At this time, there really isn't an alternative ... I mean, delivering Flash ads is pretty much the industry standard nowadays, especially with large campaigns. Especially when you consider that the ads are our sole source of revenue - ie we don't charge members and have no intention of doing so. (Unlike Experts Exchange, for example, which charges members AND runs just as many ads as we do).

Basically my final say (as of right now, at least) is that DaniWeb loads pretty speedy for me on all my computers (Windows and Mac, multiple browsers) both at home and at work, both cable and dsl. Additionally, I just returned home from an Internet marketing convention in Chicago, and DaniWeb loaded just fine from the hotel wireless access. The only slowdown that I've noticed is sometimes it takes an extra second or two for the ads to load after the rest of the page has already loaded, but I don't have a problem scrolling down a page or navigating before the ads are fully loaded. I will admit I have no experience loading DaniWeb on dial-up, but nowadays household broadband is even cheaper than dial-up access, ironically enough.

I'll keep your comments all in mind, but ... well ... it's the sole source of revenue, there are no viable alternatives (you guys already booed my IntelliTXT idea, which eliminated the need to download Flash ads ... you can't have it both ways.)

Perhaps it is when you are trying to reply in that second or five and the page jumps back just as you click what would have been the button/link you wanted.

DevShed appears to do IntelliTXT for guests only, perhaps that is an alternative.

I haven't experienced any "jump backs" and I'm pretty quick, especially when trying to reply to a bunch of Community Introduction threads in a single sitting.

Read the really long IntelliTXT thread around here ... EVERY combination of using IntelliTXT was rejected by everyone - even when I made it fully optional for everyone!

Geet yerself a slower see-sytem.

Perhaps it's hard to describe until you experience it regularly.

M'kay. I don't care to go dig that one up. But I notice from work, where I don't log in, that I get that annoyance -- but at home I'm dandy (on DevShed that is, with regard to IntelliTXT). I can live with that. (No options, just membership=less crap.) FWIW

I have no problem with IntelliTXT - and definitely find it a more bandwidth friendly alternative to flash ads. However, the community at large voted on flash ads over IntelliTXT, and I succumbed to their decision. The concensus seemed to have been that members felt their writing was being intruded on, and preferred to have the extra download time if it meant more out-of-the-way ads that didn't interfere with the actual page content.

[babble]
If there are basically two formats for communcations on the web -- HTML and PDF, and HTML is basically "what you see is what you want" and PDF is "what you see is what I see", then you really need to develop your own new language (let's call it WYSIWIWYTS -- or not), "what you see is what I want you to see") that combines the two. :p
























Aha! You've left the technical realm and gone all marketing on us!
[/babble]

> Aha! You've left the technical realm and gone all marketing on us!
Guilty as charged. However, that's why I have all of you mods, and Davey, to keep me well grounded.

Dave take control of your own destiny, download the Adblock extension for firefox,

https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/10/

Restart firefox, from Tools->Adblock->Preferences add */ajrotator/* into the filters.

FWIW I don't hink that there is any great ad overload at DaniWeb, certainly no worse than any other such free system and much better than most - including many paid for membership ones. Sure, I no longer have dial-up connectivity but then again neither (I suspect) do the vast majority of users these days.

If I were stuck on a slow connection then I'd take the client side ad-blocking in the browser solution to the problem.

Dani is doing a good job design-wise, IMHO, in keeping the adverts relatively unobtrusive. You know they are there, they have the right visual impact, but do not interfere overly with the site content.

So, for now at least, I'm with Dani on this one :cheesy:

For those that don't see what I see -- good for you.

But on a longer thread, say some 15-20 posts where I had replied to about #2 or 3, it goes something like this:

1. The page begins to load, but doesn't take me to the new post #4 right away.
2. I scroll down and find it and begin to read. It is a short reply and I have an immediate response, so I begin to scroll down to find a non-quote reply button way down at the bottom.
3. The page catches up and scrolls me back to the start of post #4.
4. I continue scrolling down to find the elusive reply button.
5. After sometimes two or three repititions of the last three items, I'm a little pissed and have forgotten what I was going to reply.
6. Eventually I get to the bottom and have to find the button.

To me:

1. This sucks.
2. Why can't there be a non-quick, non-quote "advanced" reply button on the each post?

And I prefer the advanced post because I regularly use those features available on it. And I don't care for the quote version because I often find it distracting.

I would say this happens several times a day for me, almost typical it seems sometimes. Sometimes my computer is busy with stuff, but other sites don't have this same feel.

[edit]Heh, it did it to me for this edit. :rolleyes:

On a related note, I start a "session" by going to about 3 forums right off the bat -- using the Ctrl+Click in FF. From there, I like to Ctrl+Click the new posts, let's say a dozen in each. Daniweb is the one that leaves my poor pinky finger stuck on the Ctrl key for minutes while the pages load. The others take a bit of time, but this here it is noticeably the slowest.

FWIW

[I'm not angry or ornery -- just critical.]