we've bought a lot of submit passes and we don't regret, exception made of a couple.
But I can see the flaw here, and it's purely maths (equals money)
1- Most average submitters won't be able to get traffic for galleries
2- Most average submitters won't be able to pay for submission software+submit passes+content+server bills+.......
3- In this scenario, submissions will drastically go down, so TGP owners will need to fill spots with FHG, but 99.99% of FHG sucks ball for different reasons (lousy designers, oversaturation, whatever). Hence signups will reduce drastically as well.
4- The excuse is to "weed the bad seeds". Well, this is the biggest flaw. He who is a pro cheater has the money to purchase these passes. The regular guys are less prolly to cheat or scam. Or they would be really stupid if after the cheating and scamming they can't even afford 35 bucks.
5- As we all know, TGP traffic quality is worse everyday, surfers have everything for free if they know where to look.
5- To add to all that, galleries aren't guaranteed. In other words: you're purchasing the right to click a button. Nothing else.
The way I see it, program owners should be very concerned about this, and maybe even pay the submit passes to their best affiliates (I won't charge you about this idea
)
And a final thought: if TGP owners wants to go this way, they'll need to give 100% exposure to the listed galleries, not using the paying submitter galleries to rotate or skim traffic. Otherwise, you're very close to those "bad seed" you're supposed to fight with this. If I've my gallery listed, which I paid for, i want to see it for at least 24 hours in your site. And when I click on my thumb, with my content, supposed to promote something I planned for, I wanna see nothing but my gallery when clicking. Just my
