A couple of weeks ago, someone put up the idea that the dope could bring in more cash via becoming an affiiliate of Amazon and using special Amazon sponsered links. So whenever someone bought a book using a SDMB affiliated link, a certain percentage of the book price would go to the dope.
Has anything been done about this? It seems like a quite lucrative money maker for almost no effort.
Well…
Lots of sites do this but here, I’m paying to not see any ads.
And you still wouldn’t see any ads. All that would be entailed would be one text link, which could even be burried at the bottom of the main page, you could click which would take you to Amazon. Once there, anything you bought would be the same price to you as normally, but a portion of the profits would go to the board. If you don’t buy anything from Amazon, you just completely ignore it, and if you do, then you can make one extra click to benefit the Dope in the process.
Chronos, it seems to me you’ve just described an ad.
No. An ad’s purpose is to get you to buy something you wouldn’t otherwise. An Amazon sponsored link would only apply to those who were going to buy something from Amazon anyway. An ad is placed prominently, so that you see it whether you choose to or not. An Amazon sponsored link would be placed inconspicuously, and sought out by anyone who intended to use it. What exactly is it about an ad which you object to, and which is shared by a sponsored link?
No, amazon sponsered linking wouldn’t even mean that if you don’t want it to. Every time a user links to amazon in their post, instead of inserting a normal amazon link, they would insert one with a bit of extra information on the URL which would mark it as coming from the dope. It would be completely transparant to the reader but would put the onus on the poster to link it properly.
So Joe Bloggs goes:
I disagree with the purpose of an ad as you define it. A more general purpose might be a message from a seller/producer to multiple customers. Classified real estate ads, for example, are to connect sellers to buyers seeking the product. Public service ads don’t ‘get you’ to buy anything either.
It does sound as though perhaps I’ve misunderstood the Amazon dealie here.
At any rate, I strongly oppose any type of commercial affiliation on the SDMB.
Why? People on the dope are going to buy from amazon anyway. It’s not like we’re going out of our way to generate them any extra traffic. All it is is a specially formatted URL that will divert a tiny sum to the SDMB every time someone buys from it.
No Starbucks for you!
Seriously, I have no problem with some kind of commerical affliation, as long as we don’t get ads for boobies/hot chix/spank the monkey.
What I would love to see is something like Fark does. A sidebar of classifieds that people pay a token amount to either bring in traffic to their web sites or ebay listings ( ok, they don’t do ebay listings) but I’d love that. Granted, most of the Fark classifieds are boobie sites…which I don’t get at all…why pay the money to direct people to those places when its all over the web…Maybe I’m just dense.
Dunno, just a wishful dream.
No ads!!! AT ALL!!!
I don’t mind the Amazon sponsored link, though… I know it’d get some of my business, and I’m sure it’s at least somewhat significant if the entire SDMB bought through that link.
We’ve mentioned it before. We’ll mention it again.
your humble TubaDiva