Addressing the Elephant in the Room

[Donteventrii]

Twinks, and TwinkInfo are getting greatly increased exposure thanks to individual efforts on Twitter, and the Twink Cup. Blizzard's official Twitter's are endorsing and interacting with us weekly.

For twinking to proliferate into the mainstream, the go-to site cannot so blatantly support account sales and gold/item selling for $. This goes for site advertisements as well.

Please end these advertisements, and privatize account sales into a subforum restricted to those with accounts of at least 2 years. This has the added benefit of reducing scamming as vets are more trustworthy.
[MENTION=5141]Shane[/MENTION]

 

[artonkn]

But that money doe

 

[Donteventrii]

You mean the ads? How much is needed to maintain? Could regular Google ads offer comparable revenue? If we could get transparency with the site's finances, perhaps some portion of TC proceeds could go towards stabilizing those finances.

Our community has aged. I suspect more people could donate now that they've become young professionals. I have never donated to TI. If we could get transparency on site costs, and get account selling hidden, I'd wager many others could chip in to support financially. This could be especially enhanced with a "gilding" system like Reddit uses.

Tapatalked from a PACMAN 4.4 Note II

 

[Rusks]

hide the ah/account sales forums just like the donator/vet lounge

 

[Myrm]

So what I have done is hide the forum for visitors, new users (those below the post count threshold to see the forum), users awaiting e-mail confirmation / moderation.

All normally registered members will still be able to see the forum.

Will that suffice?

 

[Myrm]

You mean the ads? How much is needed to maintain? Could regular Google ads offer comparable revenue? If we could get transparency with the site's finances, perhaps some portion of TC proceeds could go towards stabilizing those finances.

Our community has aged. I suspect more people could donate now that they've become young professionals. I have never donated to TI. If we could get transparency on site costs, and get account selling hidden, I'd wager many others could chip in to support financially. This could be especially enhanced with a "gilding" system like Reddit uses.

Tapatalked from a PACMAN 4.4 Note II

Also, the adds are all Google Ads at this time. Have been for awhile now.

 

[Donteventrii]

So what I have done is hide the forum for visitors, new users (those below the post count threshold to see the forum), users awaiting e-mail confirmation / moderation.

All normally registered members will still be able to see the forum.

Will that suffice?

Thank you for addressing this with expedience.

I maintain the need for it to be hidden from brand new registered users. Perhaps some other staff and TC organizers can weigh in on whether this move goes far enough. Adding a moderate time of registration requirement has the added benefit of a decreased risk of scamming.

Tapatalked from a PACMAN 4.4 Note II

 

[Superstylin]

Thank you for addressing this with expedience.

I maintain the need for it to be hidden from brand new registered users. Perhaps some other staff and TC organizers can weigh in on whether this move goes far enough. Adding a moderate time of registration requirement has the added benefit of a decreased risk of scamming.

How do default ads for those without Google Ads input get chosen? It seems like it still defaults to account and gold sale sites. Could these sites be removed from the pool that Google is pulling from?

Tapatalked from a PACMAN 4.4 Note II

The google ads would be picked from users cache and browsing patters, relating ads to your previous history. Right now an ad for me is for sportchek. It really does depend on the user.

 

[Donteventrii]

The google ads would be picked from users cache and browsing patters, relating ads to your previous history. Right now an ad for me is for sportchek. It really does depend on the user.

Thanks for the follow up.

 

[CIHC]

Also, the adds are all Google Ads at this time. Have been for awhile now.

Pretty much this, the only advertisements I see when on the forums are KH's account selling and gold buying and selling sites. Not really bothersum or anything. A simple ad blocker can fix it if I get too annoyed, but I enjoy the site too much to block it.

So what I have done is hide the forum for visitors, new users (those below the post count threshold to see the forum), users awaiting e-mail confirmation / moderation.

All normally registered members will still be able to see the forum.

Will that suffice?

So people that are completely verified and registered on the forum can view that section. This could be a bad thing, it doesn't really take much to get verified and past 10 posts. What'cha think, perhaps some more drastic measures are needed?

 

[Donteventrii]

So people that are completely verified and registered on the forum can view that section. This could be a bad thing, it doesn't really take much to get verified and past 10 posts. What'cha think, perhaps some more drastic measures are needed?

Thanks for the reply. I also think it is too easy to attain viewership of a section that is against Blizzard's TOS.
Twinking could become main stream. If it does, a major hurdle will be THE site devoted to twinking also supports account selling.

Why not stash this marketplace away for veterans only?

 

[Kincaide]

Something that would be interesting would be to research what the account level was of people who have actually made purchases through the subsection. If they have mostly been people with titles, then that would be a good way of handling the situation maybe.

 

[CIHC]

Thanks for the reply. I also think it is too easy to attain viewership of a section that is against Blizzard's TOS.
Twinking could become main stream. If it does, a major hurdle will be THE site devoted to twinking also supports account selling.

Why not stash this marketplace away for veterans only?

My opinion was only a suggestion, merely a thought. However since I have a reply...

More than two of this site's sections can be, and are technically illegal from Blizztard's stand point (as a company ofc). Private servers are completely illegal. The fact we allow people to advertise private servers without any real limitation or restriction can harm the site. Just like public access to our Trade District forum despite it being approved by our Admin.

Twinking -was- and can be mainstream, can you imagine what would happen if levelers and twinks got re-immigrated? A lot of QQ on the leveler's part as the twinks got fubar'd once again. AFAIK twinks vs levelers, a lot of dedicated (if not all) twinked wanted the separation. Now we have people on the BG forums that -are- twinks whining about how ques aren't popping yet the leveling/end-game community doesn't care.

I can be what is called a white knight and report all of the bs activity that is going on. However; do i care enough? Nope lol. People bot through PvE dungeons all the time as tank, healer and dps. If you break the rules then why do I care?

Something that would be interesting would be to research what the account level was of people who have actually made purchases through the subsection. If they have mostly been people with titles, then that would be a good way of handling the situation maybe.

Read my previous post and give me a like then,