- 7,313
- 28,679
- Joined
- Dec 8, 1999
Basically. I'm used to it. People complained about the new site. People complained about the old site. People complained about the mobile site. The common denominator is that people complain about change.
This is something different than they're used to seeing on NikeTalk (though it's no different than what's common across the industry), and any type of change freaks people out. I get it, and for that reason I'm all the more appreciative of those who've managed to keep things in perspective here.
I'm grateful for your patience and continued support.
Some people in this world DO need help from NGOs to survive. Our ads help finance our donations.
Tell me: do you need blank, unused space in your NikeTalk experience to survive? Moreover, do you need NikeTalk to survive?
You're acting like a restaurant patron who skips out on the bill every night and still has the nerve to complain about the service. You cost us money with each visit, and you won't help us recoup that money? That's money that could and should go towards our donations.
Do me a favor: go to ISS, ask Complex about their donations, and then accuse them of stuffing their pockets. They'll laugh in your face.
Read these comments and then think about our priorities. Who would YOU rather sacrifice pay for? Somebody acting like a spoiled brat, or somebody in genuine need?
Ads serve multiple purposes. They help us finance our donations. They help us stay online. They help us offer a better user experience. All three are very important to us.
NikeTalk costs a LOT of money to operate. We have to cover software, hardware, technical support, sales personnel, customer support, etc. Migrating over from the old platform despite the opposition of our former host and building out a new, top of the line website cost a LOT of money. Since we're not Apple or Walmart, we have taxes to pay - and that's certainly not cheap.
The funniest thing about this, to me, is that you don't complain about this on any other website. Go to nba.com right now and there's a gigantic takeover ad for NBA Live. Go to engadget and there's a gigantic takeover ad for battlefield 4.
The difference between us and them is that when you attack us on this basis, when you accuse us of being "selfish" with something that requires a full-time professional commitment from many people that, under any other circumstances, would be utilized to generate the MAXIMUM amount of personal/corporate profit at the MINIMUM possible expense, I actually give a damn. It hurts.
It's for that reason that people feel comfortable complaining. We actually LISTEN to it. When's the last time you sent an email to a big website and complained about ads? Probably never, because you know that whichever underling received the email would delete it instantly without giving the complaint a second thought.
By all rights, we could just sit here, take ALL the money from the operation of the site, donate NOTHING, not even give a damn about your opinion on the matter, run this site like any other professional website - and we'd actually receive LESS complaints as a result.
NikeTalk is 100 times better today than it was on Yuku. Some of you are legitimately appreciative and I'm very grateful for that, because otherwise, if I didn't give a damn, I'd just look at comments like this and ask myself why I even bother.
Let's just call it what it is:
For all of 72 hours you've suddenly got a white background in the MARGINS of a website that costs you nothing and is donating tens of thousands to charity on an annual basis and you're complaining.
Okay.
Obviously the rate is dependent upon the size of the website(s) running the campaign. Believe me, we're not getting anywhere near that much for this.
If you think your company can help us receive better rates, just send me a PM and we can look into it, but given our current situation the rate you've thrown out creates an unfair expectation.
I hear that.
We're just way too patient with people who steal from us in that way because we'd rather try to find a way to convince them to become legitimate community members than exile them for their selfishness.
I've been wanting to set up an ad-free annual subscription for this site for awhile now. Perhaps this will give us cause to redouble our efforts on that front and finally get that system in place. If we give people a LEGITIMATE way to enjoy an ad free experience, there will be literally no excuse left for what basically amounts to theft. It's no different than sneaking into a movie theater or pirating media.
And the worst part is, it really is the donations that suffer. THAT is the flexible part of our budget.
