Or do you really think there's a way to put something like this site on the Internet at no cost?
no cost to who? the members yes. but your right someone has to pay a bandwith/hosting bill. Yes i know it can still be done by allowing "approved" vendors to advertise for free. but i suppose that depends on what you call advertising.... you want a nice graphic to click on...you just want to drop textual hints in contextual threads? you want google text links? I think everyone would agree if you have a huge banner plastered at the top of a high traffic site, they would pay more for it than just a small contextual text add.
I sure hope you're kidding. Who do you think does the necessary programming, maintenance, record keeping, bill paying, etc.?
necessary programming, you think the owners of the site wrote php bulletin board softwere? they tweek some settings. maintance? like forum backups? oh that would all be handled by your hosting agent agreement. you pay for that service so you dont really do anything, record keeping? like what? who are the admins? what powers do they have what forum sections there are? thats all tracked in the php bulletin softwere, you really dont do anything. bill paying? oh thats the easiest.. (likely) all the money (from advertising) comes in via a google services account (or simular). like paypall. some credits show up, depts go out for hosting services, you collect any excess or cover any shortages. no real paper money changes hands.
There is no question time is put into maintaining the site, but for the most part it runs itself. On top of that you get other people (admins) to volunteer there time to run the day to day stuff, you know carry the ban hammer and thread locks around.
Explain to me why a vendor should be allowed to use TBN, or any other web site, as a free site for making sales and providing support.
because it draws people to the site to get free advise and support for the products they own from those vendors. In turn i can cover costs by selling adds for competing products or those same products, or make it clear that if the people benefited from the information on the site the site owners would gladly accept a donation to keep the site running. Or i simply make the donation myself because i feel the need for people to be able to freely exchange information and ideas is greater than money grubbing profit hungry company could hope to do.
That's a pretty Eutopian vision of the internet, both in its origin and in what it should and should not be. And it all sounds fine and dandy until YOU are the one paying....
perhaps, but we have to start someplace. Oh and i do pay for what i use, every user does for a connection to the great internet.
at any rate, we seem to be digressing into an almost political discussion now and that would just be bad... so... im out.
