I GUESS I NEED TO BECOME A SUBSCRIBER

[dc]

yeah, non subscriber speeds went down the crapper fast. hehe.
get more bw AT!

oh well, this slow down might be a good thing. it's helped cut down my forums usage quite a bit.
less time wasted on forums! yay! ... now i can waste more time on irc instead. =/

 

[Hammer]

I'm still debating it. I've never paid for posting on a forum before so it does seem a little wierd.

 

[GooberPHX420]

Wow, some pretty definate YES and No answers....Jeez

Ill bet those of you who are like "OMFG ITS ONLY $2.50 A MONTH1!?!!?!!!!!" have high paying jobs. Or are at least employed at the moment

 

[pyonir]

<< Wow, some pretty definate YES and No answers....Jeez

Ill bet those of you who are like "OMFG ITS ONLY $2.50 A MONTH1!?!!?!!!!!" have high paying jobs. Or are at least employed at the moment >>


i don't have a high paying job and i subscribed. and maybe you should spend less time ATOT worrying about subscribing and more time looking for a job.

 

[Viper GTS]

<< Jeez, does anyone remember the piece that some tech show did on anand a while ago? Way before this stupid subscription crap came? Anand was driving a pimped out BMW and going to school full time. While Anand did not reveal how much he made, it was obvious that the advertisements alone were enough to pay for the bandwidth, server, his school, and there was enough left over to pay for a freaking BMW! Please don't give me the crap about how bandwidth costs money and poor anand, he's so noble to have given us this forum for free. He jacked the bandwidth from the nonsubscriber forum to the susscriber area. Think about it, its perfect....take the bandwidth away from the unsubscribers, and then sell it back to them when they subscribe! Its genius I say!

I for one won't be paying, just for the way that it went about. Maybe if the speed wasn't throttled and I just had 20 bucks to blow, but its principle now. If and when it gets unbearable, I'll leave.

-D >>



You are really dense, you know that?

AnandTech is a business. Businesses exist for one, and only one purpose: To make money. WHen people make money they do strange things like buy cars, pay for school, etc. And guess what? That's OK!

The bottom fell out of the ad market. That means the already non-profitable forums began to truly hemorrhage money.

AnandTech is not a non-profit organization. GET OVER IT!

If you're jealous of the Bimmer (which, BTW, rumor has it it's been replaced by a 911), go buy your own. Can't afford it?

Then get off your ass & earn some money.

Viper GTS

 

[hoihtah]

my move to subscriber's forum has been one of the best investments i've made this year.

 

[n0cmonkey]

<< Wow, some pretty definate YES and No answers....Jeez

Ill bet those of you who are like "OMFG ITS ONLY $2.50 A MONTH1!?!!?!!!!!" have high paying jobs. Or are at least employed at the moment >>



Get a job. Its that simple.

Id be willing to pay $10/month. I dont know how bad it is for non-subscribers because I figured one less <insert luxury here> for this luxury was a good tradeoff. I also dont waste money on expensive software (like Windows or video games )

 

[murphy55d]

<< Wow, some pretty definate YES and No answers....Jeez

Ill bet those of you who are like "OMFG ITS ONLY $2.50 A MONTH1!?!!?!!!!!" have high paying jobs. Or are at least employed at the moment >>



Employed, yes. High paying job? Hardly. I work at freakin WalMart.

2.50 is less than a combo meal at a fast food place.

 

[ViperXX]

What do you get from your $30 besides better bandwidth? Usatoday.com and cnn.com are free they don't make you subscribe to get better bandwidth.
I come to anandtech because I'm at work and I like to read some of the forums that pertain to my job. I like to see if I can help someone or be helped. I'm not going to pay to give my advice to someone else. I won't be becoming a subscriber anytime soon.

 

[SCSIfreek]

I caved in last month ...

To me subscription to AT Forums shows your support for this forum. You kids never learned there aint no free lunches in this world. Have you ever thought of the cost to run a server 24/7/365? Plus with the amount of bandwidth we're producing it aint cheap to maintain it. A good web-developer cost over 100K+ in salaries to hire, add all those things up and you'll find how expensive it is to run a server with high bandwidth.

Furthermore please ask yourself, how often do you click on those advertisements on top of the forums? I never did noticed those banners nor have I ever click on any of them. so Anand didnt make a penny from me clicking on those banners LOL.

If you do the math it is 8.219 cents per day which is affordable. But if Anand were to increase the fees then I might reconsider. As of now, I'm enjoying my fast access through the hot deals and ATOT. cool beans everyone!!! later....

 

[Aves]

<< Usatoday.com and cnn.com are free they don't make you subscribe to get better bandwidth. >>


Those are multi-million dollar companies that make enough money from TV and print newpapers to support the load of their websites. AnandTech is not.

 

[Aves]

<< If you do the math it is 8.219 cents per day which is affordable. >>


No doubt. I know that everyone here could find a dime on the ground somewhere each day.

 

[Jfrag Teh Foul]

I became a subscriber yesterday... to me it's worth it because of the people who post here. Living where I do it is easy to get wrapped up in your own little microcosm and become rather stale in thought. ATOT gives me a chance to communicate to people that I ordinarily wouldn't, and that in itself is what makes it worth $2.50 a month to me.

 

[Optimus]

Geez some people need lessons in basic economics:

The forums LOSE money - hand over fist. They are a MASSIVE cost.

From a business perspective, the forums are BAD. They do not justify themselves with increased site traffic or ads viewed as those benefits are DWARFED by the sheer cost of maintaining the forums.

i.e. (not real numbers, these are examples - the real numbers are similar and if I recall, much worse):

Cost of operating the forums: 100,000
Income from ads: 25,000
Benefit from increased site traffice (promotional value): 10,000

= -65,000

This is money out the window - lost, goen, kaplooie.

The forums are a drain and would sink the business - therefore they needed to be wither A) Dropped or B) Subsidized

The optional subscriber program is a comprimise - you don't have to pay, but they have had to limit the bandwidth to a cost-managable size. If you pay, you get the real deal.



<< Is your Hotmail, Yahoo email accounts more important that this forum? Are they free? >>


Both have a free intro service, paid better service. SAME as here. Not to mention that the promotional value to Microsoft/Yahoo is higher.


<< Because you can make money from banner ads. >>


You CANNOT make anywhere near enough.


<< Because you can get more members (= more money from banner ads) >>


Again - not nearly enough to even dent the cost.


<< Because you can be more popular by doing that = higher rating = higher advertising fee = making more money. >>


Again...


<< Because this is Anandtech! >>


And the bank will not give one flying hoot when Anand can't pay his bills because the forums have eaten all the money. They will take the servers, the ISPs will shut him down. He will lose everything.


<< Last time I checked, non subcriber's page has ads. >>


Yet again - tiny, tiny dent in the cost. Where does he pay for the rest of the costs?

CNN.com and USA Today are web incarnations of REAL WORLD companies. They are advertising in and of themselves for the real products that make money (papers and TV). That is why they are cost effective.

Anand has a WEB product - web journalism. He does not sell TV ads or newspapers. Therefore ad revenue is IT - and although its enough to support the main site, it is NOT enough for the forums.

 

[Viper GTS]

<< Because you can get more members (= more money from banner ads) >>

Not if the increased bandwidth/server cost exceeds the ad revenue.

Which it does, obviously.

Viper GTS

 

[Ns1]

<< While it's fun to be here, it's definitely not the end of world without the forum. I HAVE A LIFE! >>




that's nice, some of us don't; AT is like bad crack, you don't want it but you keep coming back to it



come now people, the days of the free internet are long gone

 

[PowerEngineer]

I must admit that "subscribing" puts me off a bit, but so does paying for banking privileges and paying to park my car. However I may well get to the point where I'm comfortable with the idea. I have to agree that access to these forums is worth it to me.

Non-subscribers need to appreciate that we are getting a valuable service at no charge, and so much more than what we're paying for. We don't have a right to it; we're just lucky to have it now. And it is bad manners to complain overly much about what we're getting. That said, subscribers shouldn't adopt the "holier than thou" attitude that exude from some of their responses. Let's all play nice.

I am curious to know what percenatge of the on-line users are "subscribers" during various periods of the day.

 

[Joyride]

I am happy with the performance as is

I may subscribe but see no reason to right now.

 

[Descartes]

Many of the sites I visit now have "subscriber" options. Every resource I used years ago, now costs "a small sum". Trouble is, the aggregate financial impact of all these "small sums" add up.

Such is the nature of the net these days, as I'm sure advertising revenue has all but dried up.

 

[Ultima]

Forums are fine for me at home. They're unusable at school though, often threads don't finish loading. Don't have problems with other message boards there.

 

[Wingnut]

<< Such is the nature of the net these days, as I'm sure advertising revenue has all but dried up. >>



Which is why I will definitely subscribe as
soon as me finds better job, and/or the live
in gf GETS a job!

$30.00 is next to nothing for the advice that I am sure many of us have received here.

To be quite frank, I find even the non-subscribe speed to
be quite good... after initial login that is! This is the only
area I find that has any sort of considerable lag.

 

[Bobomatic]

I dont think I willl come here anymore if it continues to be slow, especially at times like 1 in the morning.

 

[phatcow]

since when was 2.50 a latte? in hawaii its 3.50