Strange links being added to postings

[cgutjahr]

In the first two postings in this thread, four occurences of the word Debian have been turned into hyperlinks to an ebay auction. This was obviously not done by the authors of said postings, since the link is added through Javascript after the page has been loaded.

Anybody familiar with this phenomenon? Has a.org been hacked by some spamming script, or is somebody testing new ways to generate money?

[cgutjahr]

(Edited: it's *not* my browser, it *is* a.org)

[cgutjahr]

Yeah, checked some more - looks like it is the site doing it. The advertising partner is VigLink ("Make money with ordinary links"):

http://www.viglink.com/

I simply didn't see it so far because my Adblocker usually filters that crap out (I'm using a backup machine right now, apparently the adblocker isn't properly configured on this one).

Meddling with user postings really is the lowest from of advertising, as far as I'm concerned. I really don't want to have random commercial links added to things I write... I'd be pretty pissed if I had posted about an open source Amiga emulator for Debian and my post would now contain three links to some ebay seller.

Can this be removed please? Or at least some form of opt-out being offered?

[cgutjahr]

What does it mean " by the authors of said postings"?

It's just a phrase, as in: "the postings I just talked about". I could have simply used "the authors of these postings" instead, but I tried to sound cool

[cgutjahr]

if this is a Ad feature you don't like on Amiga.org feel free to use an Ad Blocker.

You are missing the point - this form of advertisement is meddling with my postings. I have no control over what links are added to my posting, or what they link to. I do not want to promote some leecher who sells DVDs with copies of Linux distributions on ebay. Apparently, that means I have to avoid mentioning Debian Linux, because otherwise a link to said leecher will be added to my posting.

At least today, god knows what said link will point to tomorrow or the day after that.

Amga.org has to generate revenue somehow

You're not the only person running an Amiga website. Some of us do have a clue how much that costs per year, you know.

How much is your hosting? And how much does this form of socalled advertising generate?

Paying members of Amiga.org don't get this.

Apparently that's not true.

[cgutjahr]

Your never satisfied with anything done on Amiga.org

Why don't you adress the question I asked, instead of trying to label me a troll?

How much income does this perversion of an advertisement create?

[cgutjahr]

I guess current owners are trying to claw back some of the money they spent/wasted (which it was never worth).

The current owner (note the singular) is BillP, who claims to have been given amiga.org as a free gift from the (alleged) previous owner Tedd G_a_l_l_i_o_n.