Announcing Slashdot Subscriptions 2332
To understand why the system works like it does, you need to first understand that Slashdot is about to start accepting new ad formats. The large ads that you see on many other sites are coming here. We really don't have an option: these are what advertisers want, and if we don't provide them, we won't be around much longer. But we want to give you an option to see Slashdot without these ads. Second, you need to understand that Slashdot readers fall into a variety of types, and charging the same flat fee just isn't possible.
Slashdot subscriptions will essentially let you buy a thousand pages to be viewed without banner ads. And you will have some flexibility to decide what types of pages (Comments, Articles, The Homepage) you want ads removed from, and what types of pages you just want to see the ads.
The rates are currently set at $5 per 1000 pages. To put this into perspective, $20 (typical magazine subscription) will be enough pages for 82% of our readers to view Slashdot without ads for a year. Another 15% will need to spend $5 a month to accomplish the same thing. 3% of our readers would need to spend more than $5 a month- but they could choose to see ads on comments and in almost every case, still pay around $5 a month. (As an aside, it's also worth noting that more than half of all comment posters fall into this 3%)
We realize that this system is more complex, but Slashdot has a third of a million readers per day with different reading habits, and this is the best way to accomodate everyone fairly.
Currently we only accept payment via paypal. It was simply easy and fast. We intend to offer other options as time permits and readers request.
Eventually we intend to offer additional features to subscribers. Exactly what those plums are remains to be decided: Access to the rejected submissions bin? A 'Gold Star' in your comments header? Karma? (I think that would be hilarious) We really don't know. We'll decide and implement what makes sense as we have time to do it.
We are doing our best to learn from the mistakes made by other sites that have started charging for subscriptions. We won't create subscriber only features that cost more to maintain than they generate. But we do need support from you if we are to continue. So anyway, here's that link again if you forgot it ;)
I've already my "subscription" system (Score:4, Funny)
That's nice. Hope you don't love slashdot... (Score:4, Insightful)
Consider that if we all used an effective ad blocker, that'd be the end of adverts as an effective means of funding this site. And that'd mean we all pay, or byebye slash dot.
Or don't you realize that bandwidth doesnt grow on trees.
Re:That's nice. Hope you don't love slashdot... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:That's nice. Hope you don't love slashdot... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:That's nice. Hope you don't love slashdot... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:That's nice. Hope you don't love slashdot... (Score:5, Insightful)
Bandwidth and server space isn't free, nor is it even cheap. Lots of people come here daily, and many actually like it, unlike a bunch of whiners that complain about every little change, or lack there of, just because it isn't the way they'd do it.
Is this place perfect? No. But the only place that will be perfect to a person is one that is run by them. I don't have the time or resources to do something similar, and this one does pretty damn good in providing me with what I want.
Rob and Jeff have put a lot into this site, and they are justified in trying to make some money off it. If you don't like it, go elsewhere.
Re:That's nice. Hope you don't love slashdot... (Score:5, Insightful)
I've had it. I can't take any more advertising. Television, radio, magazines, billboards, even the Internet for Christ's sake. Everywhere. Why do they keep targeting me? I never did anything to them. I don't even buy anything! They're wasting their time! Fast food makes me feel like shit, soft drinks make me dizzy, candy is disgusting, chips make my stomach hurt, I don't smoke, and any band that has ever been advertised anywhere sucks unequivocally. I eat tortillas and vegetables, I drink tap water. I ride my $40 bike for entertainment. I buy a new pair of Dickies at the army navy store every year and I get all my other clothes at Costco in 3-packs. My car works fine, I use my Internet connection for long distance, I've had the same boots for three years and re-sole them when they wear out. As far as booze goes, well, as long as it's wet.......
So why do they keep attacking me? Why are they filling every square inch of every available space in my life? Above urinals, on concert tickets, underneath the ice at hockey games, on blimps, in video games, as props in movies, plugs in rap songs, on shitty Web Sites (No, I will not visit your motherfucking sponsor. If you're not in it for the love, and you can't figure out any better way to pay for your site than by slapping some ugly, corrupted banner across the top of your pathetic work, then fucking close up shop, kill yourself, and leave the Web to non-polluters). They'd advertise on the backs of my eyelids if they could get away with it, and I can't hack it anymore. They win. I lose. They succeeded. I failed. Like Brian Wilson, I just wasn't built for these times. I fold. Here are all my cards. Keep the pot, keep my ante, keep the goddamn jacket on the back of my chair for all I care, I can get another at Costco. I'll be out in the parking lot getting drunk and yelling at cute girls because I can no longer stand the taste of tentacles. Marketing has poisoned everything worthwhile under the sun, so I'm giving it all up. Everything.
But the way I figure it, there's no real loss. I've seen all of the episodes of the Simpsons 200 times each. Most of the good writing was done 100 years ago. I haven't listened to FM radio in years. I could play all my records beginning to end alphabetically and I'd be 76 years old when I got to the Zeni Geva. Online culture is a fucking yawn, only good for buying stuffed goats on Ebay and getting cracked copies of $1000 software. Movies always end up at the 99 cent video store across the street eventually, and you can fast forward through those commercials. My girlie's cute and the corner bar has Pabst on tap. What else matters?
True, by shutting myself off to everything, I'm probably limiting my future potential as a 'community building' or 'bleeding edge' cog in someone's nightmarish vision of Internet profitability, but fuck, a simple read through my writing should've cured that anyway (Note to potential employers: The bidding starts at $120,000 a year with full dental).
So I'm out. No more.
I just feel bad for those of you I'm leaving behind. You'll be wearing your Slave Labor Nikes, sweating under a Third World Vest, listening to Everqueer or Fratboy Slim, your hair styled stupidly with gasoline and aborted pig placentas, trying to choke down a Double Meat Fuck Splattered Cow Testicles On The Slaughterhouse Floor Pus Coagulated Lactacious Secretion Yellow Dye #2 Deluxe. Man, will you be looking dumb. It makes me want to cry. You poor, oversugared demographic you. You're filling your apartments, your bodies, and your minds with useless junk. You stagger under your own weight, throwing money in random directions until you collapse and die, buried by a bunch of people who you failed to create meaningful human bonds with, who forget about you on the way home from the funeral.
Maybe I'm just oversensitive, but I actually feel those fingers reaching out at me - cute little girl fingers, feeling at my face like a bind man, pulling at the loose threads all over my brain, trying to find a sensitive one, one that tweaks me. Desires to be successful, attractive to the opposite sex, spiritually satiated, or conversely, the fears of disease, dismemberment, of being outcast, of repressed homosexual desires. Herd mentality as dictated by herd mentality. A gas mask of soiled wool, worn in a steaming shower of chlorinated pond water. A lumbering culture created by profit motive, existing as window dressing to disguise the brutal cynicism of the architects, the brassy checks and balances of accountants bleating commands to the flunky tastemakers on the production line. The subversion of anything subverting. The conversion of something dangerous into something profitable. The gutting of the lion and the championing of the taxidermist. And the puffy vests, my god, the puffy vests........
I give it one more shot.
I hit that little "on" button, and immediately this little red dot appears on my forehead. I feel the barrel rising on the other side of the glass as some powersuited executive attempts to get me in his sights. His scope is the best money can buy, but my nausea and skittishness mark me as difficult prey. I make a sprawling leap over a pile of books, spilling a glass of wine and sending my cats scattering. The TV takes a shot at me. It misses, but after the smoke clears, there's a shimmering can of Pepsi on the coffee table, seductively held by a well manicured (but severed) hand. Then the Taco Bell dog is outside, scratching at my window, singing "That's Amore", the secret code that alerts Col. Sanders and Ronald McDonald to get their tumor inducing grease guns at the ready. "We have a resistor! Alert Cap'n Crunch and Mrs. Butterworth. Tell Hogan to pull that Subaru around!" And then, as the entire posse of 1-800-COLLECT goons attempt to joke their way through the front door, a helmeted uberyouth does a backflip on rollerblades against the window, almost crushing the Taco dog, thankfully getting tangled in the iron jungle of security bars designed for such a moment. The severed Pepsi hand launches itself across the room onto the stereo, turns it to HOTROCK 99.5 FM and starts dancing suggestively on the turntable. Warm, gooey songs ooze from the speakers, blurring the lines between commercial and product, product and art. The walls are running with honey, blood, and Gatorade. Limp Bizkit tries to sign me up for the Rap Metal MasterCard, but is outvolumed by a chorus of creepy NY Gap models, dead eyed and Children of the Damned style, singing nostalgic 80s songs with cool detachment, trying to sell me vests. Close inspection reveals UPC codes on the backs of their beautiful necks and a legion of bulimic girls behind them, mascara mixing with puke on ten thousand toilet bowls. Budweiser frogs are crawling out of the toilet bowls. A one-eyed, mutilated Asian girl holds a pair of new Levi's against the window with a thin, purple arm and starts screeching "It's a Small World After All" at the top of her lungs. Magic, The Old Navy dog, is sniffing butts with the Taco Bell dog, who had since bit the Asian girl on the leg and now yelling something about Gordidas. A waifish beauty suddenly appears on my bed, vying for my attention, trying to talk me into a new car, her hand slowly unbuttoning her blouse, batting her doe-ishly brown eyes, "C'mon Mark. It's only a test drive. No one ever has to know."
Realizing my one escape, I yank my battered wallet out of my back pocket and pull out a twenty dollar bill. The entire scene freezes. All eyes are transfixed to the damp, smelly piece of paper. Andrew Jackson snickers and you can almost smell the cannibalized Indian on his breath. A miraculous cross breeze flows through my apartment, and I let the money go. It catches an upward draft, a hot air thermal, and is gone out the window.
And then, something even stranger happens. The spokespeople, animals, models, body parts, and corporate whores all disappear in a anti-climactic 'puff' of yellow smoke, leaving a slight smell of perfumed intestine twisting through the air. My twenty freezes in mid flight about thirty feet above the ground. A helicopter drops out of the sky, and lowers a rope down to the cash. A man in a business suit slides down the rope, commando style, and captures the money in his mouth, gives a contemptuous snort, mumbling something like "sucker" under his breath. And then the helicopter is gone, vanishing somewhere behind the radio towers spiking the top of Queen Anne Hill. Everything is quiet again.
I didn't just turn that TV off. I unplugged the motherfucker.
Re:That's nice. Hope you don't love slashdot... (Score:5, Insightful)
In 1991 (just before I finished my undergrad study) I wrote a little program that I gave away for free. In 1994, another student was fiddling with hypertext and made a page out of the docs I wrote for it (with my permission). By mid-95, I was getting an email every week from people who saw it. By September '95, I got around to trying Mosiac (and then Netscape 1.1), and I decided to make a nice little web site, with a variety of other info to support people using it. I think I can pretty honestly call that "in it for the love".
Though I was no longer a student since '92, and I moved away from the college town in '96, they kept hosting the site until '98. For many years, it was the vast majority of that department's external web traffic. Eventually, there was some liability scare (some university somewhere got sued, or was threatened, or there was at least a rumor of such) and the university informed me they had to pull the plug. Also, very uncommon for a university... they gave me a few months of advanced notice and kept it up for many months as I tracked down webmasters for hundreds of sites that had created links. Even to this day there are dozens of links pointing to the old site, and they have been gracious to leave a redirect in their server config.
Fortunately by that time I was making a reasonable income and I decided to pay to keep the site instead of abandon it (and nearly all sites created by students end up). By this point I was certainly "in it for the love", and I was determined to work on the site again after neglecting to do updates from '96 to '98. I really needed it hosted on a box where I had some admin control, and I needed a low-latency connection to it to really accomplish anything creative in my spare time (after working full time plus unpaid overtime). Co-lo and low speed frame relay were about the same cost, so I went with frame so I could have it locally. Being "in it for the love", I began paying about $270/month (just slightly more than my car payment at the time).
Eventually, the local ISP upstream of the frame PVC was sold, and after the original owner bowed out, it all fell apart (previously their uptime was close to 100%) The site has also had been running into bandwidth problems on the frame circuit, as it became more popular and the number of pages increased.
All the while, I resisted banner ads and other annoyances. I've always been "in it for the love", even when I had to pay hundreds of dollars each month. Being a site about hobbist electronics, I got requests for sources for the parts, and for custom-made circuit boards there was no good answer. I guy I worked with wanted to try a little e-commerce and I agreed to send all those requests to him when he made a batch of custom boards. His prices were outrageous and the service wasn't great... but at least there was a source and it was obvious (to most people) that it was another site. After about 18 months, he finally sold all the boards and I decided to take over the e-commerce part. I immediately cut the prices in half (remember, I'm "in it for the love", money be damned). My girlfriend pitched in and together we had many little learning experiences about UPS, packaging, etc. I poured thousands of dollars of savings into buying parts, expecting that someday in half a million years I might get my money back out of it (not). Thus began the e-commerce.
A funny thing happened. The site's traffic went up even higher, and we sold more than triple the number of boards that my co-worker had. It's funny how that works... offer a good product at a fair price and work hard to satify customers. I wouldn't go so far as to say it "paid off", as I have not yet ever received any money out it for the long hours I constantly put into the project... but after a little over a year the website paid me back all the money I "invested" into it from my personal savings.
Luckily, the dot-com bust happened and a number of datacenters had space available on dedicated servers, and we managed to move the site to one of these at a great discount. We get a monthly quote of 50 Gbyte, and currently the site is running somewhere between 15-20. The website now pays for its own hosting, which we got at a steal for $175/month (their regular rate is $400/month, and similar services have similar prices when I've compared).
I'm still "in it for the love".... I still spend long hours working on existing and new projects for the site.... I still try to answer every single email (eventually).... the site makes a tiny profit "on paper", but that money always goes into buying more parts or set-up costs to get new boards made.
Slashdot was "in it for the love"... and maybe they still are, at least partially. But I can tell you from experience that my tiny site, it's bandwidth needs above $25/50/100 per month hosting, it costs real money to serve up web pages in large volume.
Perhaps if you're already insanely rich, you could continue to host a site like slashdot, paying all the expenses out of your own pocket. Saddly, there's only a tiny number of people that rich... for everyone else, no matter how much you are "in it for the love", you're just not going to be able to sustain the expense of slashdot's bandwidth without some sort of revenue.
I agree (Score:5, Funny)
Re:That's nice. Hope you don't love slashdot... (Score:5, Insightful)
That's crap. There is absolutely NO REASON, moral or otherwise, why you should force yourself to look at ads. The value of advertising is based on the statistics of how many people see them. We absolutely should NOT tailor our behavior to please their statistics. That's their problem.
I get up from television ads or mute them all the time. I block most ads on the internet through a proxy. Even when I don't, I have learned to mentally ignore them, hasn't everyone at this point? I see the ad, but not what it's for. This isn't television or a magazine, and it's much easier to scroll the add off the screen or focus only on one part of the screen.
Choosing to point your eyeballs toward the ad doesn't actually generate any revenue for anyone, and pointing your eyeballs elsewhere doesn't take anything from anyone. It's a little game the corps have invented that works well for TV and print, but is unproven for the internet. In fact for some people, I bet all advertising is ineffective.
Maintain your preferred behavior and let THEM figure out how to profit from it.
I much prefer to pay for access to sites, than to see ads, anyway, and I'm glad /. is doing this, it makes a hell of a lot of sense.
This is just a pet peeve, people always popping up in these discussions claiming that by not looking at ads, you are somehow depriving someone of something, and it drives me nuts!
Gee, thanks Slashdot. (Score:5, Insightful)
The single thing that has kept Slashdot interesting (especially in the face of its constant editorial decline over the past couple of years) has been the quality of the user comments.
Hello! That's me. When I moderate, I follow the rules. When I meta-mod, I also follow the rules. And most importantly, whenever I comment, I do so on-topic and in as interesting and insightful a manner as I can manage - and if my would-be comment is neither, then I keep my peace.
In short, I'm what a proper Slashdot "citizen" should be. I'm one of the many (but it seems, increasingly few) people who keep this site from falling into the swamp of the trolls, crapflooders, and other kiddies.
By rights, Rob should be *paying* me. I'm practically a Slashdot employee, and I (and people like me) are what brings Slashdot its value. No good citizens, no Slashdot.
So how am I rewarded for my good behaviour? Extortion. Pay money or get exposed to more and bigger ads so I can continue to have the privilage of contributing content to someone else's site.
Yes, I can certainly sympathise with Slashdot's bandwidth costs, but that is not my problem to solve. I'm already providing content; I'm supposed to pay for the bandwidth too?
This smacks heavily of something Jack Valenti would come up with. How Slashdot has changed!
So no Rob, I'm not paying your subscription fee. And furthermore, I'm going to assume that every advertiser who uses the new "large format" ads is one of the entities who held a gun to your head to force you to accept these new large ads. Not only will I NOT make use of their products/services, and not only will I advise my friends to do the same, but I will be writing these advertisers to TELL them that I am boycotting their products SPECIFICALLY BECAUSE they are forcing their way into my Slashdot experience - and I urge other people who feel similarily to do the same.
If Slashdot was having trouble with the bandwidth bills, there's about a thousand different ways this could have been addressed without pissing off the core people who make the site work Rob. Hell, you could have done an "Ask Slashdot" on it even.
I suppose it's too late now.
DG
Re:Gee, thanks Slashdot. (Score:5, Interesting)
And so I suggest the pledge drive model. Every few months, half the front page gets replaced with a big "hey, this costs us money, please join at one of the following giving levels and contribute." *That* I would do. They could offer t-shirts and bumper stickers, just like the public broadcasting pledge drives do. And I would probably give more money to them than I will ever give to a subscription, perhaps as much as 60 dollars per year.
Frankly, I think sites such as Slashdot should be .org's in fact and not just in name: filed as not-for-profit enterprises (which doesn't mean that they have to lose money, and which doesn't mean that no-one gets paid.)
Re:Good Riddance to the Ad companies (Score:4, Insightful)
How much do you think it costs to send say 100 gig of data down the pipe? Cmon "Mr.Bandwidth doesn't grow on trees". How much? I'll tell you how much. After the hardware is paid for (which it was in the 90's for the most part) It costs fucking pennies, if that.
I highly recommend you sign up for "Economics 101". If someone puts $1 billion of hardware out there, they expect a RETURN on that $1 billion worth of hardware (if you believe that is evil then please pony up that billion yourself) that at least equates what they could get if they invested it in the general markets (i.e. at least 6%), and that's ignoring that the internet today is VASTLY changed from the infrastructure put in place in "the 90's for the most part" : Want to back up that?). Don't like it? Build your own friggin' system.
Help your favorite site, spoof the click (Score:4, Interesting)
This creates the illusion that people are viewing the ads even if they are not. This makes it so you don't have to see the ads, and the sites you like will get advertiser supporting.
Re:Help your favorite site, spoof the click (Score:4, Interesting)
Now, make a crawler that actually buys random stuff occasionally, and you're on to something. It would be interesting to see what you got, too.
Re:Help your favorite site, spoof the click (Score:5, Funny)
That's easy, get married. You'll see what I mean.
Re:Well if I really cared... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:That's nice. Hope you don't love slashdot... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:That's nice. Hope you don't love slashdot... (Score:5, Insightful)
Sure, if they got NO clickthrus it would be odd, but sales, and stats are done mostly by impressions.
Re:That's nice. Hope you don't love slashdot... (Score:5, Insightful)
And things being fun are not correlated with how much one is willing to pay for them. I enjoy playing frisbee in the park. A lot. I go often to the park to play frisbee - I could do it for hours. But the fact that I do it for hours doesn't translate into my willingness to pay, say, a dollar an hour for the "right" to play frisbee, or a willingness to "pay" for my frisbee rights by playing in a field lined with billboards if I can help it.
I frankly think I have every right to block ads if they become to invasive (I don't block Slashdot banner ads, because 1. they often are for products that are at least interesting and 2. they aren't invasive), just as I have a right to browse with a text-browser, a browser that kills pop-ups or doesn't enable them, or to use a braille- or voice- browser if I'm blind. Slashdot's - or anyone's - business model is *not my responsibility.*
Incidentally, I *did* pay for a premier service at Salon because I wanted the added content, not to get rid of the ads. I am very much *not* interested in a rate-based fee based on how many pages I load - this way lies madness.
Well, I must be Cattle then, Moo, I paid my $5 (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:I've already my "subscription" system (Score:4, Funny)
In addition, no one may link into any stories anymore from applets or other websites.
-The Management
Re:I've already my "subscription" system (Score:5, Insightful)
And then they die. It's simple really, people follow the path of least resistance. Slashdot, for the most part, doesn't create the articles, they just collect links to them. The announcement makes it sound like you have two options "Pony up the dough or be hassled with full-page ads", there's a third hidden option not mentioned "Go elsewhere." Everyone will default to option three.
The ad-driven internet isn't a viable model for information delivery anyway. The paltry 40 years that commercials have run TV makes it seem like selling your time and space is the best option. That's simply not true, it's channels like HBO that grew vastly beyond the other stations. It's because their model is pay-only, but you're not paying for a compilation of what's already available on every other station. You're paying for exclusive content, HBO Original Series and Movies that are box-office quality (The Jack Bull anyone? The Sopranos?) and unavailable to you if you don't fork out the cash.
If I'm going to pay for it as if it were a magazine, I would expect the same quality of articles, reviews, and applications that I'd find in National Geographic, rather than trickled-down, patchwork, mentions of articles I could find if I subscribed to another magazine.
Harsh? Maybe, but when you put a price tag on crap, you don't get gold, it just gets renamed as "fertilizer".
Re:I've already my "subscription" system (Score:5, Insightful)
Rob and the Slashdot crew are smart. They support people running all *SORTS* of platforms, and to develop some ad-driven client, or propose that they are going to force us to accept spam just to watch this is absurd. Granted, I could be wrong about that, but I don't think so. Too many economics at work.
I'm sure they are prepared for a downdrop in stats, but I don't think it will be that drastic. Why? Because people who don't run high-traffic sites have NO IDEA the costs involved. And those are the ones on here complaining about $5-$20 a year to help keep this community up and running. But as soon as it switches over, I bet they are still going to come back. Oh sure, some are going to say they are going to leave, and some even may. But I'm not abandoning this community, so don't call me stupid for that.
Off I go to help [slashdot.org]
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Subsciption or financing a wedding... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Subsciption or financing a wedding... (Score:4, Funny)
Do subscribers get:
ads and such (Score:4, Insightful)
PayPal? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:PayPal? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:PayPal? (Score:4, Informative)
Rejected submissions (Score:4, Interesting)
Yes, please -- with the opportunity to moderate or rank them, so the most interesting rejected submissions float to the top.
If a story gets a very positive ranking, maybe the editorial staff can give it a second thought. And if it goes the way of the troll, nobody is the worse for it.
It's called kuro5hin.org (Score:4, Informative)
I still like reading /., though, b/c it's more news for nerds while k5, while it has it's technology and nerd news, also has a lot of political and social discussions. Oh yeah, and k5 also has subscriptions before /. did, but "subscribing" does nothing for you, really, since even if you don't subscribe you don't see any ads. (Although when k5 showed OSDN ads in the past, subscribing hid these banners...)
Re:It's called kuro5hin.org (Score:4, Insightful)
Are you on crack? See my previous rant [slashdot.org] about K5. The quality of postings over there are just horrible. For example, see the current front-page story about female curcumcision. Technology and culture from the trenches my ass.
I have a 3-digit K5 uid, but I am done with that place. I simply don't have the time to go through the submissions bin and give a -1 to all of the crap that is constantly in there.
Re:It's called kuro5hin.org (Score:4, Insightful)
Logic fault....
if you tell people to ditch slashdot to go to kuro5hin...then you increase the overall traffic to kuro5hin...thus lowering the quality of postings on kuro5hin.
By telling us to check out kuro5hin you just peed in yer own pool.
You'd think you want to encourage people to stay on slashdot.....
-jef
Karma (Score:5, Interesting)
Just My $.02
Re:Karma (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Karma (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Karma (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Karma (Score:5, Funny)
Don't you mean 'Just My 4 pages'?
Disappointing.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Gee, I wonder what I'll do?
Let's try browsing with graphics turned off. *click* Ahh.. better.
Metered pricing vs. flat rate (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm not sure about this -- not that I refuse to pay, since I understand the web won't survive on a free-for-all basis forever. What I don't like is the fact that you pay for a number of pageviews, not for a period of time or some other flat rate.
Flat rate pricing has two advantages: simplicity, and comfort. It's simple to say 'Okay, no ads for a year for $x.' No need to count the pages you visit, or wonder if reloads count, or if changing the threshold settings to go from 500 posts to 15 is going to count as an add-free counter item.
Comfort, because I hate nervously watching a meter deplete and trying to optimize my web viewing habits in order to make sure I don't run out. When you say 82% of folks are covered... don't forget that this site caters to the hardcore sorts that participate the most and are likely to fall into the 18% that have to worry. I've never counted my page views, so I can't even tell if I fit that 18%.
And all things considered, I'd rather browse with javascript off and image loading off than worry about depleting my ad-free views. It's less hassle. Which means less profit for you, but that's free market in action... maybe when you add those value-added feature you're thinking about we'll be getting somewhere.
Re:Metered pricing vs. flat rate (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Metered pricing vs. flat rate (Score:5, Interesting)
Unfortunately, I'm a little late to this thread, but I hope you'll read it.
I would like to start off by saying that I'm not overly enthusiastic about your plans to make
I would also have to add, that bigger adds are not an option for me:- I'm in fact very depressed about where the good ole internet is heading with this advertising crapola.
Even though I have no real objection against paying you for your site, the fact that you can't tell me exactly how much I'm going to have to pay bothers me.
What I would like to ask you though is, what kind of alternatives have you considered?
Why have you not asked the
I would like to bring up for discussion some alternatives myself:
To get back to the advertising: the advertisement industry is going totally nuts trying to come up with 'something' that works. Be it pop-ups, pop-under, dhtml on top of content, whatever,- I perceive it exactly the same as a person walking up to me in the street with a 10 by 10 feet billboard that starts yelling in my face, whilst keeping me from moving on.
Today they want you to put up bigger ads, tomorrow it's pop-ups, the day after we can't find your site behind all the ads. This basically makes subscription the only option.
What I suggest is that you come up with some creative alternatives. I mean, look at Google,- they have come up with a non-annoying way of allowing companies to advertise. (You really should read up on how their advertising works [google.com]). Why couldn't this work for
An other thing that comes to mind is sponsored submissions. Hey, if AMD comes out with a new CPU, they may as well pay you to announce it. As special header color or something could indicate that it was sponsored.
I was also thinking about something like "paid for 'Ask Slashdot'". This could be very helpful for companies that want industry feedback. For example, our company has a product that is designed for In-Flight Entertainment. But we could consider bringing this product to the general market. It would be interesting though to get some feedback (like, 'that's waaay to expensive' or 'but it's missing an xyz port!'). This would have the side-effect of acknowledging that people that post comments add value to your site.
There could be entirely sponsored sections, like 'what's up with Intel', basically a glorified portal to Intel press releases, but targeted for the
I guess what I'm saying is, instead of the 'in yer face' approach that seems to dominate the internet, why not take a more co-operative approach. I understand that you want to remain un-biased, and it should always be clear to readers when something is placed because of sponsoring. But I think that could be communicated easily.
The interesting thing is that these kind of scenarios could be implemented in parallel with subscription system. The good thing about that is that you will have instant feedback on how the readers appreciate either one. So instead of following the masses, lead them again!
Good luck!
Re:Metered pricing vs. flat rate (Score:5, Informative)
This system works well for 82% of Slashdot readers- for them the cost is the same as a typical magazine.
Re:Metered pricing vs. flat rate (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Metered pricing vs. flat rate (Score:5, Insightful)
You're running a site where 3% of your users provide content to the other 97%. You've just said that you doubt the 3% will ever pay. Do you think they're going to not pay, and continue to provide you with free content? Particularly taking into account the "venom posted in this discussion"?
Taco, you're running a magazine of sorts. 75% of your writers and researchers are screaming their heads off at you, and your response is that you doubt they'll pay you at all. You should probably be wondering who, exactly, is going to pay you at all if those 3% leave.
It's strange that of the 3% who make this site worth visitng, probably 20% of them are no longer allowed to moderate, and 75% of them are yelling at you right now, and you're so blase about the entire affair. Aren't you just a little bit worried? Particularly if your ads are large enough to screw page formatting and make everything ugly when filtered by proxomitron or junkbuster, those 3% might not be around for much longer.
I respect what you've done with this place (aside from $rtbl'ing me and a couple thousand others), and I know this decision is driven by your advertisers, and your corporate parent, but I can't believe that what I'm saying here passed under your radar. I assume these concerns were raised, addressed, and resolved -- so tell me, what was the resolution?
I'm worried Slashdot is going to die. Assure me that this is not the case, that these new measures are not going to cause all of your unpaid content providers to scatter [kuro5hin.org] on the [metafilter.com] wind [plastic.com].
-l
Re:Metered pricing vs. flat rate (Score:4, Informative)
I'm sorry we don't have a system in place to tell you your activity in advance, but those realtime updates are DB hogs and we don't do them for everyone.
I'm not leaving, but I'm not paying either (Score:5, Interesting)
Remember folks, this isn't a mandatory service, you only pay if you want to avoid the ads. At least that's what I understand from Taco's article
Re:I'm not leaving, but I'm not paying either (Score:4, Interesting)
Or block them in your hosts file or with web washing software.
Now I actually don't block any of the adverts that appear on Slashdot. I even (gasp) click through, and actually (double gasp) buy Thinkgeek merchandise.
But if it gets out of hand... I'd appreciate knowing this up front:
I.e. if I start blocking Slashdot ads, am I going to hurt Slashdot?
support via content (Score:5, Insightful)
Never forget that all of us who post intelligently are supporting you, by giving you free content. That is, after all, why people read /.
I can get tech news anywhere. The commentary (yes, you have to filter for trolls, flamebait, and stupidity, but that applies just as much to any major newspaper's op-ed page) is what makes the site worthwhile.
Re:support via content (Score:5, Funny)
Good point. I have 50 karma points, where's *my* cheque?
Re:support via content (Score:4, Insightful)
Never forget that of the 250,000 Slashdot readers, about 3000 post
Then if you you post, i.e. contribute content to the site, which is thought to be "good" by your peers (the moderators) you shouldn't have to pay for removing ads, it actually makes having karma worthwhile...
Al.question about what is a page (Score:5, Insightful)
What is a page? Each time I load www.slashdot.com? What happens if I load it, go read a link it points too then come back to it again?
Please provide more detail on how this scheme works
Let the Flames Begin (Score:5, Insightful)
Also keep in mind that unlike many subscription sites, Slashdot is not talking about premium content for major articles (like Salon or IGN), only little bonuses for subscribers, which is fair enough. I'll wait until the ads actually start appearing to make up my mind, but let's not flame Slashdot for coming in line with the almost defacto practice that today's Internet economy demands.
This will be very awkward (Score:5, Insightful)
I can see paying X dollars to surf without ads. A simple flat rate.
But of I have to start thinking "should I hit reload and waste a page view", it will make using Slashdot very awkward.
Time to install junkbuster
PayPal only..? (Score:4, Insightful)
As for the Subscriptions, well, I hope things work out, this could be really good for Slashdot, or really bad. I biggest concern is since I've read that only a small percent of Slashdot readers post and read articles, that means the majority only uses Slashdot as a proxy for news. If the banner ads start to annoy them, they'll start going straight to the new source.. Oh well, only time will tell, Good luck Slashdot team.
Possible Repercussions (Score:5, Insightful)
I think what might come of this is a tighter ship splintering off into smaller, private Slashdot sites. For example, not to slag all the people who put thought into their posts, but a private Slashdot just including my friends and others by introduction would be great for me--less traffic, so I could actually read all the posts, and less noise, so I would bother.
Just a few random thoughts... I appreciate what Slashdot has been and hope it doesn't lose its shine.
What defines a page? (Score:4, Interesting)
A few questions (Score:4, Interesting)
Considering the number of articles posted here about PayPal fraud, will you accept any payment other than PayPal? Will you accept cash in the mail to ensure anonymity for the paranoid?
The rates are currently set at $5 per 1000 pages.
When we encounter the lameness filter trying to paste code into a comment, does that count as a page view?
Eventually we intend to offer additional features to subscribers. Exactly what those plums are remains to be decided: Access to the rejected submissions bin? A 'Gold Star' in your comments header? Karma?
May I reccommend the ability to pay to Disable Modbombing? [slashdot.org]
Good luck guys...
How much will it cost... (Score:4, Funny)
Why so much hostility to this? (Score:5, Interesting)
And I think the subscription model is actually fair - what it looks like they are doing is, effectively, telling us to run our own personal ads on Slashdot - that is, we're buying their unsold ad inventory and using it to remove ads..
Here's an idea: Subscribers could be allowed to create their own main page out of the accepted and rejected submissions, so they could run their own weblog within Slashdot with their own submissions always approved. Might be a nice ego boost.
Anyway, I certainly want to see Slashdot continue; I'm surprised at all the negative comments. You want to get paid, I want to get paid, and surely Rob et al likewise want to get paid.
It's just how the world goes 'round. It was artfully concealed for a long time
D
One problem that I see... (Score:5, Insightful)
I think there should possibly be a "positive-discussion" discount, where if you post modded-up comments, you get more allowed page views. After all, you are helping the
I see the need for the system, I know you guys need to stay open, and I do understand that people like myself use up a lot of bandwidth on here, but I personally would really like to see some sort of reward for positively contributing to the site.
Am I also paying for accountability? (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh, for God's sake. (Score:5, Insightful)
a) First of all, you're paying for ad-free page views. If you can't load a page, seems to me that...surprise!...you wouldn't be charged for one of your ad-free page views.
b) Grow the fuck up. Do you think bandwidth is free? Do you think those really hibby rack-mount servers are free? Do you think that when one of those two fail, CmdrTaco is just gonna sit around, thumb up his ass, waiting for someone else to fix it?
Read CT's above comments: this is like a pledge drive for PBS. Instead of a tote-bag, you get ad-free pages. And remember: if you don't like it -- or Slashdot -- you're always free to fuck the fuck off.
Goddamn, but your comment has made me angry. I'll get modded down for sure, if anyone sees this in this field of 2000+ comments, but I don't care. I'm signing up because I like this goddamned site and I want to know it's going to stay around. I want to know that /. isn't going to sink beneath the waves because of apathy and "Where's my five-nines uptime guarantee?" clueless whining from idiots like yourself. I am honestly quite unable to understand what the fuck why your idiotic demands should seem important to you.
(I'll probably wake up tomorrow and regret how angrily I replied. But I won't regret that $20 [slashdot.org].
page views (Score:5, Interesting)
Does this change the viewer demographic for ads? (Score:5, Interesting)
Put your money where your mouth is. (Score:5, Insightful)
You can't tell me you life hasn't been changed (for better or worse) by these guys. $5 a month is a _pittance_. You can't buy LUNCH for $5.
_MY_ 'checks in the mail'
Killing the goose? (Score:4, Insightful)
So you're saying that the very people who make slashdot worth reading are the ones who will have to pay most? Isn't this...backwards?
What about HOF'ers? (Score:4, Insightful)
What about the people that put in a lot of comments, to make the stories have more depth or meaning? Do we get something besides an insult by a slashdot author [slashdot.org] to the people that indirectly line his wallet??
I've put a lot of time and effort into slashdot, is that gonna matter at all?? I try to help the site become more than a "regurgitated stories" site, but I have to pay to avoid ads?
Ethical Question (Score:5, Insightful)
Now, slashdot offers a way for me to support their site, but at the same time tells me that their ads are shifting to annoy-ware. So, do I just continue to block the ads, or try a free site or whatever, or do I pay slashdot?
While people think the internet is free, it isn't. SOMEONE pays. In this case, it's the company that controls slashdot. I value having this site up on the net, and I value all the time and effort that has gone into keeping everything running and happy.
I've decided, I'll keep blocking with webwasher but I'll also donate my $5. Think about it, $5 for something you check twice a day is worth the cost of a single lunch.
P.S. I'd love to see some recognition to people who donate though, a little star would be cool and discourage AC's
Its not so bad ... geeez (Score:5, Interesting)
sieriously though
For something that adds value
My big fear is what its going to do to the 'constructive' user.
Its not going to scare away trolls
I mean
If a large number of 'interesting' posters stop posting as much
or they could use mod_gzip (Score:5, Insightful)
The typical Slash home page is about 50K or more. mod_gzip literally gets it down to less than 6K!
It would literally cut their bandwidth costs by more than half!
Of course, they may need another server or two, but it would pay for itself quickly.
Re:or they could use mod_gzip (Score:5, Informative)
Re:or they could use mod_gzip (Score:5, Informative)
$ telnet slashdot.org 80
GET / HTTP/1.1
Host: slashdot.org
Accept-Encoding: gzip
[blank line]
You'll get back a page with Content-Encoding: gzip.
From the bottom of the page (Score:5, Insightful)
And the comments are what make
Something feels wrong here. I know it costs a lot of money to run
I think three main things are behind my unease. One is that my cheese is being moved. Secondly, VA/OSDN are for-profit. If subscriptions are successful, and they get more than they need, will the subscriptions be extended? Or will Taco, Hemos, ESR & Larry Augustin pocket the money? Thirdly, the posters are being asked to pay more than the lurkers. Hello? The people that make the site what it is have to pay more than those who merely use it? That seems wrong. If I could trade in 25 of my 50 karma for a hundred page views I think I would. Then I could keep posting witty and insightful comments, and
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Moderation and meta-moderation (Score:5, Insightful)
If you keep these two functions free, then we can maintain the value added by the community, and people will continue to contribute, because they fill feel that they are benefiting. We currently avoid the tragedy of the commons, because we can all contribute, and all benefit - let's not lose that.
If we want to be even more sophisticated, how about allowing people to trade in a certain amount of karma for a certain number of pages? Maybe 10 karma points = $5? That would encourage people to contribute more intelligently, and add more value.
And so it goes (Score:5, Insightful)
Does this sound familiar?
I love Slashdot, I really do, and I know this was inevitable. But it's sad, because it indicates that Slashdot has burned the last of the venture capital and has now slipped into the realms of desparate self delusion.
Please understand that this isn't a troll. I truly want Slashdot to survive, but I can't help but think that the people who will pay up tomorrow are the same people who are already clicking through today. There's no new revenue stream here, there's just a deparate gamble that the ads can get bigger faster than the readership goes elsewhere. There's no evidence to show that this happens. We're fickle bastards, us net users.
Before you mod me or retort, please understand one thing: I'm not talking about you. You are one of the good guys, as evidenced by your finger hovering over the "Moderate" or the "Submit" button. You care about Slashdot. You're one of the ones contributing, one of the ones who will stay after the ads (or the missing images from blocked hosts) take up half the screen. But you're not the problem. The problem are the quarter of a million casual viewers who turn up, get served a small banner or two, then wander off to Tom's Hardware or The Register. And I'm not saying bigger ads will drive them away overnight, just that the announcement of bigger ads mean that Slashdot needs to make more money... and they simply won't make it from the vast majority of casual users. They need to make it from a small hardcore minority, from the posters and the responders and the modders, from you and me.
And much as I love Slashdot, I don't want to end paying for (guesstimate) 0.02% of it. Do you? :(
I'll pay, but not on these terms + suggestions (Score:4, Interesting)
1. Your heaviest/highest rated posters should get *discounts*, not have to pay extra. Remember, your most interesting content comes from those 3% of your audience -- the ones who actually post.
2. Page views are a *terrible* way of measuring site use. Changing settings (like viewing thresholds), double-checking stories before posting, refreshing a page to see a continuing discussion -- do these count? Can you tell? I don't want to live in fear of wasting my page-views, *especially* if I'm wasting page views by *contributing* content to your site.
3. I'm sorry, but the cost is too high. You have a circulation of 300,000+, and employ fewer than 10 people. You have hardware and bandwidth costs too, but 300,000x$20 = $6 million a year, not counting the 15% who are paying more than that. You can't advocate open source and free software and then overcharge for your website.
So, my suggestions:
1. Flat monthly fee with discounts for annual subscriptions.
2. Karma-based discounts, too, so people have an incentive to post meaningful content, which would boost your signal-to-noise enormously.
3. Lower prices.
Give Positive contributers credits to pageviews! (Score:4, Insightful)
1. Positive contributers get rewarded.
2. Everyday users may work towards more positive contribution for reward, resulting in even better content!
Seems like there is no reason not to try this!
Caveats (Score:4, Insightful)
Real magazines pay their contributors -- but somehow, I don't expect to see a check from VA Systems if one of my comments is highly rated by the moderators. ;)
You might consider some sort of karma-based subscription service, where you lower prices for those who provide "good" content (as moderated). That way, people have an incentive to post quality material, and they don't feel cheated by paying Taco's web bills. ;) Everybody wins (except the trolls, of course).
I also expect professional journalistic standards from a site I'm paying for. If I'm giving away content, I'm not that concerned about spelling and punctuation -- but if I'm charging people to read what I write, I have editors and such who make sure the content is clean and readable. If Slashdot wants to move beyond amateur status, it needs to act professional.
I have no problem with Slashdot trying to recoup its costs -- but I (and lots of other people) expect value for thier money. Getting rid of ads isn't enough incentive to make me pay for Slashdot.
Good luck guys.
Let users find out their page view rates! (Score:5, Insightful)
WE ARE YOUR CONTENT! (Score:4, Insightful)
"As an aside, it's also worth noting that more than half of all comment posters fall into this 3% (that will have to pay more than $5 a month)"
Lets look at what this means...
The people that produce comments worth reading ARE your content... So, you will be charging those people that PRODUCE for you... This seems backwards to me, and if the people that normally comment are turned off, the quality of slashdot will suffer.
I fear that you will just become "another example of how websites can't make money". Noone will ever anlize the fact that you turned away the people that actually made your website worth reading... I certainly am not going to PAY you for the privledge of posting to your website so you can make money off of it.
Turn the concept around the way it SHOULD be. Do something like, "the top 20% highest moderated posters get free access" or something like this. This will, in effect, almost become like a payment to your authors.
But it is probably too late for anyone to read this... There are hundreds of posts already by upset people, and this will just get lost in the noise.
-db
Text Ads (Score:5, Interesting)
If advertisers would prefer that you post stories about thier products because "that's what the want" would you do it? I should hope not! Give the advertisers a smack across the head and tell them: "We will put text ads, you know, the kind that annoy no one and actually provide enough information for people to click on. The kind that Google uses to stay in business AND keep it's integrity."
NOTE TO SLASHDOT: BIG ADS DO NOT WORK! In fact, they actually do the opposite, which will make your advetisers even MORE desperate, and foolishly request even bigger ads! Use small, text based ads. They work!
What is a page? How much is enough? (Score:5, Insightful)
However there are two problems to the subscription gig. First there's a huge issue with page views vs page count vs whatever. I can configure my threshold and viewing preferences so that any story I want to read, and complete comments, shows in one pass saving me a page hit but we all know that by the time you get to the bottom of the page and reload it, they'll be 10-100 new comments added and this can go on for several hours (depending on how popular the subject is). Also pages like this one where I'm entering my comment and will preview it and then it gets added, do all those count? I think you guys clearly need to define what is and what isn't counted.
However I don't believe that charging by the page is reasonable for a site like this. You get 300,000+ users so asking for even 10% of them to pay means a return of about $600,000 a year. You've been spinning along for quite some time now without having anyone foot the bill so why is now any different? The gravy train has run out. OSDN execs are saying "We want to make some ROI on this Slashdot thing". And 600K a year can't pay for the hardware? I'm no expert and I don't have the numbers for this site, but I seriously doubt 600K a year wouldn't cover the hardware, bandwidth and staff costs.
liB
Do people not read the articles? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not going to pay the money for removing the ads, since after growing up reading newspapers, magazines, watching TV, and seeing billboards everywhere, I'm used to them, and don't pay attention to them anymore. If they start to run popup or pop-under ads, however, then I stop visiting. Don't complain about them giving you the option (not forcing it like Salon) to pay to get rid of ads, though, it's a nice option to have.
Can someone answer me a simple question, though: If ads are blackholed thru my OpenBSD NAT, do those still count as hits for Slashdot? I'm pretty sure they do, but I've never gotten a real answer from someone.
Garbage Bin? (Score:5, Insightful)
Please remove all my comments. Now. (Score:5, Funny)
From: J. Nagle
Over the last few years, I have posted 1700 comments to Slashdot. (Current karma: 162)
I do not authorize the unpaid use of my copyrighted materials on the pay sites of others. Please remove all my previous comments before your site becomes a pay site. Failure to do so will be considered a copyright violation.
John Nagle
Menlo Park, CA
The people who make the site pay the most? (Score:5, Insightful)
If half of that 1.5% who will have to pay over $60 a year to access
Sorry but I just don't see how charging people who are content producers as well as the heavy content consumers is going to help the site? Perhaps people should now be paid for each submission posted to the site, after all a good story will increase the views, and thus the revenues incoming to
What's wrong with ads? (Score:5, Insightful)
I remember when PC Magazine first came out (in the 80's), it was mostly advertising and that was its primary value. Everyone wanted to know all about the latest hardware and software that you could add on to your PC, and the respective vendors were best qualified to talk about them.
I think the main reason most people despise today's web advertising is that it sucks. It's all about making an impression, and contains little interesting content. These "in your face" ads are also created with the assumption that you really don't want to see them, so they have to force you to look.
This, and Slashdot's new approach, are all horribly misguided. What /. needs to do is play a major role in the production, appearance and categorization of the ads. Make them a resource, not a nuisance. Make them informative, browseable and searchable. Reject products with no real value.
Slashdot should raise the bar for web advertising, not wallow in the mud of its current state.
Distributed /.? (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course, this would have to be an independent movement, because I'm sure VA Linux (or whatever the hell they're named now) wouldn't want to lose out on a cash cow like
What The Ads Will Be (Score:5, Informative)
NO pop-ups, pop-unders, pop whatever.
NO Flash playing, Java Applet, MID playing ads.
What it will be is the messaging unit ads (the big square ad in center of page) and sometimes, a bigger banner ad where the current banner is. That's it. Still GIF/JPG ads. That's all. And yes, one ad per page.
Maintaining the site dynamics (Score:5, Interesting)
This change will change the whole site dynamics. For the worse, I think, in its current form.
Slashdot offers two main things:
Both of these things rely heavily on "community involvement". Most of the links for the clipping service come from contributions; all the discussion, and all the filtering of the discussion (moderation) comes from the community.
People got rewarded for sending in link suggestions with their name in lights; people got rewarded for good posts with karma; people got rewarded for moderation/meta-moderation with (some) karma. The efforts/rewards were reasonably well balanced to produce the current Slashdot.
Now there's a new factor. Annoying adverts. (I'm assuming they'll be annoying because of the way this is approached, the "we know you won't like this, so here's a way you can buy your way out of it" approach.)
Which changes the whole dynamics of the site. Suddenly people get "charged" for seeing their name in lights (with annoying adverts, or actual money). Suddenly people get "charged" for reading the comments so they can post. Suddenly people get "charged" for reading the comments so they can moderate them. And perhaps people even get "charged" for reading moderations so they can do meta-moderation. Incentives not to do these things. These things which make Slashdot what it is now.
If Slashdot wants to make a major change like this, and not dramatically change the "feel" of Slashdot, then it needs to be made balancing these contributions/rewards. Sending in article links needs to be rewarded; posting good comments needs to be rewarded; doing moderation and meta-moderation needs to be rewarded. In the context of the new change.
Some things Slashdot should consider:
Without these sorts of balancing rewards all the things that make Slashdot good will be discouraged by annoying adverts (persuading people to go elsewhere), or by the knowledge that if you load the comments to contribute/moderate it's going to cost you, so why bother.
I've no problem with contributing to Slashdot, even money if the framework for the contribution is right (the current scheme is not). But all the contributions which make Slashdot what it is need to be recognised in the new framework.
Ewen
Re:How sad... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Post alternative sites below (Score:5, Interesting)
Newsforge.org
theregister.co.uk
security
ibm.com/developer
codingstyle.com
Re:Post alternative sites below (Score:5, Insightful)
About 3/4ths of the slashdot articles that interest me I have already seen on blogs 1-7 days earlier. Some of this is due to the review period of submitted links, and part of it is that sometimes a link is submitted multiple times before it is accepted. Regardless, if slashdot closed tomorrow, I would still get my nerd news from other sources. What's special about slashdot is that I can post comments and get modded down. If slashdot dies, blame it on the people who still want information to be free. We will always exist in small groups and keep the information flowing.
Re:First Subscription! (Score:5, Insightful)
I suggest that for an, ahem, subscriber I could get past some of the following real annoyances:
Lameness filter
Posting timer (e.g. Slow down cowboy...)
Get a bigger submission box, hey, it's the 00's, we have higher res than 640x480, ok? Make this box bigger or at least parameter driven
Allow 2 and 3 letter words (mostly acronyms) in the Search. Geez, this is tech stuff and it's mostly acronyums anyway: RAM DVD CD HP AMD, etc.
Re:Subscribtions (Score:5, Interesting)
It'd be a user option of course, just like all the other filters. You can set a +1 to subscribers. I dunno if everyone would like that, but I would think it would be interesting to see at least.
Futile (Score:5, Insightful)
ok:
Let's say you get past robot security.
Let's say slashdot leaves you alone.
Let's say freeslashdot.org is popular.
Well... freeslashdot is going to get SLAMMED by hits just like slashdot... and not long after freeslashdot is either going to be shut down for not paying their bandwidth fees, or it wont be free for much longer.
Besides, Slashdot has been good to us. The least you can do is look at some extra ad's to keep them in buisness. (or better yet you COULD subscribe)