Techie Media

Everyone please tell me what you like about free hosts, and what you dont like.

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Smile and Be Happy

blakkfrogg

What do I like about free hosts? They're FREE!

What do I dislike about them? Depending upon the free host: Web interface uploads. Slow servers. Frequently missing images. Server-controlled/cookie-activated re-directs, popups. Overbearing free host ads in the header/footer. 'Floating' free host advertisements.

I could go on, but I do have to go home at some point.

Although I have trouble getting sales/conversions out of ARS' sponsorship program I do have to say that the idea of making users of their free host service advertise ONLY ARS SITES in exchange for not sticking their own banners/ad in the headers/footers of each page is pretty damn good. Now if I could only find the key to getting conversions, I'll be all set.

Actually, no, I'll have more than 33 cents in my pocket. I'd like that. I'd like that a lot.

Oh.. HERE'S an idea. A Free host with a hub that pushes traffic into its individual accounts via a toplist. Only sites on that particular free host may participate, and now that I think about it, why not make it so that all sites are req'd to participate by placing a text link in the header/footer of every page? Benefit to the free host is that they get to place whatever ads they want on the toplist pages. Benefit to the free host user is that they can get traffic immediately once their account is activated.

Hey.... What do I win if the above idea is actually gets used? A cookie? A drink box? Damn. Prob'ly nothing. Oh well. Maybe I'll teach myself CGI and also how to properly administer a free host in the next 20 minutes and use my own idea.... then again, maybe not.

If anyone DOES use that idea, let me know so I can sign up, OK?

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Eat Beaver.. It's Cheaper Than Caviar

Bake

Hay Lightning some things I dont like about your hosting is no zip load and you compress my pics to much and some of the TGP's that list me everday wont list you but you are acepted on the Hun witch porncity is not also some webmaster get more than 100k a day and some get fuck all but where treated the same, maybe you could have a better deal for proven webmatser?
Bake

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The harder I work the luckyer I get

Techie Media

Blackfrog and Bake, Both of you have some very valid points. We will be taking all of this into consideration and will be trying to upgrade our service to you. It does seem however that for a free service you are somewhat pleased, not just with us but with some free hosts in general. I mean let's be real, I bet it sure beats paying for it all yourself
I still want to hear from more of you, not just an attack on Lightning Free, but some ideas on Free Hosting in general.

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Smile and Be Happy

eVillage

Blakkfrogg....nice toplist idea. We are going to be integrating a toplist for our members only starting in a few days!

I'd also like to hear more suggestions for free hosts. There are a bunch of free hosts out there, and each one has strengths and weaknesses. But keep posting your ideas and they will probably be implemented!
http://www.eroticvillage.com

--David

Jamdin

Likes:
1) They're free
2) Easy & quick to setup
3) Depending on the freehost, most tgps will accept you
4) A good support team or person

Hates:
1) When the freehost changes the banner after you sign up to a circle jerk pop-up hell
2) When the freehost changes something nice to something aweful (cp &/or beastie banners)
3) When the freehost changes the space they take up from 1/8 of the page to 1/2 the page
4) When the freehost adds an extra link to your regular url
5) Crappy file managers that crashes when you upload more than 5 files of any size
6) Crazy ftp service (either slow or you cannot log in at any time of the day/night)

I'm sure I've left out a few.


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Moongem Erotica Moongem Fiction Shemp's Categorist

Xcom

Hey Lightning i run a tgp on porncitys paid hosting and I know that would pay for a service that would remotely host a top refferal list.

It would make trades very easy and I dunno id pay anywere between 20-30 a month for it.
Plus a 200-300 dollar setup fee.

Btw get discover as a credit card for you merchants account. A lot of tgp webmasters know nothing about cgi scripts and do want something like this.

Rictor

The things I look for in a free host are:

1. Headers and footers that don't take up half a page.
2. FTP or .zip upload.
3. A toplist that promotes the sites on the server (Pornbillboard.com used to do this and it really kicked ass).
4. The big TGPS (Hun, AL4A, etc.) accept galleries from the freehost (this is the most important).
5. Webmaster tools section (TGP submit page, search engine submit page, list of good sponsers, BBS, etc.).


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"Beware of all enterprises that require new clothes."

Techie Media

Jamdin,Xcom,Rictor, Mostly you all have some very good Ideas. We have thought of some of them and are in the process of implementing a few of them. Everyone these are some good points you are making, please keep them coming.

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Smile and Be Happy

http://www.lightningfree.com

oscer

They have great Fucking Ideas

This will be quite Informative for Us man

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Stynk Adult Freehost

Keller

Id like free hosts that pay me for using their bandw.

Dizzy

I don?t like when free host kill my sites,
Tell that I have not licensed content.
Dizzy.

Techie Media

Dizzy, I dont know what other Free Hosts do, but when we recieve a complaint from any Legal content owner, and they say a site on our hosting is using their content. We send the webmaster an email, and give them 24 hours to provide proof that the pics are theirs to use. If they dont respond, we have no choice but to remove their account. But we only do this if they can't provide proof.

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Smile and Be Happy

http://www.lightningfree.com

fever

Something that suck with free hosts is the rule that the file cant be bigger than 50K, at least 200K should be ok. What do you think about that Lightning???

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Check it out
BabeFever
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CDSmith

That is actually very generous. I'm sure some guys bitch and whine because they only get 24 hours notice, but as far as I ever knew --
A) The content owners do not owe anyone ANY notice at all, and it is within their rights to proceed directly to the lawsuit phaze if they so desire,
and
B) Most freehosts give absolutely no notice. They nuke the site first, and let the webmaster plead his/her case later.

Solution: buy legal content or produce your own, and have proof of permission or ownership handy at all times.

File sizes --
Again, I've said this before, 200 or 250kb for images is HUGE and a waste of time and bandwidth. I am telling you here and now, I can take any (read - ANY) full-sized pic of any file size (even 2 megs) and resize it, crop it, edit it and compress it, and it will come out looking nice and clean and nearly as clear as the original, and it will be well UNDER 100kb, likely 35 - 75 kb MAX. Those images load faster, and I can jamb more of them into a hosting account if the server space is limited. Why the hell would anyone need a 200kb size limit? I have no idea, as far as I know .mpg's are not allowed on most freehosts, so why the huge limit needed?

However, I'm not really crazy about using freehosts that go overboard with the limit either. I think that 50kb is a bit excessively harsh, really. 80 or 100 kb is perfect for free image sites though.

Suggestions for freehosts --
As some that have known me for a longer time will tell you, I've been a "damn freehoster" for forever, and here's what I look for...

FTP -- If my site is established and of any size at all, ftp is a must. It would take me a month of Sundays to upload 'CD's Models on the Web' for example, in it's entirety using a file manager, 5 or 10 files at a time. I have about 2000 files for that site. For newer and smaller sites, no problem. Lack of FTP is pretty much the only thing now keeping me from firing up a few accounts with Lightning btw.

Space -- 30+ megs is okay, more is better.

Speed -- I like it when a freehost specifies on their information page exactly what connectivity they possess, and how fast their servers are. Not all of us are doorknobs that know nuthin bout nuthin.

Headers/footers -- It really frosts my ass when there is no sample page for me to look at so that I know what I'm getting myself into as far as what the ads look like. I've signed up more than a few times for what looked like a great deal, only to find that my beautiful site was literally buried in top/bottom ads of over half a page each (both top AND bottom!). Not every webmaster will know what your freehost is all about, so I suggest putting a link on your information pages to show them "this is what our headers/footers/banners currently look like."

Bad decisions --
I've moved sites off of some freehosts in a matter of minutes and emailed all my trades to update my links to the new url. Why? Well, one freehost added those annoying audio ads that we all love to hate so much, for pure-fuck-dot-dumb. Me gone!
Also, I moved off of a few hosts for allowing their service to become shit slow to the point that I could no longer get galleries listed anywhere. I'm sure there are ways of making $$ from freehost ads without making fatal decisions that will ultimately drive guys like me away in droves.

Tech support -- well, I thought that waiting 3 to 5 days to get an answer to my emails was pretty good and pretty standard, that is until I met Wayne (from smutserver) and Lightning (from....Lightning). These guys should be called the Lightning brothers, both are as fast as shit through a goose (and twice as runny) It's just damn nice to feel like someone at the other end cares about your business, you know?

When I find a service such as a freehost that I really like, I tend to become very loyal, and will promote them and put my name behind what I say about them, and that doesn't come lightly by any means.

I'll close by saying that any freehost that runs itself well and doesn't overload it's servers, keeps it's ad space narrow and clever instead of HUGE and annoying, and offers ftp to guys like me with bigger sites, and answers emails in a timely fashion should be able to make a killing, because they will not only be TGP friendly but they will draw to it a lot of loyal business. They will also be a company that other big adult organizations will want to pay for ad space as well. By the way, the person that made the decision to put in those "expanding mouseover ads" in the headers of sexshare.com and a few other freehosts ought to be fucking shot and pissed on.

Okay, I'll take a breath now and let you guys get a word in, and since it's Friday night, I'll pour meself another icy homemade vodka cooler, hee hee evil me
<font face="Arial">___________
CD
* <a href="http://www4.smutserver.com/babes/bgnetwork/submit.html" TARGET="_blank"><font color="#27FFFC">Babe Galleries Network</font></a> < -- submit galleries here
* <a href="http://www.oliver-klozov.com/cgi-bin/refer.cgi?ref=cdsmithok" TARGET="_blank"><font color="#CBE6FF">60% of all signups, 40% of all rebills</font></a> + High Quality free content, mthly cash bonuses
* <a href="http://members.home.net/cyberdogs/Anti-Censorship%20Site/" TARGET="_blank"><font color="#FFCCCC">Sites Against Censorship</a><font color="#EDDDDD"> Support us, support your future</font></font><font color="#606060">



[This message has been edited by CDSmith (edited 05-18-2001).]

Babagirls

LIKE: Free & Easy to use.

DISLIKE: SOmetimes i will be surprised with a little pop-up window. And too much ads on the top of the page...why cant all the ads be at the bottom? lol

Gemini

We were just talking about this the other day and now I'm drawing a blank. Except the space limits need to be unlimited, and like CD said 75-100 for file sizes.

And ftp still has it over the multi-file uploads since you can add dirs etc without having to go thru different screens etc.

Oh and the ftp has to be decent. Alot of freehost' ftp's won't take drag and drop for more than one file at a time, let alone whole directories.

Steve

pros: it's free
cons: I don't have 100% of the ads on the page. Depending on what I want to do, it is either a great deal, or inconcievable.

Freehosts are awesome for webmasters breaking into the biz. Also for those who are experimenting with TGP work. I look at some freehosted galleries and can tell the guy is ready to move onto paid, and I see paid hosted galleries that have no business being posted, even on a free host.

file size: 200kb pics? WTF are you smoking? And I'm sorry 75-100kb is just as bad. If you can't compress an image below that, either change your software, or resize. Maybe both. Think of free sites like a sample of cookies at a supermarket or a bakery. Do they throw you down and jam a box of cookies down your throat? No. They give you one small fucking cookie, and make you pay for a box/bag if you want more. Free sites are ads for your sponsor, not works of art. I'm not here to present nudity in all it's beauty - I am here to get guys horny enough to buy a membership to one of my sponsors. Anyway, I think 50kb is way more than enough. I think 25kb is big.

ftp: yeah, everyone wants it. It's easier to use than a file manager. But your getting hosted for free. You can't have it all, all the time.

Lust

Lightning, my galleries hosting in your host...
And I have ONE trouble - "cant be bigger than 50K"....
All other in your hosting - THERY GOOD
And multy-upload the BEST

About other free-hosts... - I HATE THEN THEY STEAL MY TRAFFIC


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Make Money, Not War!

Wilber

Dislikes:-

No ftp
Top banners beyond 150 pixels tall
Lying links (eg:how to get into paysites free)
Overtaxed hardware = broken images/long loading
Virtualgirl (any anims)
Loading banners first then stalling my enter button
Banners on disclaimer page (wtf is the point showing a babe slurping a dick if I'm trying to tell parents etc to go away)
Stealing my SE discription line
Ignoring thehun etc have banned and no changes made


Likes:-

FTP²
Free
Subdomain'd urls (better rank in SE)
Linkpop tailcoating
FCI's Executive


Wishes:-

An invisible counter w/ referrers
Freehosted scripts w/ power

CDSmith

Sure I can. I have 6 of my 12 sites hosted on smutserver.com. Full ftp, and every other feature I currently require.

Steve --
Further to: file size -- It all depends on the size and quality of the original image, and how crappy and grainy you want your pic to look in the end. I could crank them all down to 20kb, but I like to retain my quality more than that. Smutserver has a file size limit of 80kb, and I find it quite easy to keep my images well under that limit. However, not all of my images are under 50kb, and some of my sponsors pics are over 50kb and they will not allow any compression or undue resizing of their pics. 80 kb is a fair limit in my opinion.

Another thing I want to point out is that a lot of webmasters seem to look down their noses at freehosted sites. Sorry, but I see things much differently. I judge sites on the merit of their design and quality, and there are a lot of good quality sites located on freehosts, some of which get 40, 50, or 60k hits a day or more. The benefits to these webmasters are that they don't have to worry about bandwidth theft via hotlinking, they have NO bandwidth bills at all, they just make money, period. Many of them own their own domain names as well, as quite a few freehosts are hosting vanity domains now.

I never judge any site harshly just for being on a freehost, ever. There's some great talent out there on freehosts, no question. It isn't just for "rinky-dink" or "mickey-mouse" webmasters any longer, and any webmaster that still believes otherwise is living in the past.

Another suggestion for freehosts that don't offer ftp for security reasons, maybe you could set up a "preferred ftp list" like some tgp's have for submitting galleries. Only webmasters that you know would be allowed, thus allowing them the added luxury of having ftp access. Thoughts? I'm sure I'm not alone in thinking that this feature is just as important as speed and uptime.
<font face="Arial">___________
CD
* <a href="http://www4.smutserver.com/babes/bgnetwork/submit.html" TARGET="_blank"><font color="#27FFFC">Babe Galleries Network</font></a> < -- submit galleries here
* <a href="http://www.oliver-klozov.com/cgi-bin/refer.cgi?ref=cdsmithok" TARGET="_blank"><font color="#CBE6FF">60% of all signups, 40% of all rebills</font></a> + High Quality free content, mthly cash bonuses
* <a href="http://members.home.net/cyberdogs/Anti-Censorship%20Site/" TARGET="_blank"><font color="#FFCCCC">Sites Against Censorship</a><font color="#EDDDDD"> Support us, support your future</font></font>

scarabst

Please give ours a try we have very fast and reliable servers, I'm sure you'll be pleased. http://freepages.infoextra.com

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[email protected]
Have a Great Day!

TheWatcher

Lets See.

Likes:
- Free
- FTP Access
- Custom Designed Headers and/or footers (this means they the free host took time and created a nice looking header that will not only advertise there own sponsors also there own service)
- Tech Support
- TGP Friendly
- No-Popups
- No-Audio Flash Banners
- Having a Site list
- AVS friendly ( A freehost that contacts major AVS's and settles deals with them to do target advertising with sites they host. Lets say a site is using Adult Check so that host should set the banners to promote adult check gold )
- Resource Center

Dislikes
- Web Based File Manager
- Waiting to be approved for hosting
- Crappy Servers (load balancing shit)
- Not many free hosts are Gay friendly


hmm cant think of anything else, but if I do I will shure to post them

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Peace will come, just kill them all...

Hypo

I used to use lightning free exclusively earlier, but decided to change to other free hosts that provide unlimited space.

What I like about LF -

- Multiple signups using one email id
- Reasonable ads

Dislike -

- No ftp, but that wasnt such a big problem
- No zip file uploads, not that big a problem
- Limited space (make it unlimited!)

What I would definitely like -

- An option that allows me to remove all ads for any amount of time, from a day to forever. So if I have some galleries uploaded, I can pay by credit card to get all ads removed on that account, and then by a single click of a button I can stop the payment and get all ads back. Since I wont be hosting any scripts or using any additional setup, the charges would be less than normal hosting. And since you get bulk bandwidth, maybe you could charge us $1.5 per giga? Whatever you do, I'm sure a lot of webmaster will love the idea. And if you can add domain hosting to that, all the btter!

Hypo

Hmm I didnt know you had to wait to be approved for hosting. This was not there before. Is it there now?

Gemini

It depends on the freehost Hypo. SOme don't have auto access and need to be read and dealt with by the freehost webmaster. (Might be better in some cases if they are handled that way to cut out the wannabes)

mr. mpg

I like my free host cause it makes me money. :o)

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Techie Media

Watcher, I am Launching our new Gayfreehosting in about 2 weeks max. We also have no wait to open an account on any of our hosting. Also we now have multi file uploading, 50 megs storage, (more if needed)
24/7 tech support, We answer all emails ASAP, and you can find me here all the time, at the best damm web board on the net


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Smile and Be Happy

Lightning Free Hosting
Girls Host

Doctor Dre

Ok ... I'm not using freehost anymore but they helped me a lot

The freehost of my dream would be :

Ads not bigger than smutserver one's ... To make that the webmaster should categorize each .html page but the host would make more targeted advertising . Less ads and as much money for the free host .

Possibility of both .zip and ftp upload

Unlimited disk space

Don't overload servers like smutserver do

Domain hosting

A counter for every account incorporated ... Maybe make a deal with sextacker or something

Be acceted by all the tgps of sextracker top 200

Possibility of movies ... And max images size at least 90 kb

Maybe offer a submitting script like tgsw


Maybe also the possiblity of CGI and Php host but only a list of script allowed to don't crash the server

Good tech support


mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm now I wake up everybody need to make some $$$

firesan

I have been EATEN!

http://www.stormfront.org/forum/