Skim bypass fee?

[BigJohn]

Originally posted by andrej_NDC
its pretty common, webmasters already use sponsor free content to create AVS sites and thats the same, not? They earn money from the AVS sale(sponsor doesnt) and then also on sponsor upsells. Yes, maybe not all sponsors allow this, but most of them do.

If the sponsor allows it then the affiliate has permission and there is no copyright violation. This is about control of copyrighted images. If I allow anybody and everybody to post my images and charge for them, then my copyright is worthless.

[Tommy]

but nobody is posting your images

I think you dont understand what is going on here

to bad...... it was starting to turn in to a fun thread

[andrej_NDC]

Originally posted by BigJohn
If the sponsor allows it then the affiliate has permission and there is no copyright violation. This is about control of copyrighted images. If I allow anybody and everybody to post my images and charge for them, then my copyright is worthless.

the more people push you, even from an AVS site the better. If you have a picture or movie paysite, you give just a few preview pics and trailers to the affiliates, so the surfer, even if he already paid for the AVS access has to join your site to see the full scene/movie. So the copyright is not worhless, just dont give too much free content to affiliates.

[BigJohn]

Originally posted by andrej_NDC
the more people push you, even from an AVS site the better. If you have a picture or movie paysite, you give just a few preview pics and trailers to the affiliates, so the surfer, even if he already paid for the AVS access has to join your site to see the full scene/movie. So the copyright is not worhless, just dont give too much free content to affiliates.

I agree with you andrej, I don't mind as long as I have control over who's selling access to it and for what reason. Trust me, I LOVE qualified traffic over the freeloaders!

I also don't have problems with someone trying to charge for non-skim vs skim as long as my content is available to see without having to pay.

Someone setting up a 95% skim, which pretty much insures that nobody will see my gallery unless they pay, is something I am against. Just the same as I'm not for somebody setting up a paysite front end and using my galleries as the main content without my permission.

It would seem that there is at least 1 other conversation going on in this thread, so this is about paying to get no skim on a tgp

[BigJohn]

Originally posted by Tommy
but nobody is posting your images

I think you dont understand what is going on here

to bad...... it was starting to turn in to a fun thread

True, nobody has my images physically on their server, and potentially, I am the submitter.

My ears and mind are open and I'll be the first to admit that I don't know everything. I'm here to learn as well as post my opinions so if there's something I'm not getting, feel free to explain it.

From my point of view, what I see it this...

I understand you to say that it's okay to charge a fee on a TGP so the surfer doesn't get skimmed.

I agree, as long as my galleries can still be seen with regularity (not skimmed at 90%) without having to pay.

I understand you to say that since the galleries are in the open and on my server that it's okay for someone to sell access to them and not let them be seen otherwise from their site because they are public.

I don't agree with this. This would be like saying that it's okay to create a paysite where the members area loaded tommys-bookmarks into a frame or directed the surfer directly to the site.

I understand you to say that because I've posted them in a public space that there is no copyright violation.

I'm not sure on this one anymore. If the TGP opens up my gallery and the URL in the browser address bar is the url of my site then copyright issues may not come into play... What I'm not sure of is somebody selling access to that same url. I'm feeling that once money is exchanged then they are profiting from my work and therefore copyright may apply.

[KCat]

Originally posted by BigJohn
Glad to hear that KCat, and sorry if I read more into your last statement than was there.

No problem, babe! This is a great thread. Lots of interesting discussions going on.

My affiliate content perspective is sort of a different beast since with any affiliate program, it's your rules as to how the content can be used. Whether skimming TGPs aren't allowed or no more than 20 pics inside an AVS site etc. etc. Your content, your rules.

Galleries, on the other hand, are usually build to the rules specified by the TGP owner (12 pics? 15? no video stills? no nasty dollars? etc.).

Assuming the traffic & conversions are the same, what's better - charging for the webmaster for a partner account or charging the surfer to view the galleries?

[Wazza]

The tgp is only charging for access to their database or access to a modified version - so I don't see how there could be a copyright issue.

I'd take 1000 CC verified hits over 100K cj victims any second of the day. Just ask any sponsor what their CC verified email lists are worth to them. It's alot!

[BigJohn]

Originally posted by KCat
No problem, babe! This is a great thread. Lots of interesting discussions going on.

My affiliate content perspective is sort of a different beast since with any affiliate program, it's your rules as to how the content can be used. Whether skimming TGPs aren't allowed or no more than 20 pics inside an AVS site etc. etc. Your content, your rules.

Galleries, on the other hand, are usually build to the rules specified by the TGP owner (12 pics? 15? no video stills? no nasty dollars? etc.).

Assuming the traffic & conversions are the same, what's better - charging for the webmaster for a partner account or charging the surfer to view the galleries?

There's a difference between webmasters paying for partner accounts and a surfer paying to view.... The webmaster either owns or has permission to submit the galleries and the TGP owner has the right to attempt to reduce the scammers and cheaters.

The TGP owner doesn't own the content so how can they charge to view it.

Look at this another way, what if somebody (affiliate or not) took every single one of your galleries that you've ever submitted or created and opened a paysite with it? They get 20.00 (or whatever) for a membership and end up with 100 members a month for a cool $2000.00 a month. You get nothing of this, except the possibility that someone will sign up from one of the galleries. Remember, you'll also be paying this guy 50% commission for any hosted galleries he uses. He's using your bandwidth and your content and charging the surfer, all without your knowledge or consent.

Maybe I'm not as open minded as I like to think I am, but I'm pretty sure this would piss me off.

[kristian]

I've only skimmed through the last couple of pages (excuse pun!), so excuse me if this is either idiotic or has already been discussed.

Selling the surfer on a paid version of a tgp might be achieved by splitting the site into two levels of quality; much like we already have low-band and high-band. Instead of selling the paid version based on it not fucking the surfer around, it could be sold on it containing more qaulity content for, say, a $5 a month "subscription"; subscription sounding a lot better than membership to a tgp surfer.

I think this would work best for MGPs or those tgps that offer both pics and movies.

On the paid version, you could offer higher qaulity movies, longer movies.

Webmasters would pay for submit accounts because the traffic has already used CCs and is thus high quality. Such submitters would, due to the privalegde, be more than willing to submit the required quality galleries.

I think this has many possibilities.

[Greenguy]

You know what I think? I think you're all fucked in the head! We're 10 minutes form the fucking fun park & you want to go home!

Sorry about that, but this thread does make me giggle a bit

1st off, back in the day when I was submitting to AL4A, I'd notice that a lot of other TGP's would have my gallery listed the next day. For the most part, my thinking was that I didn't ask them to link to me, so why no just redirect them via htaccess - which I did to LOR

AL4A & Ampland are really good examples of what not to do when "borrowing" galleries, because there are so many sites out that that just copy & paste their pages & put them online.

But, when each & every one of us started out, we did go out on the web & look for sites/galleries to list, so we're all guilty of "borrowing" links/galleries to get our sites going.

As far as the skim thing, it's actually not that bad of an idea, but it may fall into the "AVS" category as far as CC processing is concerned.

Of course, TGP2 & LinkList2 were "good ideas" as well, just that they came about 5 years too late

The only way that these ideas would work is if EVERYONE did them at the same time. I wouldn't do it, even if 90% of the Link Lists out there put it into place. Why? Because those that didn't want to pay for the access to the links would then come to me & surf them for free - more traffic for me, more traffic for my links - everyone is happy

Big TGP's probably wouldn't do it either, mostly because the big names don't have to skim & put a quality non-CJ site on line already. So if you were to do this, what's going to convince the surfer to pay to see your non-blind links when they can see Ampland's for free?

[Tommy]

I use to list gallerys on tommys bookmarks that had a htaccess in it
that would only allow traffic from tommys to see the gallery
this way when the tgps copyed my listings their traffic would end up right at tommys bookmarks

the tgps could charge a service charge for a lot of reasons.
no ads, bandwith, cost of doing reveiws

[RawAlex]

I think trying to charge the end surfer for something he can get for free almost any other place is just not a good business model. It will only drive people to other TGPs that don't "skim" (nice way of saying circle jerking). Surfers know the trick, and as someone mentioned before, they will go as far as to look at the page source to get around the skim - or they will move on.

Places like thehun don't skim - they don't have to. Their viewership numbers keep going up, you should take that as a lmajor indicator of how surfers feel.

Charging them to get rid of misdirection and dishonesty is really like giving someone a virus and charging for the cure.

Alex

[Sean416]

I think the absolute best you could do is get an email from surfers who want to surf a non-skim thumb TGP then from there you could send newsletters to them pushing certain sites. Or you could just do it for a bit then once the list is long enough sell it to someone.

[Tommy]

like i said before

there are newspapers that are free and newspapers that charge 50 cents

if the gallerys were really good and maybe there were no ads on the site

everyone pays for cable even though there is welfare tv
and the same with radio the satialate radio charges and its main benfit is that it has no ads

[Greenguy]

Galleries without ads? They have those already - they're called PaySites

And stop comparing apples to oranges:

TV without cable gets you 6 channels? Cable gets you 300? If you turned on the TV without cable & got 300 stations, then of course, why pay?

Local radio has 30 stations? (if that) XM has 150? (as well as Opie & Anthony) If there were commercial free statuon on local radio, then there'd be no need for XM.

Free newspapers are basically "free" because of the amount of ads or they are just starting up - or they are nothing but ads (Auto Trader & whatnot) Buffalo News has ads, yet it charges, has timely news & is just the best thing there is around here. If there was a feree version of the Buffalo News as well as a paid version that had the same articles, which one would your read?

JoeBlow.com charging $5 a month for access to galleries & sites that you, me, Ampland, The Hun, etc. offer for free? Come On!

Love ya

[lassiter]

Originally posted by RawAlex
I think trying to charge the end surfer for something he can get for free almost any other place is just not a good business model. It will only drive people to other TGPs that don't "skim" (nice way of saying circle jerking).

OK, first, I agree with Alex about this.

But second, no I don't think charging a fee is "stealing" or violating copyright. The gallery is obviously going to be freely available on other "free" TGPs or to anyone who knows the URL.
What the surfer is (theoretically) paying for is the TGP owner's value-added convenience of providing the links in an easy-to-find format.

Rand McNally doesn't "own" the interstate highway system either, but people will pay for maps that correlate physical data into an easy-to-use and convenient format. It's the effort put into the organizing and correlating the data that is being charged for here, not the "right" to see the gallery itself - a gallery that in fact is still freely accessible to the surfer who knows where to look.

But again, the argument is moot since I agree that the surfers are gonna go where the data is already organized and presented for free, rather than paying for it, just like a for-pay search engine is not gonna compete with Google, no matter how good it might otherwise be.

[BigJohn]

Originally posted by lassiter
OK, first, I agree with Alex about this.

But second, no I don't think charging a fee is "stealing" or violating copyright. The gallery is obviously going to be freely available on other "free" TGPs or to anyone who knows the URL.

Shareware is available for free, but you can't sell it. Microsoft Media player is downloadable for free, but you can't sell that either. Just because copyrighted material is freely available doesn't mean someone who doesn't own it can sell it. Copyright is about the RIGHTS of the owner to decide if and how their owned material can be used. If I take a picture and allow company A to use it for free, that doesn't mean that everyone can use it for free.

Rand McNally doesn't "own" the interstate highway system either, but people will pay for maps that correlate physical data into an easy-to-use and convenient format. It's the effort put into the organizing and correlating the data that is being charged for here, not the "right" to see the gallery itself - a gallery that in fact is still freely accessible to the surfer who knows where to look.

This isn't a good analogy for several reasons:
1. Rand McNalley did the physical work to create the maps from non copyrighted information. They are selling their work and images. Their maps are also copyrighted... try selling access to their map pages and see how long it takes for them to slap you with a C&D.
2. Roads aren't copyrighted.
3. Purchasing a map to see roads (or links) is not the same as purchasing access to use the roads (or links). Try standing on the freeway and selling access for people to drive on it or use an off ramp. With any luck you'll make enough to buy some cigarettes from your cellmate at the county jail.

But again, the argument is moot since I agree that the surfers are gonna go where the data is already organized and presented for free, rather than paying for it, just like a for-pay search engine is not gonna compete with Google, no matter how good it might otherwise be.

I agree, nobody is going to want to pay to access a TGP when there are so many great places like greenguy, tommys, the hun, etc, to get it for free.

[lassiter]

Originally posted by BigJohn
Just because copyrighted material is freely available doesn't mean someone who doesn't own it can sell it. Copyright is about the RIGHTS of the owner to decide if and how their owned material can be used.

My point was they aren't selling or reselling the content. They are selling their collating and indexing capability.
Again, a search engine would be a better comparison. And as you imply, in strict terms, copyright should apply to Google's indexing of millions of web sites they do not own, since copyright protection exists independently of whether or not someone is profiting monetarily. But since they are neither providing nor prohibiting anyone's access to a (free) gallery that already exists on the web for public viewing, but instead are offering a search and indexing service for the convenience of the surfer, I suspect their legal ass is covered. I know there have been legal issues over their caching of content on their own servers, which amounts to copying/duplication of actual content without permission, but that's a different issue entirely.

Even if Google or Yahoo went to a "pay $5.00 month to not see ads" format, the money would be for their value-added indexing service, not for "access" to any of the sites listed, since Google would have no control over actual surfer access to any indexed sites.

But even if I'm wrong about this (and I very well may be, I freely admit), presumably this theoretical for-pay TGP would be using galleries voluntarily submitted to it by webmasters, so permission for indexing of the material through the TGP would be implied automatically, no?

[bret]

oh wow.

i dont think i have ever laughed so hard as i was reading this thread.

here are a bunch of people putting down an idea because the person is trying to charge someone for something they can essentially get for free.

EVERY single person that commented on this runs a "porn site" that links to / gives away FREE porn with the expectation of selling that porn (in one way or another) to someone.

by all of your logic the pay sites don't work because people can get the porn for free... so why are you pushing pay sites then? sounds like a total contradiction in logic to me. alot of you need to seriously re-think you positions.

so many people in this business are so "set in their ways" that is why this industry is going to shit, anyone who tries to be innovative gets shot down. no one wants to help the person "thinking outside the box", in fact, its quite the contrary. when someone comes up with a new idea people won't work with that person, they shoot down their idea and do whatever they can to make sure the idea fails.

you people are so stuck on your stupid "rules" and "ways" you have no idea how much money you are missing out on. although you many not want to admit it, your days are numbered. your check regisiter and account are telling you the same thing, sooner or later you will have to come to terms with the facts.

Tommy, my hat is off to you sir. you stand alone as one of the few people that actually have a shot at weathering the storm. the rest of them won't be around much longer... it is enevitable.

[BigJohn]

If all the TGP does is to sell the ability to turn off skim AND their skim is such that a surfer has a high chance of seeing your gallery then there is nothing wrong with this. The user has a choice... view your gallery and take the chance of getting skimmed somewhere else or pay to see it every time you click. The access to the gallery is still free in this case.

Google charging to turn off ads would be doing exactly the same thing. Your link is still free, just as you intended it regardless of whether a surfer pays to have ads turned off. Google is constantly adding and removing links, I find it difficult to believe that if you requested that your site be removed from their listing that they wouldn't honor the request.

The problem that arises is that once you say it's okay for someone to use your content and bandwidth in a "charge for skimless" TGP, is not what the honest webmasters will do, it's what cheaters and abusers will do. What stops the TGP owner from setting the skim so high that there is virtually no chance of seeing your gallery unless the fee is paid or designing his TGP
to look like a paysite and "skimming" the thumbnails (which he now calls samples) directly to a join page that charges 9.95 for access to thousands of pictures and videos?

This "pay for skimless" tgp, running autogallery or something similar, is now using your bandwidth and content to build a paysite and profit off of your work. Do you feel this is an okay thing for someone to do?

By not executing your rights as copyright holder in the first place, you make it more difficult to enforce them at all.

[BigJohn]

Originally posted by bret
oh wow.

i dont think i have ever laughed so hard as i was reading this thread.

here are a bunch of people putting down an idea because the person is trying to charge someone for something they can essentially get for free.

EVERY single person that commented on this runs a "porn site" that links to / gives away FREE porn with the expectation of selling that porn (in one way or another) to someone.

by all of your logic the pay sites don't work because people can get the porn for free... so why are you pushing pay sites then? sounds like a total contradiction in logic to me. alot of you need to seriously re-think you positions.

so many people in this business are so "set in their ways" that is why this industry is going to shit, anyone who tries to be innovative gets shot down. no one wants to help the person "thinking outside the box", in fact, its quite the contrary. when someone comes up with a new idea people won't work with that person, they shoot down their idea and do whatever they can to make sure the idea fails.

you people are so stuck on your stupid "rules" and "ways" you have no idea how much money you are missing out on. although you many not want to admit it, your days are numbered. your check regisiter and account are telling you the same thing, sooner or later you will have to come to terms with the facts.

Tommy, my hat is off to you sir. you stand alone as one of the few people that actually have a shot at weathering the storm. the rest of them won't be around much longer... it is enevitable.

Glad we could entertain you

[KCat]

Originally posted by bret
Tommy, my hat is off to you sir. you stand alone as one of the few people that actually have a shot at weathering the storm. the rest of them won't be around much longer... it is enevitable.

That's pretty harsh.

I think the ability to "weather the storm" has less to do with any one particular idea & more with having the drive to carry it to fruition.

Whether this kind of idea would be successful or not is irrelevant if no one has the balls to try it.

[Surfn]

Originally posted by KCat
That's pretty harsh.

I think the ability to "weather the storm" has less to do with any one particular idea & more with having the drive to carry it to fruition.

Whether this kind of idea would be successful or not is irrelevant if no one has the balls to try it.

First bit of sense I've read since GG's last post in this thread.

[bret]

Originally posted by KCat
That's pretty harsh.

I think the ability to "weather the storm" has less to do with any one particular idea & more with having the drive to carry it to fruition.

Whether this kind of idea would be successful or not is irrelevant if no one has the balls to try it.

I was not talking about this idea in particular. tommy is pretty open minded, to me, it seems he knows in order to survive he must evolve.

look, i dont really care either way what any of you do, keep going on with your beetleheaded ways, it will just leave more money for those left standing in the new generation.

[Greenguy]

Opinions are like assholes.....

You know how you can tell that you have a really good idea? You post it & no one pokes holes in it