. That is what happens with most high traffic sites like this, they are bought up and ruined by people trying to milk out more advertising dollars.

Well, they are still showing up as of 5:30 Central today....


Put me down as a big NO. Everything that Ryan said.

Could sponsored ads be put into a firing of there own? Those wanting travel info, which seems to be most of the ads, could go and do research.

GF

And there is enough advertising here already. Seriously, I don't care what this site costs to run, its visited by a ton of people. This site is a product and we are its customers. We can voice our opinion and leave if we want to. Having to see lame ads posted in the forums when there is enough stuff on this sides is just greed.

It's refreshing that you'll listen to our input, but if it's not broken don't fix it...?

If APC (or any site, really) made a move to how it just was, it's the type of thing that makes users come to the site less and less, if only subconsciously. Eventually, I think you'd see usage drop dramatically. Then how much was that extra ad revenue worth?

Concur. It’s distracting and bothersome in a way sure to draw membership elsewhere. Posters are the content and your franchise.

We are not its customers, we are this sites product. A customer implies someone who'll purchase an item. So who's purchasing items from this website? Advertisers....

Facebooks business model. That's why I don't do Facebook anymore and have asked this websites owner to delete my profile.
Obviously they haven't....

Thanks for your feedback so far everyone. We really appreciate it.

I have not received any messages or emails from you with this kind of request. Please PM me and we can discuss your request further.

If you don't do the sponsored posts I withdraw my request. The banner ads aren't a big deal. I know the bandwidth needs to be paid for.