Reading Posts

[Flapping_Madly]

Sorry but I don't know where else to post this.

I used to be able to just read posts without logging in.

Now I am instructed to Register or Log in.

Why?:confused:

[hippotamus]

I think you are allowed a certain time period or number of views as a guest before you have to register . Probably stored as a cookie or something . I imagine that when you read without logging in it counts you as a guest and the clock starts . Now you've reached your guest limit.

[Nigerian Expat Outlaw]

I used to have a look and login if I wanted to post. Now I have to login each time. Maybe the numbers of hits has become so high it needs to be controlled or something ?

NEO

[nebpor]

That's exactly the reason - it's an attempt to limit the load the website is being put under by anonymous visitors - it hit a high after the BA 777 crash and now with the T5 fiasco I imagine it's through the roof.

By forcing people to register then login, there will be a fair percentage who will decide not to do so and thus the traffic isn't as bad as it might be otherwise.

[Breecher]

That's exactly the reason - it's an attempt to limit the load the website is being put under by anonymous visitors Do you have inside information or are you just guessing?

I would have thought it was more of an attempt to increase the number of registered members in order to enhance the advertisement revenue.

In any case it's bloody annoying.

[jimworcs]

The website is a totally free service, supported by advertising. If the owners need you to register in order to prove the number of visitors or hits, and in return you get access to the website (that you clearly visit quite regularly) it is a small price to pay. I can't see what is annoying about that. Some people will moan about anything.

[PPRuNe Towers]

Breecher,

I suspect you aren't bother by facts but here's a few anyway.

No pay per click - it's flat rate advertising across the whole site. A page view is a page view whether registered or not, whether logged in or not and gets counted by a third party- presently it's google analytics.

Once you've got 20,000 pilots signed up here that's all that matters and it happened 7 years ago. You'll note we're not carrying advertising outside of pro aviation. You'll also note that we don't do pop ups, mail shots or audio ads.

Registering evens out demand and especially helps all our sneaky anti spam and scamster spybots and scripts. It really does keep out the riff raff that spoil other sites.

You've got a mouse - if it really annoys you make us suffer and go elswhere. If you can persuade 15,000 other people to do that every day we won't have to have you registered to view the site. And if you can persuade 35,000 to join you per day we won't need ads.

Now there's a project to get your teeth into :E

Rob

[Breecher]

Yes jimworcs, you are quite right. Some people will moan about anything, just as some will forever be meek.

PPRuNe Towers, I don't recall complaining about the need to fund the site. Nevertheles you apparently felt the need to cast aspersions on my character and protest a bit too much at the same time.

Now that you have opened the subject, I suppose it is legitimate to ask why it is necessary to know my birthday or place 11 cookies on my computer?

[LH2]

If I may...

why it is necessary to know my birthday

Shouldn't be. Unless it's changed it's optional to fill in, and it's a feature of the vBulletin software that powers the site. The idea, mostly, is you get a "happy birthday" message on the date you entered as your birthday (if any).

Another couple of intended uses when bulleting boards were designed (which is a long time ago) were for access control (adult content, etc.) and latter, data mining. Nobody bothers with those as the data samples are so unreliable.

or place 11 cookies on my computer?

On my computer, four of those are used for load balancing, three for user identification (in a rather unsecure way, don't use a valuable password), one for presentation purposes (shows or not a certain "welcome" message), three for user experience purposes (keep track of viewed threads, etc.), six I'm uncertain about at first glance, but they appear to keep track of recent posts you've made, and one keeps track of whether I choose to stay logged in between sessions or not. I believe they are cleared/removed if you hit the "logout" option (but I'm too lazy to try just now)

That's for a total of 18 cookies on my PC. Again, that's nothing to do with pprune.org directly, but with the operation of the underlying software (bulletin board and load balancer). Cookies in themselves are no good for proper "spywaring" activity, although they have in the past been used as attack vectors, just the same as the HTTP payload itself. If bothered, just set your pprune.org cookie policy to "allow for session", but be reminded that any profiling would take place server-side based on your username, same as most other sites (e.g., Google, MSN, Yahoo, etc.), so that's a bit of a futile exercise.

Hope this helps to answer your question.

[TightSlot]

PRuNe Towers, I don't recall complaining about the need to fund the site. Nevertheles you apparently felt the need to cast aspersions on my character and protest a bit too much at the same time.

I'm happy that the original, and follow-up questions have been comprehensively and appropriately answered, so we'll close this now.