No more banner advertising: what's next?

[yahoo62278]

just to imagine how different it would be without stimulation through signature campaigns.

Wouldn't look any different to me. 

If you go into your profile and click the Look and Layout Preferences, you'll see a list of adjustments you can make to the forum.  One of the options is Don't show users' signatures.  If you click that box, suddenly the forum signatures no longer exist.  It does make it a little more difficult to tell who is commenting on something because they have legitimate input vs those who are getting their quota in, but if the signatures are bothersome it's worth it.  Especially once you've built up a good ignore list. 

Not seeing signatures is a great feature for those that are annoyed by them, but I think if you participate in a campaign you should not be able to enable that feature. Kind of a give and take approach. Just an opinion.

I am also 1 that feels that signatures will not be taken away since I feel that's what drives traffic to this place.

[Apocollapse]

I am also 1 that feels that signatures will not be taken away since I feel that's what drives traffic to this place.

After the forum ads has been suspended, I never think signature space will follow the same path. Actually that make projects which only promote on forum ads will consider move to signature campaign since there's no way for them to promote except it is. Maybe we will see few new campaign comes up in the next week or month.

The forum's mission is (almost) unique on the internet:

the forum's mission to be as free as possible.

I don't know a single forum that offers the same level of freedom of speech as Bitcointalk.

I think @theymos want to offer a complete freedom, just like one feature that Bitcoin is offering.

[Lucius]

I wonder how much participation around here would stop if this happened. Do you think the folks chiming in everywhere with chipmixer signatures would keep posting? How many DT1 members would suddenly disappear?

Do you think that those who have a CM signature are the biggest problem on the forum? Of those fifty people who are in the campaign, maybe 50% would stop being active, maybe all of them would disappear with time, but maybe some who don't do it just for the sake of earning would stay.

In my opinion, the biggest threat is those bad signature managers and bunches of spammers that they employ to promote even an obviously proven scam. This is the only reason why the admin can ban signatures, and he has explicitly written that several times.

What about people selling coins and other products in the goods section… Would there be anyone left to buy? It seems like this forum is heavily reliant upon signature campaigns at the moment. This is what we built… I wonder if we’ll see even more signature campaigns and paid posters as a result of no legitimate means of advertising here now.

The problem is not in the number of signature campaigns, but in the fact that even now there are no quality members to fill what is now available. This only means that the criteria will be lowered even more, which consequently means more spam and shitposting.

[nutildah]

Bitcointalk really just has one purpose now and theymos has one job, and that is to make sure satoshi's posts remain accessible and in tact.

You don't need a working forum for that, just archiving would be enough.

The source is always better than the archive. Even in Bitcointalk's case where the forum migrated from bitcoin.org.

I don't know a single forum that offers the same level of freedom of speech as Bitcointalk.

I do, but they are all notorious havens for the worst trolls society has to offer. Bitcointalk is unique b/c of the paid signature aspect. It increases activity at the expense of degrading quality of discussion.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

Signature campaign makes this forum to be lively too. Banning signature campaign is not possible because theymos will also consider others that are using it as an incentive.

Agreed--despite how much garbage a lot of people who wear them bring to the forum, those signature ads also incentivize the really good posters to post more often, which almost ensures that threads don't end up dead and that there's always some topic somewhere worth participating in. 

I mean, look at other crypto discussion forums (take your pick).  If you look at the first page, oftentimes the most recent post was from a day or even a month ago.  I'm afraid that if Theymos were to suddenly ban campaigns and bounties, bitcointalk would suffer a similar fate.  It might not, given how popular bitcoin is compared to even the hottest altcoin, but I can almost guarantee you traffic would drop off a cliff.

Besides, there's always the option to put signatures and avatars on ignore if you find them obnoxious.

[PrimeNumber7]

Seeing as this frees up a bunch of ad slots, what does Theymos think of advertising non-profit bitcoin sites?

The forum is not a charity. The forum is run in order to improve the chances of bitcoin succeeding over the long term, along with furthering the forums stated mission that loyce quoted above.

I am not surprised that forum suspended ad auctions. Given the obvious process of having to manually vet each new potential advertiser, and the low auction price in recent months, selling ads was likely not worth Theymos’ time for a long time.

I think part of the reason for the low ad prices is strict requirements to advertise, and the long list of things that Theymos won’t advertise. Plus, the forum doesn’t offer any kind of targeted advertising, which is something that advertisers are offered almost universally. The lack of targeting means more privacy for forum users, and that is the price the forum is clearly willing to pay in order to offer privacy.

[Sandra_hakeem]

Signature campaign makes this forum to be lively too. Banning signature campaign is not possible because theymos will also consider others that are using it as an incentive.

Agreed--despite how much garbage a lot of people who wear them bring to the forum, those signature ads also incentivize the really good posters to post more often, which almost ensures that threads don't end up dead and that there's always some topic somewhere worth participating in. 

I mean, look at other crypto discussion forums (take your pick).  If you look at the first page, oftentimes the most recent post was from a day or even a month ago.  I'm afraid that if Theymos were to suddenly ban campaigns and bounties, bitcointalk would suffer a similar fate.  It might not, given how popular bitcoin is compared to even the hottest altcoin, but I can almost guarantee you traffic would drop off a cliff.

Besides, there's always the option to put signatures and avatars on ignore if you find them obnoxious.

I also wanna add to what you said -- anything FAIR and uncompromising shouldn't be stopped unless yunno the better --
If I'm to add more specificity, that'll be -- except yunno of something esle you could do, that'll make interested users procure some bucks for themselves and also guarantee traffic at the same time -- then you can, as well make it an appraisal.

This place is just gonna be boring ASF!  I might still be posting but, how bout others?? I'm I gonna speak to myself?
If that's really bothering anyone, you could prolly use the said button. It's on everyone's profile.

Cheers
Sandra 👩‍🦱

[Humanoslib.com]

I would like to be a sponsor...How much?

[philipma1957]

I am sure that more than 50% (maybe the percentage is even more dramatic) of the activity on the forum is due to paid signatures. even in spite of that, some DT members or those who had almost secured a place in a better-paid campaign have left the forum. just to imagine how different it would be without stimulation through signature campaigns.

I think its probably closer to 90% just going by how many posts have paid signatures underneath them. In theory sig campaigns should just be a bonus to people who were already posting anyway, and I think for some posters this still holds true. However, its pretty clear the vast majority are here just for the payday. This has led to an ingrained culture of shitposting-for-cash where genuine contribution is quickly buried beneath a flurry of dull, meaningless drivel. Most visitors who aren't already a member here aren't gonna wade through it to find the rare, interesting nuggets of information... they've effectively stopped coming here.

Similarweb Global Rank for Bitcointalk (taken from what is currently available and archived)

Sept 2022 - 35,390
Apr 2022 - 33,489
Jul 2020 - 24,833
Jul 2019 - 7,717
Jul 2018 - 2,671
Aug 2017 - 1,890
Feb 2016 - 7,762
Nov 2013 - 33,073

At the same time, there is no motivation to attract more traffic. As theymos recently explained, the forum is doing quite well financially. Bitcointalk really just has one purpose now and theymos has one job, and that is to make sure satoshi's posts remain accessible and in tact.

Yeah especially with the deviation from POW to POS.

Many no longer understand that BTC was purely POW and now with LN it is a hybrid coin.

This is a complex issue yet to resolve itself but since LN started we no longer have huge block fees like 1btc or more. So to fully understand the shift in BTC basics and the deviation from fee structure all the older info needs to be intact.

[examplens]

I think its probably closer to 90% just going by how many posts have paid signatures underneath them. In theory sig campaigns should just be a bonus to people who were already posting anyway, and I think for some posters this still holds true. However, its pretty clear the vast majority are here just for the payday. This has led to an ingrained culture of shitposting-for-cash where genuine contribution is quickly buried beneath a flurry of dull, meaningless drivel. Most visitors who aren't already a member here aren't gonna wade through it to find the rare, interesting nuggets of information... they've effectively stopped coming here.

I just counted, and in all signature campaigns, paid in bitcoin around 415 members participate. I did not count the Stake campaign because I can't find the participants list and 1xbit for obvious reasons. Plus other campaigns where payment is in tokens, I believe there are about 1000 members in total who are paid for their activity here.
maybe Loycev or someone who deals with statistics can provide information on how many regularly active accounts there are out of 3.5 million registered while "only" 1000 paid for that.
 
in the end, several other forums tried paid to post and none of them survived.

[crypto_curious]

Signature ads should be banned, not forum ads. Almost everyone talking on this forum do it only because they signed up to some dumb signature campaign, so they have to post something every day to earn their pennies. Reading this forum is a pain. Paid posts must end.

[Rikafip]

I just counted, and in all signature campaigns, paid in bitcoin around 415 members participate. I did not count the Stake campaign because I can't find the participants list and 1xbit for obvious reasons. Plus other campaigns where payment is in tokens, I believe there are about 1000 members in total who are paid for their activity here.
maybe Loycev or someone who deals with statistics can provide information on how many regularly active accounts there are out of 3.5 million registered while "only" 1000 paid for that.

According to ninjastic space, ~9600 members wrote at least one post in the last month, and that includes all those altcoin bounty shitposters that are spamming their "proof of authentication" and other nonsense. Exclude them and what's left is maybe ~5000 members. Small number of active members I think, considering how many registered accounts are there. Increase threshold to let's say 10 posts a month (still low number), and total number of active accounts drops down by ~70%.

in the end, several other forums tried paid to post and none of them survived.

That's because none of the had an actual community built, like it was the case with bitcointalk.

I'm afraid that if Theymos were to suddenly ban campaigns and bounties, bitcointalk would suffer a similar fate.  It might not, given how popular bitcoin is compared to even the hottest altcoin, but I can almost guarantee you traffic would drop off a cliff.

Exactly for that reason there shouldn't be no fear that signature campaigns will be removed anytime soon, as everyone is well aware of the effect that would have on forum traffic.

[JollyGood]

Can you imagine how many members would no longer post here if theymos decided to remove signatures, thus ending signature campaigns. What would happen to the forum then? A huge proportion of members here are present because of the incentive (signature campaigns) therefore it would be interesting to see how such a scenario would play out.

Yes, it is highly unlikely theymos would ban signature campaigns but it is not impossible to do. As long as he decides taking a particular course of action is in the best interest of the forum, he will probably do it but thankfully he has not indicated anything negative towards signature campaigns as far as I am aware.

Signature campaign makes this forum to be lively too. Banning signature campaign is not possible because theymos will also consider others that are using it as an incentive.

[Upgrade00]

Yes, it is highly unlikely theymos would ban signature campaigns but it is not impossible to do. As long as he decides taking a particular course of action is in the best interest of the forum, he will probably do it but thankfully he has not indicated anything negative towards signature campaigns as far as I am aware.

Theymos has once or twice expressed that he's considered removing signature campaigns from the forum, but decided against it due to certain reasons. Here is one of such situations;

Signatures are going to be added back in at some point. Maybe the height limit will be smaller than here, though. I thought about removing signatures, since that'd really clean things up, but I decided that signatures (and especially sig campaigns) are too important to the culture here to remove.

If signatures are ever removed, it would clear up 100% of the spam which goes on here, but would also reduce a number of active users contributing positively, or reduce how much time they spend on the forum.

[Sarah Azhari]

quote from - https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5407725.msg60976136#msg60976136

Finally, bitcointalk.org has a large reserve of BTC, so we're able to continue operating without ad revenue for many years

how to track it?. and how much is BTC?. is the large money for continuity of the community or the person who manages the forum?

perhaps my own website bitcoincleanup.com. Of course, as a prerequisite you must already have an HTML banner designed.

this is my opinion in my eyes, First time I see that logo you look advertising bitcoin cash . Even different rotation degrees (bitcoin cash has 120° while clean energy use 60°)

[LoyceV]

I would like to be a sponsor...How much?

You joined this forum to 5 year shitbump a Forkcoin topic. I don't think your "sponsorship" stands a chance.

maybe Loycev or someone who deals with statistics can provide information on how many regularly active accounts there are out of 3.5 million registered while "only" 1000 paid for that.

I keep a list per hour, day and week.
You can't really use this to count users without paid signature, as many posts are from bounty spammers spamming Twitter links. Luckily, their forum rank is too low for a signature.
A better way to check is from Recent Posts: try to find a post that isn't bounty spam, and then see if they have a paid signature.

how to track it?

Forum funds is a good start.

[Rikafip]

If signatures are ever removed, it would clear up 100% of the spam which goes on here, but would also reduce a number of active users contributing positively, or reduce how much time they spend on the forum.

I wouldn't be so sure that removing signature campaigns would cause a total removal of spam. Keep in mind that's not the only way that someone can promote their service on the forum as there are also so called "bumping services". Some of those services (at least better ones) are not only writing exclusively in one thread, but they go around and do sort of guerrila marketing that could become quite popular if signature campaigns were removed.

[Upgrade00]

<snip>

The forum is attractive now due to the traffic it pulls. Campaigns looking to get people talking about their project would consider advertising here, cause they are guaranteed to reach a large audience. If signature campaigns are removed, majority of that traffic would disappear over the coming weeks, greatly reducing how viable the forum is for running a spam campaign.
I've been on forums without the reach or traffic bitcointalk offers, and spam is barely a problem there.

100% might be a reach, but a huge chunk of spam would be cleared up without signature campaigns.

[Sandra_hakeem]

There's something I don't understand @NotATether.
Was there an initial ordeal made by Theymos in respect of banning signature campaigns lately?
Or are you're just coming up with it as a deterrent? To get spammers enclosed in a dry well?

That's not an argument. Lets allow that remain as a question to be answered.

Sandra 👩‍🦱

[NotATether]

There's something I don't understand @NotATether.
Was there an initial ordeal made by Theymos in respect of banning signature campaigns lately?
Or are you just coming up with it as a deterrent? To get spammers enclosed in a dry well?

That's not an argument. Lets allow that remain as a question to be answered.

Sandra 👩‍🦱

I haven't heard of any talk from Theymos about banning signature campaigns. AFAIK, he just said he will no longer host the weekly banner ad (on the top of the pages) slots auctions.