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> The hardest part is that Reddit (admins and moderators, that is) is actively supportive of imgur and actively hostile towards alternatives. While I won't ar

by k3n 13y ago

> The hardest part is that Reddit (admins and moderators, that is) is actively supportive of imgur and actively hostile towards alternatives. While I won't argue that they're supportive of imgur, do you have any evidence of them being hostile towards your service? I just went to your page, and I was in the midst of critiquing your design when it occurred to me that the elements I had the largest problem with....were actually ads[1]. Ads that were inserted in such a way that I had no idea they were ads... IMO this is a terrible thing. Not only does it make your landing page trashy, it can (as I'm evidence of) easily confuse even the most seasoned of users. There is zero contextual information to signal that it was an ad, and only after clicking one of the 'buttons' did it occur to me that it wasn't a part of your site. So I almost get the feeling of being deceived into clicking an ad, and that puts a very bad taste in my mouth. I don't think that was your intention, to trick people into clicking ads, but when that's what happens I'm going to blame the site for allowing it to happen. Do note that imgur doesn't have any ads on imgur.com. Some of the other reasons why I prefer imgur over your site: * shorter URL * dark background All else being equal (feature parity for my needs), those 2 things will keep me on imgur. I hate white backgrounds (superficial I know, but preferences are preferences), and shorter urls are simply better for practically every use. While I applaud your drive, the site looks like a imgur-copycat making a money-grab (due to the prominent & intrusive ads) in a fresh market. 1. https://mediacru.sh/4y6bAzy9_bti https://mediacru.sh/4y6bAzy9_bti

Sir_Cmpwn 13y ago
Please tell me how I can make the ads less intrusive. I was under the impression that we had done them right. There's even a link to forever opt-out of ads without a second thought. >Do note that imgur doesn't have any ads on imgur.com. ...yes they do.
- k3n 13y ago
  > Please tell me how I can make the ads less intrusive. Can you show me the visual demarcation on your page between the ad and your content? > > Do note that imgur doesn't have any ads on imgur.com. > ...yes they do. My mistake, one of my extensions blocked it. However, a few things to note about their ad vs. yours, which contributes to my perception of your page being confusioning (and making it look less reputable): * imgur's ad is below-the-fold, while yours is not. That inherently makes theirs more of a 2nd-class citizen, while for yours the ad is a 1st-class citizen. * imgur's is in it's own, well-defined UI element; a bounded box clearly separated from all other content on the page. As hinted above, yours allows the ad to flow into the rest of the page, and it even borrows the main color (blue) that your page uses. Any demarcation is only virtual, as there is no visual distinction, and I'm not sure if you could blend the ad into the page any better if you tried... * imgur's even says "advertisement" underneath, so as to remove practically any chance of confusion. Yours has "click here to disable ads", but that alone doesn't explicitly call out the content as being an ad. Please don't take my criticisms personally.
  - Sir_Cmpwn 13y ago
    I can look into making the ads more obviously ads. There's not really another place to put them in our layout, though. And for the record, we have a button that makes ads go away forever. I think that nullifies anything about ads being 1st class citezens.
    - k3n 13y ago
      Does everyone get the ad that I did? I think what confused me was that it blended into the site so unobtrusively, and I know that's a fine line and hard to work with. Overall though, the rest of my experience was solid. It's really cool that you can disable ads, and that it's open-source to boot. Best of luck and good weekend!
      - Sir_Cmpwn 13y ago
        It's Google Ads. We aren't entirely in control of what ads you get (we hope to move to our own ad system in the future, but we aren't big enough). By the way, I pushed some updates today, including one that makes ads more obviously ads. Tell me what you think, and a good weekend to you, too!

by k3n 13y ago

Sir_Cmpwn 13y ago

Please tell me how I can make the ads less intrusive. I was under the impression that we had done them right. There's even a link to forever opt-out of ads without a second thought. >Do note that imgur doesn't have any ads on imgur.com. ...yes they do.

k3n 13y ago
> Please tell me how I can make the ads less intrusive. Can you show me the visual demarcation on your page between the ad and your content? > > Do note that imgur doesn't have any ads on imgur.com. > ...yes they do. My mistake, one of my extensions blocked it. However, a few things to note about their ad vs. yours, which contributes to my perception of your page being confusioning (and making it look less reputable): * imgur's ad is below-the-fold, while yours is not. That inherently makes theirs more of a 2nd-class citizen, while for yours the ad is a 1st-class citizen. * imgur's is in it's own, well-defined UI element; a bounded box clearly separated from all other content on the page. As hinted above, yours allows the ad to flow into the rest of the page, and it even borrows the main color (blue) that your page uses. Any demarcation is only virtual, as there is no visual distinction, and I'm not sure if you could blend the ad into the page any better if you tried... * imgur's even says "advertisement" underneath, so as to remove practically any chance of confusion. Yours has "click here to disable ads", but that alone doesn't explicitly call out the content as being an ad. Please don't take my criticisms personally.
- Sir_Cmpwn 13y ago
  I can look into making the ads more obviously ads. There's not really another place to put them in our layout, though. And for the record, we have a button that makes ads go away forever. I think that nullifies anything about ads being 1st class citezens.
  - k3n 13y ago
    Does everyone get the ad that I did? I think what confused me was that it blended into the site so unobtrusively, and I know that's a fine line and hard to work with. Overall though, the rest of my experience was solid. It's really cool that you can disable ads, and that it's open-source to boot. Best of luck and good weekend!
    - Sir_Cmpwn 13y ago
      It's Google Ads. We aren't entirely in control of what ads you get (we hope to move to our own ad system in the future, but we aren't big enough). By the way, I pushed some updates today, including one that makes ads more obviously ads. Tell me what you think, and a good weekend to you, too!