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Tucows Bans Pop-Up Ads, Goes Ad-Free (globenewswire.com)
HughPickens.com writes: Tucows began as a software downloads site nearly 25 years ago and has since evolved beyond that early core business and into domain names, mobile phone service and symmetrical gigabit fiber Internet in select towns and cities in the US. Now Tucows has announced that as a gesture of goodwill, Tucows has banned deceptive ads, hidden download buttons, pop-ups, flypaper, toolbars and other such Internet nastiness from the the nearly 40,000 software titles it hosts for users on it's download sites.
"On the Tucows downloads site today, you'll find no flashing ads. No toolbars. No pop-ups," says CEO Elliot Noss. "You might see a few plugs for other Tucows services, but nothing too egregious and certainly not anything that's pretending to be a download button." With Tucows' success in domain names, mobile phone service (Ting) and fiber Internet (Ting Internet), Tucows' revenue from downloads has become less relevant when looking at the balance sheet. "We don't lightly walk away from opportunities or revenue," says Noss. "In the end, though, we'd rather have the Tucows name associated with good; with a belief in the power of the Internet to affect positive change. An ad-heavy site that packages browser toolbars along with every download isn't something we want people to think of when they hear 'Tucows,'."
"On the Tucows downloads site today, you'll find no flashing ads. No toolbars. No pop-ups," says CEO Elliot Noss. "You might see a few plugs for other Tucows services, but nothing too egregious and certainly not anything that's pretending to be a download button." With Tucows' success in domain names, mobile phone service (Ting) and fiber Internet (Ting Internet), Tucows' revenue from downloads has become less relevant when looking at the balance sheet. "We don't lightly walk away from opportunities or revenue," says Noss. "In the end, though, we'd rather have the Tucows name associated with good; with a belief in the power of the Internet to affect positive change. An ad-heavy site that packages browser toolbars along with every download isn't something we want people to think of when they hear 'Tucows,'."
I've been here basically from the start, and was a religious Tucows user for a long time. I can't remember anyone having mentioned their name for 15 years.
Sometimes, getting rid of the ads you're not getting to show because you have almost zero traffic is worthwhile, if the tradeoff is that publications will write about you and raise awareness, getting your traffic back from "negligible" to "modest".
And then six months down the line, you quietly start reintroducing the ads and making your quotas.
Once upon a time tucows was my first stop to find downloads. Been more than a decade now since I even heard the name I think. The ad's, download buttons and toolbars was enough to chase me away and stop me ever recommending it again. While I applaud the effort of removing this shit I won't be going back now as once lost Trust is near impossible to earn.
/.
Ads that masquerade as download buttons are the lowest form of online vermin, having displaced "You are our 1,000,000th visitor!" some time ago.
There's no problem with having a lot of ads. People who don't like it will use adblock.
The key problem with sites like Tucows was the deliberate deception. There's a huge difference between advertising a product or service that might be relevant to the user and trying to make people click on an ad by tricking them. Having 16 buttons that pretend to be the download button is just stupid. I don't understand what advertiser would pay for that, unless they're also shonks.
Today I learned that Tucows is still around.
Please select from these 57 toolbars that you want to add to your browser
We are Dead Stars looking back Up at the Sky
MooHoo!
i thought i was up with all the interweb lingo? wtf is flypaper?
(MOO, MOO) say Tucows!
I have not visited this site since the late 1990s ... They are largely obsolete. I am surprised that someone is the CEO
I remember many years ago when Slashdot editors were almost apologetic about needing to include a banner ad in order to pay the bills. Nobody liked it, but it was a necessary evil. We got over it because the banner ads weren't tracking us across multiple sites, weren't being deceptive, and weren't serving up malware. We didn't like them, but they weren't that bad. I recall a similar level of advertising on Sourceforge.
Fast forward to today and noscript blocks numerous advertising scripts on Slashdot. Sourceforge is polluted with ads and, for awhile, bundled malware with some downloads. These ads are sometimes harmful to browser performance and often are deceptive.
On other sites, I've seen particularly distasteful tactics on mobile interfaces. Instead of the ads loading when the page initially loads, they load when you scroll to that point in the page. Ads appear where there once was text to try to trick users into clicking. Because those ads could potentially serve up malware, it's more than a minor annoyance.
Somehow, this is what we've come to. Because of the dangers of advertising, I won't click on any ad and I certainly won't be installing any toolbars or bundled software. I would be happy to go back to animated GIFs that are targeted to a website's audience. If I go to Slashdot, I see animated GIFs advertising tech products and services. If I go to ESPN, I'll see animated GIFs about products of interest to sports fans like bigger and better TVs or for sports bars. I have no problem with approximate geolocation based on my IP, though nothing else.
But this wasn't good enough. And for that reason, I block all ads except Hulu. I have no way of knowing what's safe and what isn't. I'm sorry, but Tucows, Sourceforge, and CNet have destroyed their reputations and won't earn my trust back. I'll never click any Forbes link ever again. Google and Facebook are highly evil, too. And all this greed has ensured I'll never click on any ad again. If I happen to see an interesting ad, I won't click it. I'll Google the business and look them up that way to avoid malware.
Just say no. Block all ads, and only whitelist a few sites that aren't deceptive. And don't give that trust back. Sites like Tucows, Sourceforge, and CNet don't deserve to be trusted again. Not for a long, long, long time.
Tucows really is the nicest internet company out there today. And there isn't a single /. member who didn't benefit from their download site years ago. Every comment so far has completely missed the part where Tucows is making so much money doing other things it is choosing to provide the download site gratis going forward. I signed up for Ting in 2013 and have been saving $100 mo. on my cell service ever since. As icing on the cake their web site is easy to use, shows me pertinent information and they have actual live people to talk to if you have a problem. Ting was doing Google Fi before Google. They are also doing fiber internet. Google has gotten a lot of good ideas from Tucows. If you are a business in need of creating an internet presence and no clue where to start Tucows is definitely the right place.
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it." - K
Tucows... make a lot more bullshit than wun. Anyone who saw what became of their... 'site' over the years who still uses it, deserves all the malware they receive.
I had no idea they were still in business, to be honest!
That's great for now, but how much absolute cruft have they helped propagate over the years? I haven't been there in a decade and barely remembered the name.
Just visited their site. Not many listings and what's there is very old. Perhaps they will repopulate the site with some software from this decade.
Yes, they were a favorite in the last century before the scams. It's a cute name, cute logo, clean site (mostly due to little useful information). There aren't many honest competitors in this field- let's hope they do right.
...omphaloskepsis often...
No, won't see them but everything you download will be loaded with crapware.
Nice of you to use an affiliate URL too. Crawl back in your hole, shill. No one believes you anymore.
...because they might prevent people from downloading their malware.
"We've stopped deceptive advertising and infecting you computers with adware/malware not because it's the right thing to do, but because it doesn't make money anymore".
BeauHD. Worst editor since kdawson.
I'm not surprised that revenue from downloads doesn't look very relevant on the balance sheet, because revenue sits on the P&L, not the balance sheet.
I used tucows a lot many years ago. Then they started with the sleazy ads and practices. So I left.
It probably will take another 15 years of decent behaviour to get me back.
If I'm installing LibreOffice, I'll get it from libreoffice.org. Getting it from a place like Tucows is asking for trouble. And download.com is a wretched hive of scum and villainy.
Ooh, moderator points! Five more idjits go to Minus One Hell!
Delendae sunt RIAA, MPAA et Windoze
See subject & APK Hosts File Engine 9.0++ SR-4 32/64-bit http://www.bing.com/search?q=%...
Less power/cpu/ram + IO use vs. DNS/routers/antivirus + less security issues/complexity. Compliments firewalls (w/ layered drivers blocking less used IP addys vs. hosts blocking more used domains) & DNS (lighten dns load). Gets data via 10 security sites.
Works vs. caps & HTTP PUSH ads w/ firewalls.
* Ads rob bandwidth/speed paid for, security (openbid adnetworks abuse), privacy in tracking + anonymity.
Hosts add speed (hardcodes/adblocks), security (bad sites/poisoned dns), reliability (dns down), & anonymity (dns requestlogtrackers) natively. Hosts != blockable by ClarityRay (like. souled-out to admen inferior wasteful redundant slower usermode browser addons)
APK
P.S. - Safe https://www.virustotal.com/en/... (Verified by Malwarebytes' S. Burn "I've seen the code & yes it is safe" http://forum.hosts-file.net/vi... )
It's the first I've heard of the term. From the context, it might mean sites that keep popping up if you try to leave their pages. I Googled it but learned nothing. Can anyone enlighten me?
This sets a bad example. If everyone is expecting everything for free than how is anyone supposed to make any money from the Internet??
TUCOWS should be shamed for giving the free market a bad name. What are they, communists or something like that?
Can they do 16 items hosts do 4 speed, security & reliability (more efficiently)?
1.) Protect vs. bad sites (past ads)
2.) Protect vs. fastflux botnets + stop C&C talk
3.) Protect vs. dyn dns botnets + stop C&C talk
4.) Protect vs. DGA botnets + stop C&C talk
5.) Protect vs. downed DNS (reliability)
6.) Protect vs. DNS poisoning
7.) Protect vs. trackers
8.) Protect vs. spam payload links
9.) Protect vs. phish payload links
10.) Protect vs. caps
11.) Get past dns blocks
12.) Avoid dnsrequest logs
13.) Speed up surfing (adblock & hardcodes)
14.) Works on anything webbound multiplatform.
15.) EZ datacontrol
16.) Block ads more efficiently
Answer's NO on addons doing it or @ ALL + hosts = on devices natively - not illogically inefficiently "Bolting on 'MoAr'".
(Ads on same site = rare: Admen don't trust webmasters)
Addons = ClarityRay blockable by native browser methods: Untrue for hosts.
APK
P.S.=> Hosts != crippled & 'souled-out' to admen like "AlmostALLAdsBlocked"
APK Hosts File Engine 9.0++ SR-4 32/64-bit http://www.bing.com/search?q=%...
Less power/cpu/ram + IO use vs. DNS/routers/antivir/addons + less security issues/complexity. Compliments firewalls (w/ layered drivers blocking less used IP addys vs. hosts blocking more used domains) & DNS (lightens dns load). Gets data via 10 security sites.
Ads rob bandwidth/speed paid for, security (adnetwork abuse), privacy in tracking + anonymity.
Hosts add speed (hardcodes/adblocks), security (bad sites/poisoned dns), reliability (dns down), & anonymity (dns requestlogtrackers) natively. Hosts != blockable by ClarityRay (vs. souled-out to admen inferior wasteful redundant slow usermode browser addons)
Works vs. caps & HTTP PUSH ads w/ firewalls.
Avg. webpage = big as Doom http://www.theregister.co.uk/2...
APK
P.S. - Safe https://www.virustotal.com/en/... (Verified by Malwarebytes' S. Burn "I've seen the code & yes it's safe" http://forum.hosts-file.net/vi... )