Due to circumstances in the control of this website, and my personal ethics, I can never recommend DailyKos to another soul for the foreseeable future.
I've been all over the interwebs, tubes, and nets. I've seen more ends to the internet than most kossacks put together. AOL in DOS. APPLENET. I used Gopher to do research, wrote Trumpet Winsock scripts, and helped Microsoft troubleshoot a little packet issue they had with firewalls and Exchange. I'm the managing sysadmin for a billion dollar company. I've read Groklaw everyday since it's first month and run linux web server clusters that get millions of hits a day. I have a low Slashdot number and a 5 digit ICQ number (not that I use ICQ since AOL bought em). I've been around these tubes.
After two years why will I never come to DailyKos after I hit the Publish key? Read on after the fold:: :: to find out.
No one likes ads, unless you have extra cash lying around. I for one don't, and with all the browsing I have and want to do there isn't enough eye time for all of it. After 20 years online, either I pay for viewing a website, or I look at it ad free. Never bought anything from an online ad, never will. Even if I saw something in an ad that got my attention and made me ponder it, I would immediately go somewhere else to buy it, say Froogle.
Last night I mucked about with my Firefox settings. I ALWAYS have about 35-60 tabs open, with session savers in case I crash or have to close my browser. I read every tab multiple times daily. Lolcats and Freerice to CNN and HuffPo, Sore Thumbs, SUN TZU ON THE ART OF WAR, BBC News, Google Flu and Google News, and more World of Warcraft sites than I care to name. I even have The Drudge Report and Redstate open to see what the other side is (not)thinking. News sites, tech sites, political sites and gaming sites. All open - all the time. An alltabs refresh takes about a minute or more to complete. Needless to say, my browser is super customized and does more than most. Mouse gestures cuz people who use buttons are wasting time is what I'm trying to get across here. I have real work to do and nothing gets in the way more than ads and the extra 15 minutes they add to my refresh time, 5 times a day.
So after carefully crafting an anti-ad solution, and getting rid of some cruft in my add-ons, I got a big surprise when I looked at the top of DailyKos:
SUBSCRIBE! (or exclude from AdBlock)
If you use ad blocking software while viewing Daily Kos, you're getting all the benefits of our site but we're not getting any of the advertisement revenue associated with your visits. This site relies on ad revenue for daily operations: a decrease in the number of ads seen means a decrease in the funding available to run the site, to pay those that work on it, and to create improved site features.
We won't stop you from using ad blocking software, but if you do use it we ask you to support Daily Kos another way: by purchasing a site subscription. A subscription is an inexpensive way to support the site that eliminates the advertisements without using ad blocking software.
Revenue generated from the subscriptions goes to the Daily Kos fellowship program, providing a steady income for bloggers and allowing them to concentrate full time on expanding the reach and influence of the netroots through a variety of projects.
By using ad blocking software, you may be hiding the site ads but you're also reducing the site's primary source of revenue. So if you must use one, please do your part to support the site and the people that bring it to you by purchasing a site subscription today.
To exclude Daily Kos from Adblock Plus, in Firefox click Tools > Adblock Plus > click on Add Filter, and copy/paste @@http://*dailykos.com/* to the field, then click Add Filter at the bottom of the window, then OK.
So basically, they ARE going to make money off you. "Either subscribe or give us ad impressions or we'll stick this big ole banner at the top of your page and make your browsing of our site a pain in the a$$." is how I read that. Never seen anyone, anywhere, on any site put up such a banner. This diary will be cross posted at Slashdot, so we'll see if that holds true. I can't believe that on a supposedly free site, they'll stick this in our faces if we choose to forgo the extra minute or two the ads take to load. Not. Lotta other sites, Kos. It's a shame cuz I like the community, it's just being run by money grubbing ad spammers.
Can't it be enough that I support our progressive issues and send what little extra money I have to our candidates and good causes? Can't my 14 hours a day on the computer between work and play be ad free? Isn't my time and the way I view the internet mine? At least porn sites tell you up front there's money involved.
Looks like the pronunciation I gave this place, over my wifes protestations, of "Daily Chaos" thinking it was trying to incite people to action, was way wrong. It's a well designed money making machine and the users, regardless of the content posted, are just ad impressions or subscriptions.
Laterz!!
ps. I'd delete my account quietly and move on, but apparently they don't let me control my own information like that. Heads up LL. (the wife, a regular contributer who cares about her TU status and proof read this, wants you to know that LL is Lawrence Lessig)