You're getting FUCKED! (By counter companies)
 

Don't use 'em.

or you could use server side stats

:1orglaugh Why give anyone else the traffic? You have logfiles for a reason. :2 cents:

:GFYBand

Server side stats are a workable solution. I have the feeling that most newbies (the webmasters hit hardest by the free counter SCAM) don't have the technical proficiency to implement them or are otherwise unable too (freehost, etc.).

good point

:smokin

Then they should buy a book from O'Rielly and get some paid hosting! ;)

Jact, I'm inclined to agree with you, but we all have to start somewhere. A lot of the folks here on this board probably got their start on freehosts. As a matter of fact one of the admins of this board got his start on a freehost. What's really cool about our industry is its prolitarian nature, i.e. just about anyone with sufficient motivation can learn enough to eek out a living, no matter their background or means.

My server stats only tell me monthly, they dont tell me daily.

I've never used a free counter but I agree with you! A leak is a leak is a leak leak leak....

Then you need a better host!!

Marcus, check out paycounter.com

i need to get off of shared hosting

I don't see how its a scam.

Back in the day counters also doubled as toplists.

People put the counters on their pages for increased exposure.


Now put down the cup & step away from the Starbucks :winkwink:

Most server stats only show monthly its a Sucky downfall

LOLFucking L

GoBigTime, You have a valid point, counters are used for their ranking, but you are failing to take the fact that not all sites use counters so the ranking is innacurate and incomplete...I think we can all agree that Al4a.com is one of the largest TGP's around, it is NOT listed on Sextracker or any other counter that I am aware of. Furthermore, any webmaster worth his salt can do business online without the aid of a toplist.

Remember those old cgi counters?

Are there any around that will count uniques for the full day then reset to 0 at midnight?

I want to delete my counters and see if it makes a difference on my clicks to sponsors, but I still want to know my daily uniques

Marcus, go to shemp.com...there is some sort of (truly) free counter on the bottom of the page.

*Bump*

Blah blah....

Alright guys, I'll provide you with some more compelling evidence that free counter companies take advantage of your misplaced trust in them....One of the largest free counter companies stats servers routinely goes down, it is SOP to "copy and paste" stats from the same period. In other words, the counters go down on a wednesday, they lift the stats from the preceeding wednesday, same time, add or subtract a predetermined amount, and that's what you get.

Vending_Machine, this is not a "blah blah" sort of matter. What we are talking about is a massive fraud being perpatrated against honest, hardworking webmasters. This is serious.

How? Sure a couple surfers will click the counter but who cares.
So whats the big scam?

Jim Manly, You're wrong. Example: I remember a amateur site that was getting somewhere around 20k uniques per day, they were losing almost one third of their traffic to a large image size counter. At the time the traffic referrred by that site was worth thousands of dollars per month. Do you think the stats provided were worth it?

BTW, putting text like "don't click, only a counter" increases the CTR.

"I remember" .. blah blah.. Got any info to back that up?

to each his own.

I've worked inside a counter company.

and i still use counters to this day.

the trade off in traffic is marginal - for how easy it is to use, track, get a ball park, check referrers, focus in on a particular pages performance,

plus - the extra benefits of exit stats

but fuck - just the rankings alone make it worthwhile - for chest beating and finding traffic trades - etc. sure not everybody uses them - but SO?

it's not a perfect tool - but it is a fairly effective metric

whoa. watch it there slick. treading on lible.

It's anything but fraud.

webmasters know it's not 100% accurate - no company to my knowledge ever claims to be 100% accurate.

as far as the image - that is clicked - and generates Ad Revenue for the company - that's what allows them to provide the service. Webmasters know that going into it to.

Where is the fraud?

BrettJ said it best. The image is a way for the company to earn some revnue while providing you with a service. Webmasters know what it's all about. There is no misconceptions. Fraud? Oh, Please. Are you really this dense?

Find another whistle to blow. You completely missed the mark this time around.

More newbie bashing. If it's not "freehosts suck, they are all scammers, don't use em"..... then some assclump is spouting off about counters being a scam.

Shaddaaaap already.


If people want to use them, let them use them. 80 to 90% of my clicks-out are generated from top-of-the-page ads and thumbs, and on tgp's it is the gallery links themselves. PERIOD. Any site that can honestly say they lost 1/3 of their traffic to a fucking counter is run by a retard.


And counters that pay per click negate the whole argument. If you are getting paid for that tiny "leak" as you call it, wtf do you care where it's going?


Let's talk convenience. When someone is submitting let's say 10 galleries per week to 1000 tgp's and wants to keep at least marginal tabs on traffic to each individual gallery, a counter like Fox or paycounter tracks them all from the same interface, nice and organized. You can see how each gallery is doing in a few seconds and get on with your work, instead of pouring through thousands of server logs.


Just go with what works for you, shaddap about what others are doing, and get on with it already.

Change the IMG to 1x1
:1orglaugh

We run a counter service. In exchange for a small button which we serve and a link we provide real time live stats. It's easy to set up and is cost neutral.

Many people use it for many reasons, what they all know however is that in exchange for the service they carry a link to us with our button. It's certainly not ripping anyone off.



http://www.tracker.sexfind.com/banners/trbutton.gif

hardly a big image is it ?

TheHun uses counters. :1orglaugh Nuf said.

They generate a shit load of traffic if you have sites that rank high.

I can see this debate is going to rage on all day, so..... Just browsing through the sexlist.com topsites listings, let's see whose all getting "ripped off" by the evil counter.....

I see Easypic in there. Never heard him complain about lost revenue to sexlist. Interesting.

Original Picpost, another big one.

Shemp. Ya, he must not know what he's doing. Damn newb. :1orglaugh

Freeones.com -- hmm, I wonder who owns that?

Tons of well-known movie posts, freehosts and gallery posts too. Obviously all people who lack the brain power to see they are being ripped, right? And this is just ONE counter. There are dozens of popular ones in use out there.


Yeah, I think I'll take this whistleidiot's word over the likes of highly successful long-established webmasters. Sure I will.

You can always change IMG size to 1x1. I'm using czech counter services(www.pocitadlo.cz, if you know my language :) ). It displays no advertisng on your pages, just a number of visitors of your page(which is fully configurable, can be removed, if you want), they have good stats, never went down & their service is free! Just must be able to read in czech to register.
I stopped using paycounter after they told me, that my gallery listed almost on the top of persiankitty mainpage had 150 visitors first day.

i got my start on tripod :)