# Flash Ads



## Michael Morris (Nov 23, 2003)

A lot of sites these days use Macromedia Flash to do their ads.  This is because a properly done flash file can have a better visual impact than an animated GIF and can even be smaller - plus the ads can be set to rotate even if the page isn't reloaded.

Our current ads are JAVAscript based or static as demanded by the browser (Post Nuke & VBulletin makes this determination).

Javascript can be used to query the browser to determine if the browser is equipped with the Flash plug in (most are these days).  If this condition evaluates to try then the plug is loaded.

The question then is this: is there sufficient interest in this to go to the trouble to implement it?


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## LightPhoenix (Nov 23, 2003)

Michael_Morris said:
			
		

> A lot of sites these days use Macromedia Flash to do their ads. This is because a properly done flash file can have a better visual impact than an animated GIF and can even be smaller - plus the ads can be set to rotate even if the page isn't reloaded.
> 
> The question then is this: is there sufficient interest in this to go to the trouble to implement it?



Well, since my primary interest is in the size of the front page, and loading times and speed and whatnot, I'm generally in favor for it.  But, I do have a few questions, that hopefully you could answer.

One, you state that a properly done Flash file _can_ be smaller.  That implies to me that they may not be in all cases.  Who's responsible for getting the file down to size, the ENWorld staff or the advertiser?

Two, and on a related note, who will be making the Flash files in the first place?

Three, I really like the idea of rotating ads, and I think the advertisers will too.  How often would it have to reload new Flash files?  Every time it switches to a new one, right?  Preloading doesn't seem to be an option to me, since that will increase the amount of stuff downloaded by the user when the page is first loaded.


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## Michael Morris (Nov 23, 2003)

LightPhoenix said:
			
		

> Well, since my primary interest is in the size of the front page, and loading times and speed and whatnot, I'm generally in favor for it.  But, I do have a few questions, that hopefully you could answer.
> 
> One, you state that a properly done Flash file _can_ be smaller.  That implies to me that they may not be in all cases.  Who's responsible for getting the file down to size, the ENWorld staff or the advertiser?




We would probably need to set a cap on the file size and prohibit ads with sound (most large flash files are large because of sound).

And you are correct, flash files can get into the megabytes in size.



> Two, and on a related note, who will be making the Flash files in the first place?




I'm willing to build the loader and the control software for free, but I'm not too keen on preparing the ads for free as it takes about 1 hour / second of animation to do a flash file, and often longer - depending on the frame rate.




> Three, I really like the idea of rotating ads, and I think the advertisers will too.  How often would it have to reload new Flash files?  Every time it switches to a new one, right?  Preloading doesn't seem to be an option to me, since that will increase the amount of stuff downloaded by the user when the page is first loaded.




Flash is pretty smart.  It can determine the connection speed and time its preloads accordingly.  Typically a flash control file will wait for the browser to finish acquiring images before loading it's daughter movies.  This is why when you visit flash sites the flash parts are the last part to get up and going.


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## LightPhoenix (Nov 23, 2003)

Michael_Morris said:
			
		

> Flash is pretty smart. It can determine the connection speed and time its preloads accordingly. Typically a flash control file will wait for the browser to finish acquiring images before loading it's daughter movies. This is why when you visit flash sites the flash parts are the last part to get up and going.



Cool.  I have absolutely no experience with Flash aside from seeing it in action, so that's good to know.


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## Mercule (Nov 24, 2003)

Michael_Morris said:
			
		

> We would probably need to set a cap on the file size and prohibit ads with sound (most large flash files are large because of sound).



Technical reasons aside, I just find sounds that load unbidden to be annoying on the web.  Avoid them, please.


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## Michael Morris (Nov 24, 2003)

Mercule said:
			
		

> Technical reasons aside, I just find sounds that load unbidden to be annoying on the web.  Avoid them, please.




Agreed.  Especially when they are MIDI's, cause people tend to choose the most god-awful midis for sites :\


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## Brother Shatterstone (Nov 24, 2003)

My questions is rather or not they’re going to take up anymore room...

Those ads that pop up in the middle of the screen are too annoying.


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## Michael Morris (Nov 24, 2003)

Brother Shatterstone said:
			
		

> My questions is rather or not they’re going to take up anymore room...
> 
> Those ads that pop up in the middle of the screen are too annoying.




Yes, those are Flash's fault, and God I hate those things.  No way will I have any part in bringing THOSE god awful things to this board.

No, what I was thinking about is adding a flash version of the banners we already have.


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## MerakSpielman (Nov 24, 2003)

I couldn't care less one way or the other. I have a cable modem, so size isn't an issue 'till you start pushing a few hundred K, and then I only have to wait a few seconds. 

I imagine the dial-up segment might care a bit more than I do for a few scores more kilobytes.

I pretty much filter out ads at this point anyway. If I'm surfing, and theres an image the size and shape of a banner, my eyes don't even bother focusing on it. I know it's not what Morrus wants to hear - he probably would prefer I notice the banners and click on them to support EnWorld, but I honestly don't notice them. It's like I have a banner-blind spot.

If anybody brings pop-up ads to EnWorld, I swear I'll never forgive them. Man, I hate those things.


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## Brother Shatterstone (Nov 24, 2003)

MerakSpielman said:
			
		

> If anybody brings pop-up ads to EnWorld, I swear I'll never forgive them. Man, I hate those things.




Forget forgiving...  I'm going to rage and kill them when I roll my natural 20. 

Michael, thanks for the quick answer, and I'm on dial-up and if their about the same size (psychically and file wise) as they are now I wouldn’t mind a change.   

I've clicked on a few ads, but only cause they deal with RPG material.


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## Buttercup (Nov 26, 2003)

Michael_Morris said:
			
		

> The question then is this: is there sufficient interest in this to go to the trouble to implement it?



Frankly, I had forgotten there are ads on this site.  I have Norton Internet Security set to block them, although I never minded the ones here.  All my surfing is ad free.


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## Michael Morris (Nov 26, 2003)

Buttercup said:
			
		

> Frankly, I had forgotten there are ads on this site.  I have Norton Internet Security set to block them, although I never minded the ones here.  All my surfing is ad free.




If your browser is shockwave equipped and its turned on Norton cannot block Flash ads from playing, nor is there a known way to block pop-ups generated by Shockwave files.  You don't see them that often these days, but once IE 7.0 comes out expect to see them in force since the old method of generating pop ups will be useless (IE 7.0 will be able to block pop ups).


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## Buttercup (Nov 26, 2003)

Michael_Morris said:
			
		

> If your browser is shockwave equipped and its turned on....



Thanks for the info.  I'll just have to turn it off, I guess, and only turn it on when there is something specific I want to view.  Pop-ups annoy the crap outa me.


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## Michael Morris (Nov 26, 2003)

Buttercup said:
			
		

> Thanks for the info.  I'll just have to turn it off, I guess, and only turn it on when there is something specific I want to view.  Pop-ups annoy the crap outa me.




Heh heh yup.  Is there anyone who *likes* popups?


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## Umbran (Nov 26, 2003)

Michael_Morris said:
			
		

> Is there anyone who *likes* popups?




Must be someone.  Because they must get retruns on the ads to justify paying someone to make them.  Just like spam e-mail.  Most folk hate the stuff, but there's enough boneheads that respond to make it profitable.


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## jezter6 (Dec 2, 2003)

I say, no way. Since there isn't a nice way to effectively block them (for those of us who have ad blocking in the browser), and they just get outrageously stupid with their animation most times...I'd definately NOT enjoy it. Animated gifs are pretty easy to ignore, because they just flash from one image to the next, but when you start adding complex fading and more flashy flashy crap, it'll just ruin the experience that is this site.


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## Morrus (Dec 2, 2003)

Buttercup said:
			
		

> Frankly, I had forgotten there are ads on this site. I have Norton Internet Security set to block them, although I never minded the ones here. All my surfing is ad free.



That's interesting.  How does it distinguish between, say, the banner ad at the top of this page and the EN World logo next to it?  How does it know what to block and what to allow?


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## Brother Shatterstone (Dec 2, 2003)

Morrus said:
			
		

> That's interesting.  How does it distinguish between, say, the banner ad at the top of this page and the EN World logo next to it?  How does it know what to block and what to allow?



I'm not an expert but I think that the coding would be different, the ads are set to rotate, and that would/should be in the code, while the planet is static and never changes.

Could be she'll reply back in say "What planet?" but I think I'm right.


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## LightPhoenix (Dec 2, 2003)

Morrus said:
			
		

> That's interesting. How does it distinguish between, say, the banner ad at the top of this page and the EN World logo next to it? How does it know what to block and what to allow?



Erm, I may be stating the obvious, and I may be wrong, but the ad images aren't stored on ENWorld, but at an off-site address.  The ad blocker just refuses images that aren't from the same root address (in this case www.enworld.com).


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## Morrus (Dec 2, 2003)

LightPhoenix said:
			
		

> Erm, I may be stating the obvious, and I may be wrong, but the ad images aren't stored on ENWorld, but at an off-site address.



A quick right click and a look at "Properties" reveals that, in this case, you are correct in your assumption that you may be wrong.


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## Eternalknight (Dec 2, 2003)

I also have Internet Security running from here.  I can see the En World logo, but not the ads; the same is true on the RPGHost forums.  

As to why, I have no idea.


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## Buttercup (Dec 2, 2003)

Morrus said:
			
		

> That's interesting. How does it distinguish between, say, the banner ad at the top of this page and the EN World logo next to it? How does it know what to block and what to allow?



I have no idea. However, the logo always displays, and the ad never does. Once in a while, an ad will get through, in which case I open Norton, and drag the ad onto a little icon that appears. Poof! The ad is gone, and moreover, I'll never be bothered by an ad from that url again.

Edit: I just conducted a little test. I went to google news and started following links with the ad blocker turned on. No banners, and no popups did I see. Then I turned it off and visited the same sites. Blech. How does anyone stand surfing at all, with all the popups and annoying crap that cover most pages? The signal to noise ratio is unacceptable to me without my dear, sweet Norton running.

Also, regarding the question of who likes popups, at work (a public library) we have a number of public computers which end up getting infested with adware and spyware daily. (And why can our IT department not come up with a solution? Don't get me started.) This stuff usually gets loaded and installed by users who aren't very savvy. They see a box pop up, and they don't understand that it's crap. If it says "click here" then they do. After all, the computer told them too, right?  We spend several hours every day rebuilding the machines from the server. Pain in the tookus, I can tell you. But my point, and I do have one, is that inexperienced internet users, who are dazzled by bells & whistles, enjoy popups or rather aren't discerning enough to understand that they are garbage.


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## Castellan (Dec 2, 2003)

Eternalknight said:
			
		

> I also have Internet Security running from here.  I can see the En World logo, but not the ads; the same is true on the RPGHost forums.
> 
> As to why, I have no idea.




Two possibilities, here, depending on how the software does its filtering. First, is a code-based solution. ENWorld's banners are nestled between <script> tags and the file is called banner.js.php . Second, banner ads usually conform to a set size standard (i.e. standard width and height). Most ad blockers know the various standards and filter images that conform to that standard. In some ad blockers, this can cause a problem because sites often contain non-advertising banners of the same size (i.e. logo) and filter those out, anyway.

I think ENWorld's logo image is a non-standard size, so it doesn't get filtered by default.

I think it might be important to point out something else. I surf with popups blocked and ads blocked. But, I altered the rules for ENWorld, so banner ads still turn on. That way, I can see ads that really are targeted to me and I'm helping my favorite website. If your ad blocker supports site-based rules, I'd strongly urge you to turn ads on for the sites you really do want to support.

In my case, ads for ENWorld will remain on as long as they're not annoying and obtrusive. In the case of flash ads, the ones that flash obnoxious colors or jitter annoyingly will get a *block* smackdown slapped on the site, so please avoid those.


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## Cthulhu's Librarian (Dec 2, 2003)

Buttercup said:
			
		

> Also, regarding the question of who likes popups, at work (a public library) we have a number of public computers which end up getting infested with adware and spyware daily. (And why can our IT department not come up with a solution? Don't get me started.) This stuff usually gets loaded and installed by users who aren't very savvy. They see a box pop up, and they don't understand that it's crap. If it says "click here" then they do. After all, the computer told them too, right?  We spend several hours every day rebuilding the machines from the server. Pain in the tookus, I can tell you. But my point, and I do have one, is that inexperienced internet users, who are dazzled by bells & whistles, enjoy popups or rather aren't discerning enough to understand that they are garbage.



I'm responsible for the upkeep of 50+ public PCs here at the library I work at (and thats just a fraction of the total # of public PCs here, not including staff PCs). In order to keep from having to rebuild the PCs due to the same issues, we have taken several steps to insure that users cannot install software. the best one is "Deep Freeze" http://www.deepfreezeusa.com/index.htm. Basically, it makes a copy of the hard drive in a seperate partition on the HD, and when the PC is rebooted, it rewrites the image of the HD over anything that may have been installed since the last reboot (this takes only a few seconds more than rebooting a PC without the same software). This wipes out any cookies, viruses, spyware, and unauthorized software that may have been installed. The only problem with it is that you need to "thaw" a frozen PC before running windows updates, and then "freeze" them again to incorporate those changes. Forget to freeze them, and anything that happens becomes part of the image. Its much easier and faster than rebuilding the PCs from the server each day, and it eliminates mid day crashes when someone screws something up. Just reboot and you are back to the standard dektop build.


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## alsih2o (Dec 2, 2003)

wow. i just thought 'russ stopped using ads on the boards.

 i LIKED the ads on enworld. i felt i was keeping up with what was going on that way.


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## Buttercup (Dec 2, 2003)

Castellan said:
			
		

> If your ad blocker supports site-based rules, I'd strongly urge you to turn ads on for the sites you really do want to support.



You are right, Castellan.  I will check on this tonight when I get home.  And really, I *liked* the EN World ads.  I mean, ads about d20 stuff?  What could be bad about that?


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