Adf.ly links on BukkitDev

hatstand We're talking about donation links not download links! Donation links are allowed. BukkitDev even gives you an option to place such buttons, but only for PP links. What if you don't have a PP account? Or what if you don't want your users to spend their money to donate? Adf.ly links would make everyone happy... That's the only point I'm talking about. That would not ruin the users experience as the download is still the same, there's just a donate link linking to adf.ly with big, fat, red and bold warning that you'll klick onto an adf.ly link. But it is not required to click on that link. It's just a f*cking donation!

And no, I'm not infected by this. I have my PayPal link at every plugin (and at my signature), but I know some people that aren't able to use PayPal...

 

Have you ever used Adf.ly without an ad blocker? It is not a pleasant website to end up on. This is what I mean by the experience of your users.

Edit: Oh, and ad blockers stop you from getting anything, because the ads aren't being viewed.

 

again: clicking the link is optional! and I know watching ads for 5 seconds is a pain I cant describe.. -_-

 

...

 

....Missing my point entirely. You assume users are smart enough to avoid clicking on the big fake download buttons Adf.ly throws in your face, and now suddenly said user has a virus, from trying to donate to you. Saying it is optional doesn't change that, warning the user is next to useless, people ignore warnings all the time.

 

any link in the description could be a virus..
Edit: oh wait you mean the ads? If they ignore the warnings its not our fault.

 

hatstand W00t?
1) Links in generell are allowed to be used for whatever reason (some of my plugins have a link to the JavaDocs for their API, for example).
2) If a user is lazy and you want to infect him www.getMyVirus.com/IownedYou.LOL or adf.ly/bla won't make any difference, as you told:

 

Reading ability, you do not have it:

 

so every page with ads on it is disallowed? no its not. and it shouldnt
And yes sure I dont think Users are stupid..

 

I'm talking about why Adf.ly is a bad place to send users - Links on your description page, other pages with ads, not relevant.

 

yes but then it should be in the plugin developers decision to add those links on their plugin description.

 

hatstand Okay, so your point is that a user who spends all the time reading the whole plugin description to find the donation (adf.ly) link and who wants to donate (not download!) clicks in some weird moment onto a faked-download-add link and gets a virus cause of this? Yea, sure... But couldn't it be that these guys go a few steps out of their door and a bus hits them cause they know there's a street and they know the bus drives there, but in some weird moment they just close eyes and ears and walk? Should we disallow going out of the house cause of this?

Also this has nothing to do with adf.ly nor URL shorteners. I could put ads at my own page too...

 

I think you'll find that most ads do not attempt to maliciously imitate page content, like many do on Adf.ly.

Related:

And yes, I get you're not talking about download links, but Adf.ly is most commonly used to link to downloads, and either way, it isn't a great experience.

 

hatstand Well, you stretch "download experience" very wide here. Download experience in my mind:
1) Go to the plugins BukkitDev page.
2) click "Download".
3) click "Download".
so an adf.ly link for a donation wouldn't interrupt that in any way. In fact BukkitDev itself interrupts it cause of the third step. So We are not allowed to use BukkitDevs download service but have to use a direct download links instead?

But finally we have a source! So I think EvilSeph is the only one who is able to bring this topic to a end (but please with better explainations as the ones from TnT and h31ix ).

 

URL shorteners are not allowed. Our position is quite clear. The reasons have been laid out before on this post as well as the previous ones.

While you may want this allowed, the majority of our community does not, along with our entire staff. This is not a position where we will change out minds.

Locked, we're just going in circles.