Forum auto amazon affiliate link disclosure

[ItsMitch]

8 minutes ago, djdwosk97 said:

Wait, so what happens if someone pastes an affiliate link (which I know is against TOS), does it get redirected to LTT's referral link or does it not get attached to pasted referral links?

Redirects I believe

[colonel_mortis]

8 hours ago, djdwosk97 said:

Wait, so what happens if someone pastes an affiliate link (which I know is against TOS), does it get redirected to LTT's referral link or does it not get attached to pasted referral links?

Any existing Amazon affiliate tags are removed and the LTT one is added.

[ItsMitch]

3 minutes ago, colonel_mortis said:

Any existing Amazon affiliate tags are removed and the LTT one is added.

Are you serious? Pretty dodgy lol

[colonel_mortis]

15 minutes ago, SC2Mitch said:

Are you serious? Pretty dodgy lol

Using your own affiliate link has never been allowed, and posts containing an affiliate link were liable to being edited to remove the link or being removed entirely. This way there is less moderation action required, because the posts will be fine when submitted, and also allows the forum to make a small amount of income rather than having more ads (I don't know how much, but I would be surprised if it comes close to covering costs).

[AlTech]

21 hours ago, colonel_mortis said:

Using your own affiliate link has never been allowed, and posts containing an affiliate link were liable to being edited to remove the link or being removed entirely. This way there is less moderation action required, because the posts will be fine when submitted, and also allows the forum to make a small amount of income rather than having more ads (I don't know how much, but I would be surprised if it comes close to covering costs).

But why?

 

If somebody recommends something and if you wanted to then you could let the person choose to keep their affiliate link or use LTT's one. This rule seems forceful and there's no apparent reason why the user shouldn't be able to choose to have it automatically changed or allow other affiliate links.

 

And now I've come to the realization that I can no longer in good conscious post links to products on Amazon even if they never contained any affiliate links in the first place.

 

Also, I'm fairly sure if Amazon fully understood what was going on here then they'd disapprove.

[colonel_mortis]

35 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

If somebody recommends something and if you wanted to then you could let the person choose to keep their affiliate link or use LTT's one. This rule seems forceful and there's no apparent reason why the user shouldn't be able to choose to have it automatically changed or allow other affiliate links.

 

And now I've come to the realization that I can no longer in good conscious post links to products on Amazon even if they never contained any affiliate links in the first place.

 

Also, I'm fairly sure if Amazon fully understood what was going on here then they'd disapprove.

We aren't the only site to do this - sites like overclock.net do the same. It is, and has for a long time been, that all affiliate and referral links aside from those belonging to LMG are banned. The introduction of this feature did not change that policy, it just means that we no longer remove links or posts for containing amazon affiliate codes.

 

Aside from a clear disclosure in the Terms of Service, which will be added in due course (but because it's a legal document I can't just add it), this is the idea of the Amazon affiliate programme - to give sites a small kickback for driving traffic & sales to Amazon.

 

It doesn't affect you in any way (the price is still the same regardless of how you get there), so it is an unintrusive way for LMG to slightly offset the significant operating costs of this site. If you want to stop posting links to Amazon products, you of course can, but I am unable to understand what difference the affiliate tag makes to you, or any other member of the forum. I accept that, per the programme's terms it should be transparently disclosed, and that will be done now that it has been brought to our attention, but I don't think that would have influenced anyone's behaviour.

[Eduard the weeb]

1 hour ago, colonel_mortis said:

all affiliate and referral links aside from those belonging to LMG are banned.

What if your on Bitwits floatplane channel and he has a referral link he posts it would it be changed to LTT then ? ( not sure if he does ) 

[colonel_mortis]

3 minutes ago, Eduard the weeb said:

What if your on Bitwits floatplane channel and he has a referral link he posts it would it be changed to LTT then ? ( not sure if he does ) 

The only Amazon links that I can see that he has posted are shortened links which aren't modified, but in theory they would be affected too, yes. When we switch to the new Floatplane site, which should be relatively soon (though it's been soon for a while), that will cease to be an issue.

[handymanshandle]

3 minutes ago, wcreek said:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XNRQHG4/

AMD Ryzen 5 1600

 

I'm just verifying that.

 

Huh it does it to either one. Sneaky lol

 

[handymanshandle]

1 hour ago, colonel_mortis said:

We aren't the only site to do this - sites like overclock.net do the same. It is, and has for a long time been, that all affiliate and referral links aside from those belonging to LMG are banned. The introduction of this feature did not change that policy, it just means that we no longer remove links or posts for containing amazon affiliate codes.

 

Aside from a clear disclosure in the Terms of Service, which will be added in due course (but because it's a legal document I can't just add it), this is the idea of the Amazon affiliate programme - to give sites a small kickback for driving traffic & sales to Amazon.

 

It doesn't affect you in any way (the price is still the same regardless of how you get there), so it is an unintrusive way for LMG to slightly offset the significant operating costs of this site. If you want to stop posting links to Amazon products, you of course can, but I am unable to understand what difference the affiliate tag makes to you, or any other member of the forum. I accept that, per the programme's terms it should be transparently disclosed, and that will be done now that it has been brought to our attention, but I don't think that would have influenced anyone's behaviour.

Puts in a referral link to pcpartpicker >:3c

[AlTech]

55 minutes ago, colonel_mortis said:

The introduction of this feature did not change that policy, it just means that we no longer remove links or posts for containing amazon affiliate codes.

Why was that policy added to the rules in the first place?

55 minutes ago, colonel_mortis said:

It doesn't affect you in any way

It alters the relationship between the user and the site.

 

If i want to use the affiliate link then I'll deliberately use it. But converting any amazon link to one with an affiliate link means that if somebody posts an Amazon link you're effectively using people so Amazon can give you a tiny fraction of a bonus for using referring them.

 

The problem I have with this is the fact that this is done automatically and happens on every link.

 

If it wasn't done automatically then It'd be fine and I'd ignore any link containing the affiliate code.

 

It effectively feels like you're trying to force people to use it so you can make that tiny bonus.

 

If the site truly relies on this to survive then something is really wrong.

55 minutes ago, colonel_mortis said:

so it is an unintrusive way for LMG to slightly offset the significant operating costs of this site.

Here's a suggestion.

 

Why not allow users to pay the forum to run their ADs on the site? You can set the rate to be as high as you want and you can curate which Community ADs are shown.

 

I would vastly prefer a system like that. I'm really tired of all the Amazon ADs and affiliate links and whatever. I don't need Amazon knowing more about me than they currently do. And I certainly don't want to reward people unless I'm fairly confident that they deserved it.

55 minutes ago, colonel_mortis said:

If you want to stop posting links to Amazon products, you of course can, but I am unable to understand what difference the affiliate tag makes to you, or any other member of the forum. I accept that, per the programme's terms it should be transparently disclosed, and that will be done now that it has been brought to our attention, but I don't think that would have influenced anyone's behaviour.

The point is, if I want to reward LTT then I will and use the affiliate link. If i don't then I shouldn't be forced to use the affiliate link by default.

[Eduard the weeb]

2 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

Why not allow users to pay the forum to run their ADs on the site? You can set the rate to be as high as you want and you can curate which Community ADs are shown.

most likely not enough ads for them and a lot of people would prefer to run ads on YouTube due to the much larger audience there and people can and will use ad block because I can assume 50 percent of the forum has ad block.

[Eduard the weeb]

question on the first video about what are we buying was majority of the data from the forum audience ? also what happened when the LTT Amazon affiliate program went down was that removed?  I honestly have no idea how the Amazon affiliate program works so yeah sorry if these are dumb questions.

[ItsMitch]

Just now, Eduard the weeb said:

I honestly have no idea how the Amazon affiliate program works so yeah sorry if these are dumb questions

The main problem people are bringing up is that they want more disclosure from LTT and there has been done, it's not outlined in the Privacy Policy nor community guidelines and from what I can find out that what they're doing is violating the Amazon Affiliate Agreement

 

[Eduard the weeb]

Just now, SC2Mitch said:

The main problem people are bringing up is that they want more disclosure from LTT and there has been done, it's not outlined in the Privacy Policy nor community guidelines and from what I can find out that what they're doing is violating the Amazon Affiliate Agreement

 

Yeah I get that it seems kinda like a dick move because they are getting the money, I am more pissed off because I use amazon smile to help red cross so I was wondering does the affiliate program work with smile because sorry if this is harsh but I would prefer that money going to the red cross more then LTT. 

[ItsMitch]

Just now, Eduard the weeb said:

Yeah I get that it seems kinda like a dick move because they are getting the money, I am more pissed off because I use amazon smile to help red cross so I was wondering does the affiliate program work with smile because sorry if this is harsh but I would prefer that money going to the red cross more then LTT. 

Oh I totally understand, it'll just be nice to be able to opt out of all of this, I'm sure Amazon wouldn't be too pleased with this, kind of weird we got no update from Linus or Nick about this. 

[Eduard the weeb]

Just now, SC2Mitch said:

Oh I totally understand, it'll just be nice to be able to opt out of all of this, I'm sure Amazon wouldn't be too pleased with this, kind of weird we got no update from Linus or Nick about this. 

@LinusTech @nicklmg

[AlTech]

4 minutes ago, Eduard the weeb said:

Yeah I get that it seems kinda like a dick move because they are getting the money, I am more pissed off because I use amazon smile to help red cross so I was wondering does the affiliate program work with smile because sorry if this is harsh but I would prefer that money going to the red cross more then LTT. 

As mentioned earlier by Mortis, any affiliate link posted gets removed and they insert the LTT affiliate link.

[Eduard the weeb]

Just now, AluminiumTech said:

As mentioned earlier by Mortis, any affiliate link posted gets removed and they insert the LTT affiliate link.

k

[colonel_mortis]

11 minutes ago, Eduard the weeb said:

Yeah I get that it seems kinda like a dick move because they are getting the money, I am more pissed off because I use amazon smile to help red cross so I was wondering does the affiliate program work with smile because sorry if this is harsh but I would prefer that money going to the red cross more then LTT. 

Smile and affiliate links can be used at the same time, but most links posted to the forum aren't smile links so you would need to edit the URL to add the smile. part.

[Eduard the weeb]

Just now, colonel_mortis said:

Smile and affiliate links can be used at the same time, but most links posted to the forum aren't smile links so you would need to edit the URL to add the smile. part.

oh yet I know I made smile my default for amazon and in my bookmarks

[Eduard the weeb]

@colonel_mortis Do you know if that money from the forum goes to the forum thought? because logically that makes the most sense imo but still, I get that LMG is a company and they still need to make $ if we are to keep using them and this forum.

[colonel_mortis]

4 minutes ago, Eduard the weeb said:

@colonel_mortis Do you know if that money from the forum goes to the forum thought? because logically that makes the most sense imo but still, I get that LMG is a company and they still need to make $ if we are to keep using them and this forum.

I'm not aware of the specifics of the finances, but I know that the forum used to make a loss. Given that costs have increased since then, I suspect that it still does, though I don't know how much difference income from contributors makes (or how much of that could be counted as forum income rather than LMG general income).

[vanished]

To add to the above, as for how much money LTT makes from the affiliate program, it is significant, as you will recall from the Honest Answers video where this was explained.

[shadowbyte]

whoa, that's sketchy