Website redesign – Update

andytheadequate,

You are a subscriber. You can turn ads off in your premier settings.

That will shortly be the default setting for subscribers

The rogue ads were appearing way before Christmas…strangely exactly the same time.as the new site…if the ad networks are relearning then they have failed to provide those high quality ads from the start.
I’m visiting the site about 4 times a day…and each visit (apart from this one so far) has had a rogue ad…
I don’t understand how the ads work, it has been several years since I was last involves in digital ads, but I’m pretty sure things aren’t working properly.
Given a fair amount of visiting is done on mobiles (and a fair amount is on Android), then it would make sense to get the stuff that generates income working properly.
Saying that, I’m still liking the new design, works much better than the old one…the ads are an on-going battle but I’m sure it’ll get sorted in the future…

If you are visiting 4 times a day then you are definitely going to be seeing the low CPM inventory at the moment.

I’m not saying the rogue ads were not there before Xmas I’m saying they are more likely to be seen now the demand has dropped.

There is a reason we coordinated our mobile theme launch with that drop in demand and I guess it’s understandable that you would therefor draw an incorrect correlation between the two.

Mark, that’s a bit cryptic – have you fixed the spammy pop up ads or not? If you are telling me they are there by design and not a defect them “I’m oot”.

Thanks, I’ve found the option to turn off ads now.

@allthegear – I am a premier member, i just didnt know of the option as the ads had never bothered me before. And I don’t think many people would see that as a good reason to become a premier member. ‘Pay us money so we don’t spam your phone with shitty adverts that make your phone look like it has a virus’ is hardly the greatest of sales pitches.

So you timed the launch of the new look at the same time as you expected poorer quality ads to be served? Was this an intentional decision to get more testing done?

Given how much noise is coming about these rogue ads, it seems odd that you have intentionally timed something big to happen with an increase in junk ads.

I need to have a trawl back but I was sure we were told that the ads were carefully selected previously…has that changed with the advent of tailored ads and has allowed the rogue stuff to appear.

I’m slightly gutted (but also relieved) that I’ve not seen any of the naked stuff.

Suspect like most people I’ll stop using the site as often…Won’t make any impact on any ad revenue, just 1 person but it should help reduce the redirects (for me)…

In Firefox / Chrome / Android, all forum links are appearing as white at the moment? Topic titles, user profile links, report post links etc..

All the hyperlinks are not visible now on my laptop using chrome and W10.
I can see thread content etc but not the titles on the forum home page.

glad its not just me..

And text as well if in quotes I think. Imossible to read as white on white. Ok on iPad but unreadable on windows phone

And text as well if in quotes I think. Imossible to read as white on white. Ok on iPad but unreadable on windows phone

Just checking 😉

🙂 and back again…

Is there any way of switching back to desktop view from a mobile? Most websites have a link the bottom of the page or something. I like the forum but not keen on how the home page looks
Cheers,
Keith

What phone/browser are you using? On chrome (in Android), if you click the 3. Buttons in top right corner, you can scroll down and select Request desktop site and it will load.
It isn’t permanent (as far as I can tell) but it works.

DickBarton – Member
What phone/browser are you using? On chrome (in Android), if you click the 3. Buttons in top right corner, you can scroll down and select Request desktop site and it will load.
It isn’t permanent (as far as I can tell) but it works.

Doesn’t appear on an IPad Air 2 with Safari. In fact the whole css on the iPad is utterly comical. Fonts go from tiny on the forum view, to stupid large on the topic, with quotes being a variety of sizes. It shouldn’t take more than 10 minutes to fix that style sheet. I’d be embarrassed if one of my devs had done it, and there’s no way it would have been released to live.

There is no good reason for a mobile view on a full size iPad. It’s perfectly capable of rending normal websites.

I’d be embarrassed if one of my devs had done it, and there’s no way it would have been released to live.

I remember thinking the wages offered for a php dev for STW in a recent advert were way too low for a business based on an online platform. Bloke’s probably doing his best with what he knows but it’s clear where this business needs to invest.

Apologies if this has been pointed out. I tried to view subscription prices, but the boxes with the value/description are blank. This is the case for Windows 8 phone, iOS Safari, and Android.

Still really disliking the forum on mobile; it’s not simply niggles for me, I just find it crap..

However the main page is brilliant – great work there.

As I said it’s not the ads that’s the problem it’s the fake youve won a prize virus pages popping up instead of the actual page you clicked on

They are actually ads, just badly behaved ads and they appear on other sites as well. I saw the same pop up on a doctors website today. Doesn’t mean that they aren’t annoying though

DickBarton – Member

So you timed the launch of the new look at the same time as you expected poorer quality ads to be served? Was this an intentional decision to get more testing done?

Given how much noise is coming about these rogue ads, it seems odd that you have intentionally timed something big to happen with an increase in junk ads.

Reading between the lines, they timed the new site launch (and bugs) to correspond with a low ad demand/revenue period. They did this as there is less financial impact now than during times with more normal advertising demand and higher ad rates.

An unintended consequence of this are more lower quality ads slipping through as Mark explained…

One thing I have noticed is that the mobile version with the new ad placements is sucking a lot more of my data allowance than it used to. Probably due to the amount of ads that are videos rather than just static. Also getting the ‘You’ve won!’ fake Google ad every 3/4th page too. All on Chrome.

Reading between the lines, if it was launched when night quality ads were in abundance they would have made more money (due to volume of visits (and potential clicks)) and the users wouldn’t have been subjected to such a poor experience and blame it on the redesign…pros and cons to each decision, but even with hindsight…ye cannae polish a turd.

Has someone just increased the default font size? I’m sure long thread titles had more characters showing earlier today.

They seem to have sorted out THE MASSIVE **** TEXT SIZE FOR PAGES AT THE BOTTOM now though…

We could have a competition: can you recognise the thread title from the first three wor…

Is it website redesign update?

Fonts are awfy small when writing post…iPad mini

iPad mini what age? what iOS? etc etc.

It’s *really* useful to give as much info as you can when describing an issue.

You might find it useful to visit whatsmybrowser.org and paste the link it provides along with the problem you are having. A screenshot is really useful, too!

Rachel (hopefully being helpful – if not I’ll just shut up)

^^^^^ 2 week old iPad mini2 with Chrome 55

Samsung A3/Android 6/Chrome

View as above, usability has gone even worse.

At least I’m spending a lot less time on here!

Just because some of your members need a magnifying glass to read doesn’t mean everyone does!

At least it still works on desktop (albeit with masses of white space!)

I still want to be able to pinch zoom.

The text is fine but when people post pics it’s ncie to be able to zoom before offering advice.

If pinch zoom was the default (other than being available as a browser option) then the default text size could be made smaller again.

Feels a bit Fisher Price

Turning on zoom on my iPhone just gives my an anoying magnified box that can be moved round permantly there for every phone screen.

What I mean is text and zoom functions were fine before the update and now not so fine

And why can’t I view the desktop site on my phone. The request desktop drop down does nothing

Only 2 topics listed 8n the front page now too.

My Iphone 5s on the latest software is the same as posted by scotroutes above, can’t see full thread titles, can’t select the latest post etc.

Also, pictures are often chopped on the right hand side when in threads.

It’s actually getting worse. I actually prefer the old desktop site on mobile. It was trash to get around, and looked terrible, but at least the limited functionality was there.

See last poster? Nope.
Badly truncated topics? Yup.
Go to last post? Nope.
Click to last page? Nope, but how about page 5 for no reason.
Turning device to landscape mode improve things? Nope.