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10:47:00 AM EST
Feeling Angry
Boycott the Company Featured in the Banner Ad
Folks,
When AOL introduced AIM Blogs, they placated paying members by saying the free AIM Blogs would have an ad banner and paying AOL accounts would have no such ad.
This is evidenced in this blog entry from John Scalzi -- Introducing AIM Blogs
The important excerpt in case the entry is removed: "For AOL Journalers, this means that the neighborhood is about to get a lot bigger and a lot more diverse -- and, not entirely coincidentally, that all your friends with AIM accounts will now be able to have their own blog here on AOL, with all the features of AOL Journals (the real difference is that AIM Blogs, being a free service, have an ad at the top, whereas AOL Journals, as part of your paid AOL account, are ad-free)."
As time goes on, AOL has been giving away for free what many members pay the highest cost of any ISP to have. Yes, I realize they make more off of advertising than paid subscriptions. Have we, as AOL members, become redundant? There comes a time that you have to make a stand for services you dole out your hard-earned money to have. The customer should be a priority to any company and it's obvious that AOL considers their advertisers their customers, not those of us who have subscribed for years. The Journals of paying AOL accounts should NOT have ad banners and should function well on the whole. Flashing ad banners not only are aesthetically offensive, but take a long time to load for those AOL members paying an absolutely ridiculously inflated price mainly for features and benefits AOL gives away for free on AIM.
What am I doing? I'm writing to AOL. Whether it will have any effect or fall on deaf ears, I don't know. I've already moved one of my Journals off the service to Blogspot where their free blogs carry no huge banner ads. In my recent entries on my AOL Journals, I'm posting no actual content. All I'm doing is posting a boycott of the advertisers listed in the ad banner. Now, if the advertisers see their ad followed by a request to boycott -- well, it's not a good thing.
Any ad banners should be restricted to those with FREE AIM Blogs, paid work accounts for AOL, etc. Those of us who PAY to be a member here shouldn't have to have garish, crass and annoying ads for companies we do not support on our personal journals -- especially when we can go elsewhere and create blogs for FREE with no such ad banners. AOL stopped listening to its customers long ago and stopped the ad campaigns which spoke of how important we, as the customer, are. What they're not giving away for free these days really isn't worth paying the highest dial-up cost in the country to have, IMO. And, something like this, pushes more subscribers right out the door.
If you're not making your Journal private, boycott. Post one entry for all to see urging the boycott of any companies in the ads and of AOL Journals themselves. Hopefully the companies in the ads themselves will note the negative publicity.
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(I hope that as you do this, you continue to send your feedback to the feedback address we've set up, JournalChanges@aol.com, which I can't stress enough is not a dumping ground for your e-mails -- it's set up because I don't know if any high-powered AOL executives are going to see the comments you post in my blog, whereas with the e-mail, we can collect your feedback directly and share it with our executive team.)your voice counts so let them know how you feel.
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Points well taken. Of course in my case I haven't found an add on AOL that I suport in any case... not the free morgage rates, curcut city, Bank of America, etc. I am keeping tack and also writing, by hand... US PO.. them a letter of protest as well. Telling them tha their add is not welcome on my journal.
Gotta hit em at all ends methinks.
Michael -
I think we should seek out an attorney for a class-action lawsuit, because they are generating revenue U|SI||NG our creative work! Unpaid work = slavery! Instead of complaining about it, lets send them bills, based on traffic to our sites! Force them to put a counter on that measures visits other than our own, and make them pay--or remove them! Bruce http://journals.aol.com/anarc
hitek/thewizardofahs/ -
Jackie,
When I was finally able to post this morning, I typed "This blogger does NOT endorse ads displayed above" in the LISTENING TO field ....
I'm sure it will make no difference, but I'm taking a blog break until there is some type of response from AOL execs. As for finding another blog host -- I already have 4 outside AOL. If I move my current two from AOL, they'll go to a web site.
Stay in touch.
http://journals.aol.com/gullspirit/PerishTheThought/
11/19/05 6:40 AM
Let me know where the ball lands.
Always, Carly
Ellipsis...Suddenly Carly
http://ellipsissuddenlycarly.