Scripts on Main Forum Page

[JohnW2]

Ooooh, that's another kettle of worms. Are you saying you intentionally put up with the 'annoying' adverts for fear of the forum disappearing?

Effectively, yes - but not just this forum. A high proportion of 'Internet resources' I use, free of charge, (including search engines) are at least partially financed by advertising revenue.

Doesn't it actually work the other way round in that such websites are set up to attract participants and then advertising with a view of making a profit?

I suppose that's how it starts. However, as I said, advertisers are only going to contimue to pay for adverts if they are coinfident that appreciable numbers of people are being exposed to those adverts.

Presumably an advertiser would be unlikely to do so were they aware NO one was looking but can they tell?

I would not be surprised if they can tell, either directly themselves, or via the operator of the site. Standard website tools enable the site owner to gather a lot of information about 'visitors' - location (at least, country), operating system being used, browser being used etc. etc. In any event, what the advertisers obviously can tell (and what matters most to them) is how many people actually click on the adverts. If that falls too low (which it obviously would if most people were not even seeing the adverts), they would presumably stop paying for advertising on the site in question.

We're starting to see a similar issue with TV advertising. Since increasing numbers of people are using technological means of avoiding watching the 'commercial breaks', this is becoming a less effective/attractive method of advertising - so we are seeing an increasing incidence of (now legal in UK) 'product placement' within programming.

Kind Regards, John

 

[JohnW2]

Not if it happens on many sites, some without any advertising, and only with IE.

If that all is/were true, then I'd probably have to agree with you.

A site I manage has the Facebook 'like' scripted link on the front page and nothing else scripty, and it shows this IE scripting error to users all of a sudden, when it has run fine for years.

Interesting. As I said, my IE certainly hasn't been updated 'with my permission' recently (I have updates set to require my intervention), but I suppose it could have happened 'naughtily' without my knowledge. There certainly isn't anything else that has changed at my end with my knowledge.

The running of these "Facebook-like scripted links" can presumably be influenced by interaction with what is happening at the other end of the link (I've noticed that, whilst the script is running the browser is sometimes 'waiting for' the Facebook connection). Are you sure that it's not something (even something as simple as difficulty in gaining access to the url in question) 'at that end' (e.g. Facebook) that is causing the problem?

Kind Regards, John

 

[EFLImpudence]

We're starting to see a similar issue with TV advertising. Since increasing numbers of people are using technological means of avoiding watching the 'commercial breaks',

I have thought about that so I will put their minds at rest.

Since being able to record virtually everything I want to see and watching it later, I fast-forward the commercial breaks and realised that I have to 'watch' the adverts, albeit twelve times faster, so that I can see when the programme restarts whereas before I would make tea, go for a pee or totally ignore.

this is becoming a less effective/attractive method of advertising - so we are seeing an increasing incidence of (now legal in UK) 'product placement' within programming.

Do you not think that since it is now legal it is merely a means to generate more income for the television company as the per-hour allowance is limited?
They do have far more advertisements in the land where capitalism is king.

 

[JohnW2]

I have thought about that so I will put their minds at rest. Since being able to record virtually everything I want to see and watching it later, I fast-forward the commercial breaks and realised that I have to 'watch' the adverts, albeit twelve times faster, so that I can see when the programme restarts whereas before I would make tea, go for a pee or totally ignore.

I don't think their minds can rest that soundly. When I do that, I could rarely tell you anything about the adverts (not even what they were advertising) that I had fast-forwarded through.

Do you not think that since it is now legal it is merely a means to generate more income for the television company as the per-hour allowance is limited?

That may be true at present. However, if their minds are not resting soundly as a result of your 'reassurance', and particularly as the incidence of 'advert-avoidance' increases (particularly as technology improves to the extent that you will definitely not have to 'watch' any significant part of the speeded-up adverts!), there will presumably be an increasing reticence to pay (as much, if at all) for commercial break adverts, and hence a progresive shift towards product placement. If the commercial breaks were to get much shorter, or even disappear, one assumes that the limit for product placement would be correspondingly increased.

However, that's an aside. If people stop clicking on website adverts, the adverts (and hence financing of the websites) will surely gradually diminish or disappear. That's surely inevitable, isn't it?

Kind Regards, John

 

[JohnW2]

The running of these "Facebook-like scripted links" can presumably be influenced by interaction with what is happening at the other end of the link (I've noticed that, whilst the script is running the browser is sometimes 'waiting for' the Facebook connection). Are you sure that it's not something (even something as simple as difficulty in gaining access to the url in question) 'at that end' (e.g. Facebook) that is causing the problem?

To illustrate this ....

Untitled

• JohnW2
• 6 Jul 2013
• 2

Kind Regards, John

 

[Lectrician]

There are times the FB embed does slug up, but you see the rest of the site work as it should, and the FB embed appears after a few seconds. I have not noticed it cause an error previously when it slugs up, and not had members comment, only in the last couple days.

 

[JohnW2]

There are times the FB embed does slug up, but you see the rest of the site work as it should, and the FB embed appears after a few seconds. I have not noticed it cause an error previously when it slugs up, and not had members comment, only in the last couple days.

It's certainly all changed in the last couple of days. However, as I asked, could not a (recently arisen) problem at the Facebook end be causing the problem. For example, per the screenshot I just posted, could this endless millions of script statements being executed not simply be the result of repeated unsuccessful attempts to access the (unresponsive) www.facebook.com/... url?

Kind Regards, John

 

[ban-all-sheds]

I remember that in pre-Sky days when people complained about paying for the television licence it was stated that their contribution, by product prices including a proportion for advertising, to Independent Television actually cost them more than the BBC.

Sky now analyse the behaviour of people playing back recorded programmes to see if/which/how many/etc ads they FF through.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

Since being able to record virtually everything I want to see and watching it later, I fast-forward the commercial breaks and realised that I have to 'watch' the adverts, albeit twelve times faster, so that I can see when the programme restarts whereas before I would make tea, go for a pee or totally ignore.

What is needed is something to process the picture, which looks for the DOG.

Two birds then with one stone - it could remove the DOG, and since the only things not defaced by those are adverts, it could remove all of those too, allowing you later to watch a DOG-free, advert-free programme.

 

[JohnW2]

Sky now analyse the behaviour of people playing back recorded programmes to see if/which/how many/etc ads they FF through.

Assuming it's technically possible, I would expect no less. If advertisers are shown, and believe, their figures, as I've been saying, I suspect they would reconsider the worth of their expenditure on such advertising if/when the figures indicated that the number of people being 'properly exposed' to the adverts had dwindled too much.

However, as I've said, in relation to the actual issue under discussion, with website advertising the advertisers have 'the proof of the pudding' in front of them - since they will presumably know exactly how many (or how few) people click on a particular website advert - and that is what matters to them.

Kind Regards, John

 

[Lectrician]

My websites are causing this error because of the FB plugin - Commenting this script out fixes the issue. Looking via google, it seems to be well documented in the last few days.

I assume DIYnot also had a FB like button in place which has perhaps now been removed?

Edit - Actually, I think the FB button on DIYnot can be removed in your profile which is why I can't see it.

 

[DIYnot]

Those using IE might want to try this:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/175500

 

[JohnW2]

Those using IE might want to try this:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/175500[/QUOTE]
Indeed. That is the 'workaround' that I described on the first page of this thread.

However, to warn people, the fixes described there are aimed simply at preventing the warning message appearing, which actually makes things worse (performance-wise) with the situation we are facing. If one uses the 'fix it for me' option, it sets MaxScriptStatements to the maximum possible number. The warning message would then never appear, and the script would just go on running (grinding one's computer to a halt), without any user opportunity to terminate it. Similarly, if one 'fixed it for yourself' and set MaxScriptStatements to a high number (greater than 5,000,000 decimal) this would actually increase the amount of time taken for the message to appear (and for one to be given an option to terminate the script).

As I described, what one needs to do, as a sort-of workaround, is the opposite of this. One needs to reduce the value of MaxScriptStatements (I am currently using 500,000), so that the warning message appears more rapidly, at which point one gets an option to manually terminate the script.

Is it not possible for DIYnot to remove the offending script (it seems probably relating to Facebook) until the third party get their act in order? Having to repeatedly manually terminate the script is gradually driving me mad!

Kind Regards, John

 

[bernardgreen]

i am probably very dim in asking this but why are BaceFook and Tweety involved with this forum ? What useful function does the connection provide to the users of this forum ?

 

[JohnW2]

i am probably very dim in asking this but why are BaceFook and Tweety involved with this forum ? What useful function does the connection provide to the users of this forum ?

My personal answer would be 'goodness knows' - I certainly don't want such functionality. However, I think the proper answer to your question is that there are FB and Twitter 'buttons' on the forum page, for those which might want such things!

However ... breaking news (and touching wood) ... it seems that the problem might have gone away this morning.

Kind Regards, John