Ditch the Contentlink...

[dcorleone]

I know there's no money in this stuff, that yer all basically just volunteers, but there's gotta be a better way than Contentlink. That is horribly annoying, slows browsing down a ton cuz all that crap has to load. Personally I find the ethics of Contentlink disturbing to begin with, but besides this, when I'm in the forums, I'm usually looking for answers and having a hundred popups appearing in my face whenever I move my mouse is unbearable.

The Google ads on the home page are a bit too much too. All those script-generated links mix in with all the important stuff. It makes the homepage much more complicated to figure out than it should be. You've got the donation links and you've got the Sabayon store and you've got purchasable copies of the distro you sell. Half the home page is taken up with ads and links to ways for people to donate money or buy stuff. Not to mention all the script-generated "Spotlight" posts on every page in the forums. It's too much. There's gotta be a better way.

Sell printed documentation, I dunno. There's gotta be ways to fund things without it being so obnoxious. As is, the website and forums are like trying to read a newspaper that's 3/4 advertisements. Linux is supposed to be a clean, efficient, lean operating system, but the website here is more bloated than the worst of Microsoft apps. Hate to say it, but it's true.

[Fitzcarraldo]

I'm sure all viable means of obtaining revenue are already being used: the Cafe Press Web shop (caps, mugs, t-shirts, badges etc.), donations via PayPal, advertising on the Home Page and in the SL Forum, ISP sponsors to host the ISOs, and so on. But I'm sure it still does not generate enough revenue to even support one full-time developer or buy enough hardware. You suggest selling printed documentation instead of advertising. Who's going to write it, set up a Web shop to collect credit card and PayPal payments, maintain the retail site and operation, collect the revenues (which will not be much, I'll wager), keep the accounts, take care of the legal aspects and so on. Such a venture in itself would cost something to set up and run, eating into any profits (which I doubt would exist anyway). Are you going to write the comprehensive, accurate, fully-proofread documentation to sell? The SL Wiki is not too bad, but has quite a bit of out-of-date or inconsistent information, and it would not be viable just to print it out and try to sell it. Are you going to get the documentation printed, run the retail operation, process the orders and post the documentation worldwide (at what cost?), and so on? The two SL developers have day jobs and lives outside the project, as do the moderators. If you really hate the adverts that badly, make a donation via the link on the Home Page; buy a t-shirt and cap from the shop; get any fellow Linux enthusiasts into SL and ask them to do the same. This also goes for anyone else reading this who hates the advertising. I don't much care for it either, but I can see that it's a necessary evil in the absence of any viable alternative that is not already in use. SL does not have a company such as Canonical, Novell or Red Hat behind it -- all of which are commercial organisations with employees and who either sell software or support services -- to do this work. Just two young developers and a few active moderators (you can count them on the fingers of one hand -- without the thumb!).

[freeallbadgers]

Well said Fitzcarraldo.

[joost]

Hey we are saving for lxnay's Ferrari, so its not an option to leave out the ads.



P.S. Wolfden,Darkmage,WarraWarra,Element,etc.. Who was the last one to use the SL private Jet? Please flush the damn toilets next time! Thank you.