Yes some ads do kind of link

James — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 00:23:41 +0000

Yes some ads do kind of link to bad sites I have to agree there.

I don't know if you thought about things like this but a site such as this should be able to find web hosts who would be willing to sponsor it with a server. (in return for some ads maybe)

Or you could partner up with sites such as mine at websitesnetwork and explore possibilities to exchange traffic.

greg wrote: One option in

Megan — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 16:24:16 +0000

greg wrote: One option in revenue earning is to make TWF a paid membership. But then you have to offer something extremely special to make it worthwhile people paying to join when there are 1,000's of free alternatives.

I'd prefer to do something like this as a voluntary donation where users would get some extra perks in exchange for a donation (rather than looking at it as purchasing a membership or those extra benefits). I still like this idea, and it could also tie in with the advertising thing I mentioned above. Right now the revenues from something like this would probably be relatively minimal. Maybe we'll think about it when the site gets a bit bigger.

jeeves Bond wrote: Hey man,

greg — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 04:54:34 +0000

jeeves Bond wrote: Hey man, we run our own ad system here. Those people specifically asked to be put on the site!

Then all is not too bad as presumably you get paid for simply serving them. I presumed they were a PPC or PPP, and my point was no one will click them so you wont earn much (well, that one ad in particular)

One option in revenue earning is to make TWF a paid membership. But then you have to offer something extremely special to make it worthwhile people paying to join when there are 1,000's of free alternatives.

An interesting idea is for TWf to provide for paid website work. So perhaps create a team from carefully selected TWF members for freelance sub contract work. Where a TWF member wanting work done can pay TWF to have a website built, specific scripts made or just a little tweaking or advice on their current website.
The freelance TWF member doing the work gets a percentage or set fee. Of course this isn't only limited to TWF members wanting work, you could then do work for anyone really.

But this adds a whole new avenue for TWF from currently just being a forum. Interesting idea though.

Now that last idea is pretty

demonhale — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 17:48:48 +0000

Now that last idea is pretty good...

Although I couldn't care less on some of the ads, 80% of the time the ads are pretty useful on TWF though...

I agree with you greg. It

Megan — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 15:58:09 +0000

I agree with you greg. It would be nice if we could afford to be fussy about which ads we accept.

We are currently testing a new hosting provider that would reduce our costs significantly (it's a virtual private server rather than a dedicated server, which should be just as powerful but much less expensive). If that works out we'll be able to be more seletive about the ads and maybe even remove some of them.

Our goal is to eventually remove the advertising altogether and find other ways to finance the site. Another alternative we've been thinking about is giving ad space to members who participate a lot (this is something that TWF actually did about 5 years ago).

Hey man, we run our own ad

JeevesBond — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 12:18:10 +0000

Hey man, we run our own ad system here. Those people specifically asked to be put on the site!

Anyway, I don't doubt that the beach bum in that picture sits around Hawaii all day. The serious question you have to ask yourself is: could I make as much money as that dude from his scheme?