Confessor
CCF Mod Squad
Not Bucky O'Hare!
Posts: 10,197 
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Post by Confessor on Oct 17, 2016 18:39:13 GMT -5
Yesterday and today I've been getting really aggressive advertising that hijacks my iPhone's safari browser when I view the forum on my phone. I click on a link to a thread or to the next page and suddenly, bam! I'm whisked off to another webpage, sometimes with a "scammy" looking "Congratulations! Your iPhone has been chosen etc, etc" style popup message, sometimes I'm taken to sites for things called "Lacrosa" or "Campaign Launcher". It all looks decidedly dodgy to me and the way that it so aggressively hijacks my phone browser, is making the forums unusable on my iPhone. Anyone else experiencing this?
I surf around the web a lot on my phone, but this is the only site I'm getting this on.
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shaxper
CCF Site Custodian
Posts: 22,860
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Post by shaxper on Oct 17, 2016 20:20:59 GMT -5
Yesterday and today I've been getting really aggressive advertising that hijacks my iPhone's safari browser when I view the forum on my phone. I click on a link to a thread or to the next page and suddenly, bam! I'm whisked off to another webpage, sometimes with a "scammy" looking "Congratulations! Your iPhone has been chosen etc, etc" style popup message, sometimes I'm taken to sites for things called "Lacrosa" or "Campaign Launcher". It all looks decidedly dodgy to me and the way that it so aggressively hijacks my phone browser, is making the forums unusable on my iPhone. Anyone else experiencing this? I surf around the web a lot on my phone, but this is the only site I'm getting this on. Sorry to hear this! Normally, we have direct control over the advertisements on this site, but due to an issue not worth getting into, we are stuck with Proboards-controlled ads for the next three weeks. I can let them know if something objectionable or misleading comes up, but I can't do anything about ads that are annoying. Truly sorry about this. |
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Confessor
CCF Mod Squad
Not Bucky O'Hare!
Posts: 10,197
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Post by Confessor on Oct 17, 2016 21:16:09 GMT -5
Yesterday and today I've been getting really aggressive advertising that hijacks my iPhone's safari browser when I view the forum on my phone. I click on a link to a thread or to the next page and suddenly, bam! I'm whisked off to another webpage, sometimes with a "scammy" looking "Congratulations! Your iPhone has been chosen etc, etc" style popup message, sometimes I'm taken to sites for things called "Lacrosa" or "Campaign Launcher". It all looks decidedly dodgy to me and the way that it so aggressively hijacks my phone browser, is making the forums unusable on my iPhone. Anyone else experiencing this? I surf around the web a lot on my phone, but this is the only site I'm getting this on. Sorry to hear this! Normally, we have direct control over the advertisements on this site, but due to an issue not worth getting into, we are stuck with Proboards-controlled ads for the next three weeks. I can let them know if something objectionable or misleading comes up, but I can't do anything about ads that are annoying. Truly sorry about this. Ah, OK...I didn't realise that it was to do with the proboards' ads thing. That makes sense though, as it started at the same time. I can still access the site on my windows laptop running Firefox, so it's not the end of the world. Thanks for the answer, shax. |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 17, 2016 22:29:48 GMT -5
ConfessorConfessor do you have Ad Block on your iPhone yet?
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shaxper
CCF Site Custodian
Posts: 22,860
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Post by shaxper on Oct 18, 2016 7:29:21 GMT -5
ConfessorConfessor do you have Ad Block on your iPhone yet? I always implore our members not to use adblock under normal circumstances, as the ads here have historically not been disruptive and are what keep proboards and The CCF going. However, in this case, it might be appropriate to use an ad block for the next three weeks until we have direct control over our ads again. |
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Post by Prince Hal on Nov 13, 2016 1:20:20 GMT -5
Is this also why on my computer I keep hearing but not seeing ads? Now I have to mute the computer when I'm here.
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shaxper
CCF Site Custodian
Posts: 22,860
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Post by shaxper on Nov 13, 2016 10:43:19 GMT -5
Is this also why on my computer I keep hearing but not seeing ads? Now I have to mute the computer when I'm here. We have direct control over our ads again as of three days ago. If an ad is putting out audio, I'd like to know so that I can block it in the future. Any idea what ad was doing this? |
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Post by Prince Hal on Nov 13, 2016 19:27:13 GMT -5
Is this also why on my computer I keep hearing but not seeing ads? Now I have to mute the computer when I'm here. We have direct control over our ads again as of three days ago. If an ad is putting out audio, I'd like to know so that I can block it in the future. Any idea what ad was doing this? Nissan was one and another sounded like a New York City tourism ad. |
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shaxper
CCF Site Custodian
Posts: 22,860
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Post by shaxper on Nov 14, 2016 8:24:35 GMT -5
We have direct control over our ads again as of three days ago. If an ad is putting out audio, I'd like to know so that I can block it in the future. Any idea what ad was doing this? Nissan was one and another sounded like a New York City tourism ad. Blocking certain types of advertisements via Google Adsense is a complex ordeal, but I believe I've just blocked all future audio/video advertisements. If that is not the case, please let me know. Thanks much for the heads up. One of the hallmarks of this community is the unobtrusive advertising. When an advertiser is demanding your attention like that, it is unacceptable. |
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Post by Prince Hal on Nov 14, 2016 9:37:44 GMT -5
Nissan was one and another sounded like a New York City tourism ad. Blocking certain types of advertisements via Google Adsense is a complex ordeal, but I believe I've just blocked all future audio/video advertisements. If that is not the case, please let me know. Thanks much for the heads up. One of the hallmarks of this community is the unobtrusive advertising. When an advertiser is demanding your attention like that, it is unacceptable. Thank you, Shax! |
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shaxper
CCF Site Custodian
Posts: 22,860
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Post by shaxper on Nov 19, 2016 11:10:32 GMT -5
Audio ads are back and out of control this morning. I'm looking into it.
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shaxper
CCF Site Custodian
Posts: 22,860
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Post by shaxper on Nov 19, 2016 11:50:38 GMT -5
So it looks like there is no way to prevent these from occurring entirely, unfortunately. I'm quite disappointed by this and apologize for the inconvenience.
We currently control our own advertisements by paying proboards (our hosting company) for the privilege to run our own Google ads in lieu of theirs, and our ad revenues cover that cost. The idea was supposed to be to give us greater control over the content of these ads (and it has, to a certain extent), but apparently this remains a limitation. Were we to surrender our right to use our own google ads, proboards' google ads would similarly sometimes have audio. In fact, theirs would likely have audio more often than ours do.
Some here have suggested the idea of going entirely ad free and having a paypal donation button on the site to cover the cost, but I don't like asking our members for handouts, and we also can't count on that kind of revenue. If we didn't get enough donations, I'd be the one stuck with the bill, and if we got too many, I'd feel bad having an unneeded surplus from members' hard-earned contributions.
So I think we are stuck with this for now. Sorry.
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