Different Advertisements in BYOND Discussion

ID:260701
 
Apr 3 2009, 2:43 pm
I'm not entirely sure how the Google Ads thing works. Many sites use the Google Ads thing, but what bugs me about BYOND is that many of the advertisements seem to be... overtly sexual. Well, most of them are either tee-shirt ads and ads for, shall I say "seedy" games, both of which tend to be more than a little sexual.

I'm sure I'm sounding somewhat prudish, but I just think it's a little rediculous. Especially since the advertisements are in the center of certain pages. I often have the urge to alt-tab the screen whenever someone walks behind me.

Just as an example, I clicked from this page to the "Live games" page in another tab, and the two ads that popped up both fit my complaint.
The rectangular ad was an ad for a game that clearly stole graphics from Age of Empires II and features the image of a very sexual "queen" on the bottom half of the ad, and the smaller (more squareish) ad simply features the picture of a valkerie/angel looking woman and the words "free to play", with no title or anything.

I think it's an image problem for BYOND. The site might appeal to a wider audience (dare I say females), if it didn't have ads that are clearly appealing to horny guys. Personally, I often judge sites by advertising and I'm many other people do, too.

I know that BYOND needs advertising, but it doesn't help if the advertising drives people away from the game because of the content. I don't know how much control BYOND has over what ads are put on their site by Google, but I do think it should be looked into.
#1 Apr 3 2009, 3:01 pm
Google Ads can be blocked, BYOND should look into blocking some of these. In the meantime, get Firefox 3 and Adblock Plus.
#2 Apr 3 2009, 3:04 pm
In response to Jeff8500 (#1)
Well, I would guess that they select genres of ads, or perhaps google does that for them.
No matter what, does it really make sense for BYOND to be advertising other online games?
#3 Apr 3 2009, 3:09 pm
Thanks for the input. We don't have much say as the ads are context-generated (which explains all of the Naruto ads). We can specifically block ads on request; I submitted Civony (the queen ad) since I agree it's too explicit for this site. Unfortunately it appears like we just keep getting the same groups of ads.

Note that as a BYOND Member, you can block the ads through your Settings tab.
#4 Apr 3 2009, 3:45 pm
In response to Tom (#3)
It's a shame that you can't have more control over what advertisements appear on the site...

(I have filtered my own ads now, but it's really not BYOND members who are the issue. They're not going to be scared off the site by the advertisements)
#5 Apr 3 2009, 3:51 pm
In response to Chessmaster_19 (#4)
I suspect non-members mostly won't pay too much attention. I've heard this notion of advertising the competition on other sites, but never really had the benefit of seeing any statistics to follow it up. I suspect any permanent loss BYOND suffers isn't worth the disk-space for our comments on them.

My worry would be that BYOND tries to play net-nanny to visitors, which leads down the path of trying to please everyone but failing to please anyone with regard to it's stance on adverts. For instance those silly "Woo Me" adverts have followed me from facebook and they are a bit of a distraction (it's kind of their point), but I wouldn't think I'd feel particularly compelled to stop using either site or get sucked into Woo Me as a result of them being in circulation.
#6 Apr 3 2009, 4:22 pm
In response to Stephen001 (#5)
Well, the advertising the competition thing really isn't the main point (or even much of a point at all). I'm not too worried that all the people visiting the site will quit to play AdventureQuest, or whatever the heck that Age of Empires rip was.

But, the sexual advertising is an issue. Perhaps not for you, but not all people are as comfortable with the advertisements. If I were a parent, I don't think I'd be too comfortable with my child playing on a site that features ads of 'well-endowed' women with very little on. And, with some ads, I really have had to alt-tab out (this was before I had membership) of the window when my parents walked by.

And, don't underestimate the power of first impressions. When I joined BYOND, this wasn't really an issue, and while I was annoyed when it started, I was attached enough that I didn't consider leaving. (Same with facebook, actually) I suspect that it is the same with you. But it's not the same with people first coming to a site.

BYOND has done alot recently (fairly recently) to try to make the site more user-friendly. And, while personally, I don't completely agree with all the changes (though that's a different topic), I think the general idea is a good one; but having so many sexual ads works against the concept of making the site more friendly.


#7 Apr 3 2009, 4:50 pm
In response to Chessmaster_19 (#6)
Especially if said ads happen to have a man lifting their shirt up in a sexual way. I fear that I will never get that image out of my head, no matter how much I want to.
#8 Apr 3 2009, 6:20 pm
In response to Chessmaster_19 (#2)
Whatever gets them money, really. That's the only reason anyone uses advertisements.
#9 Apr 3 2009, 6:27 pm
Hilariously enough, Google's ads are based on YOUR interests. Based on what Google knows about your viewing habits.
#10 Apr 3 2009, 8:00 pm
In response to Nadrew (#9)
Viewing habits being, visiting online game websites(BYOND) frequently?
#11 Apr 4 2009, 3:43 am
In response to Chessmaster_19 (#6)
Ads are not something that scare people off websites any longer. They're a standard fact of life on the internet, my sisters 9 year old kid knows what ads are.

I agree that overly sexual ads might be better to remove, but in general many ads *will* feature lightly clad girls, because - those ads generate more clicks. I'm in the same boat as stephen here - I think its a phantom issue, really.

The parents who won't let their kids browse a website with an ad of a woman with a t-shirt on, are probably likely to be the same parents who won't let their child download the byond software suite anyway because it might be dangerous.