HOT DEAL! Anandtech Forums for $30/yr.

[Sanjoelo]

Hell, I'd probably pay the $30 a year if they they threw in a nice AT T-Shirt

I'm gonna try and pricematch this to Techbargains... anybody got an AT $5 off $30 coupon?



-JB

 

[Doomguy]

Arstechnica had to move to subscriptions to keep its forums alive. It still has the best off-topic forum.

 

[Heifetz]

Have any of you guys ever thought of the idea that it could be possible that Anand purposely made the forums slower and moving some hardware for dedicated Subscription use? I swear, anand forums were a lot faster before, even with all the PMs and full text search enabled. Even though they turned all that off, and did multiple hardware upgrades, its as slow as ever. Where would Anand get the hardware for the subscribers in the first place? Wouldn't the easiest way just be to use a machine that is being used for the forums now, thus leaving the forums with even less capacity? Just a thought....


Heifetz

 

[corinthos]

when did ars move to subscriptions?

 

[M O M O]

hell if i paid 2.50 a month i want to see coupons and codes again.. woot

 

[Muffy]

ROFL!

 

[Pothead]

There is no subscription, Anandtech gets plenty of traffic, thus money.

 

[Red Dawn]

If all those who said they are really going to quit did so this place would be much faster and much better!

 

[LoverBoyJ]

<< I can't believe how ignorant you ppl are. They will not be charging you to use the forum. If you decide to subscribe, you would be getting benefits!! :| I can't believe you ppl. GO TO THE F-ING LINK AND READ!!! :|:|:| >>




THATS CORRECT!!! Most of you guys are ranting for something you don't understand!!! If your read it properly, ITS NOT MANDATORY!!!


You only get premium service + extra if you subscribe, IT DIDN'T SAY YOU HAVE TO PAY IF YOU WANT TO READ OR POST IN THE FORUMS !!!

 

[Nitemare]

<< Have any of you guys ever thought of the idea that it could be possible that Anand purposely made the forums slower and moving some hardware for dedicated Subscription use? I swear, anand forums were a lot faster before, even with all the PMs and full text search enabled. Even though they turned all that off, and did multiple hardware upgrades, its a lot slower than before. Where would Anand get the hardware for the subscribers in the first place? Wouldn't the easiest way just be to use a machine that is being used for the forums now, thus leaving the forums with even less capacity? Just a thought....


Heifetz >>



It's sort of a little known fact that they did throttle down the bandwith to test this out. As well as we used to have unlimited pm's. Pretty much most of the perks that we will get if we were to sign up we had at one time or another for free. Some people refer to that as bait and switching...giving you a taste for free, then start charging you for it.

The 30 a year is by no means mandatory(for those 50% above who are apparently reading inpaired)

Is it worth 30 a year? my answer is no. I will remain with the freebie access until the access becomes unbearable. Then I will switch to fat wallet for my hotdeals and will probably pluck down the 50 for arstechnica.

Is arstechnica worthy of 50 a year? No, but at least the moderators are not ban and lock happy over there...

 

[MaDHaVoK]

i'd pay if and only if we could post coupons, and codes.

 

[gtd2000]

The people on this forum make the Hot Deals the "hot deal" because they share their info for free.

Take away that free flow of information and you have no more Hot Deals or information flow.

And therefore no reason to subscribe.

However, I do appreciate that it does cost money in order to have this information available on the website.

It's a classic catch 22

EDIT

I did goto the link and read the spiel about the subscriptions. This forum is a great source of information but the problem is that most of us assume that all information on the net is free and find paying for that info somewhat hard to digest.

There is a product cycle for everything and you can gaurantee that whatever happens there will always be an option that you can choose:

1. Stay for free and sit for ages while the pages load perhaps?
2. Pay for the service and have faster page loads and other added services.
3. Go to another site which is dedicated to "Hot Deal" information for free.

I actually never had any use for the Hot Deals forum (was living overseas - yes there is a whole world out there!) and was always to be found in the Hardware/Software sections helping out others with their problems etc.

Now that I am over in the USA I can take advantage of the deals and find that I spend most of my time on Anandtech browsing for a bargain

 

[stingbandel]

it aint gonna work...



nobody wants to pay....

 

[WhiteMouse]

IMHO, charge (in any format) for forums is a bad idea. Unlike web site, where the owner(s) provide the info. to its reader, here in forums we readers create the topics and push useful (or useless) information to others. How can the forums charge us? If it is right, can those Diamond members who provide tons of deals charge us also?

 

[peterframpton69]

No need for fees if a couple of simple things would be done:

1) Have a fraction of the screen dedicated to Staples, Amazon link etc so that Anandtech gets credit. I usually have 5 sessions of IE running. When I see a hot deal, I usually go to another session and type in the URL. I'm sure many lurkers do this.

2) Allow codes to be used in forums.

 

[Sanjoelo]

Wanna save bandwidth?

BAN THE SMILEYS !!!!!

:disgust::|:Q:frown:

 

[SFang]

I will pay for it only if they offer me $30 off $30 purchase coupon

Or, maybe not, too much trouble :disgust:

I guess by that time, I will be jumping to fxxwallet ... Ops, I forgot, I already did that

 

[NightTime003]

Worth a shot, someone rich and dumb might bite, then again, rich and dumb @anandtech??

 

[SgtZulu]

This is too funny
What next,links to pr0n sites?

 

[DaveR]

<< I will pay for it only if they offer me $30 off $30 purchase coupon

Or, maybe not, too much trouble :disgust:

I guess by that time, I will be jumping to fxxwallet ... Ops, I forgot, I already did that >>



HeeHee, then we can post the Anandtech $30 off coupon code. We can even ask someone to scan it in!

 

[Cyberizer]

:| Not worth it at all. The day they ask for subscription or out, I am out. Not that I have even posted any hot deal lately!

 

[gogeeta13]

99.97% of the members who read this hot deal forum are leaching trolls. At any moment, there are probably 200 of you who are waiting to pounce on the latest deal. You get great deals, and kill them off within minutes. You leach leach leach and never give back. Now, when you have to actually give something, you cry wolf!

Personally, I think the payment should be mandatory...it would get rid of all the riff raff we have around here

TROLLS!

 

[fragarific]

three words, lol.

$10 a year and 1/50th of the population might sign up.

mho

 

[jlee75]

<< :| Not worth it at all. The day they ask for subscription or out, I am out. Not that I have even posted any hot deal lately! >>


YOU PPL ARE STILL SO FRIGGING IGNORANT AND STUPID!!! READ THE POSTS. THIS IS NOT MANDATORY!!!! :|

I think it would be beneficial for the forums if those that say, "If we have to pay, we'll leave"

Leave already! FIrst off you are too ignorant/stupid to comprehend what's going on with subscriptions. Second, you are probably the ones that constantly whine about the hot deals if you don't get them, or if there was a pricing error. Go somewhere else then. You won't be missed.

AND LEARN TO READ!!! IT IS NOT MANDATORY!!! You ppl make me frustrated. Knowing that there are so many more ignorant ppl out there.....

 

[alchemize]

Why does every decent web page out there think that their site is worth $2.50 a month? I could probably list off 30 web sites that I really enjoy visiting each month for my news, forums, gaming, etc. Gee...and I can have all that access for the low low price of $75 a month? Plus my $45 a month cable modem bill? Plus whatever it costs me to maintain a computer? I don't think so.

If advertising didn't work on the internet, what makes anyone think that subscription based web pages will? If the good web sites become cost prohibitive, I'll just stop going. Somehow I managed before WWW, I'm sure I'd manage again.

Its time the web marketing gurus figure something out that works. Maybe nielson ratings for the internet All this click through/web page loads is junk.