New, obnoxious, autoplaying, video ad

I decided to test some things on my forum as a guest. Words cannot describe my horror when I saw this thing in the bottom right of my screen:

A very obnoxious video ad, that autoplays, and follows the user around the page, covering the actual content. A quick google search will clearly show that users hate these ads.

We already have sponsored content(an euphemism for what is, in fact, spam) in the topics, was this seriously necessary? Were we even announced of this change? What is the point of having a forumotion forum, if what I show to a potential user is an obnoxious ad, that wastes their internet bandwidth, and makes them not want to have anything to do with my site?

While this ad is autoplaying itself, the ads that used to show up at the bottom of the forum have stopped displaying properly, leaving an ugly white space where they used to be.

If I continue with my forum, I will urge my users to install an adblocker, until ads like this are gone. And that is a fairly huge "if".

Please post your forum's link.

P.S.  The link in your profile leads to the forum does not exist message.

This is my forum:https://fmagic.forumotion.com/
And this is a topic where that ad appears:https://fmagic.forumotion.com/t3-bug-reporting-101

I didn't have a forum when I made my account here, but the registration form was asking for a forum link, and it wasn't taking no for an answer

Edit:Similar ads show up on a bunch of forums, but not all of them. Could it have something to do with activity?

I do not see that video ad, but I do see the ads at the bottom of the topic fine.

Is that popup message about cookies something you added?

Yes, ads could be based on your activity.  Also it could be based on content on your forum.

It takes about 15 seconds for it to load:



Yes, the small cookie thing in the bottom right was added by me, to replace the default cookie banner. Something similar to this tutorial:https://help.forumotion.com/t147313-how-to-change-the-cookies-bar-information
That being said, I'm not sure if its necessary anymore, as forumotion has another cookie banner now:


I can see the sponsored content:


I can also see the top banner:


But the 2 ads at the bottom don't show up anymore:


Edit:the ads at the bottom don't show up even on a default forum. For example, here:https://otesting.forumgratuit.ro/. There's no custom javascript, css, or modified templates there, but there's still a blank space at the bottom of the forum.

Clear your browser's cache & history and see if the ad still appears.

Already done that. Cleared cache and cookies, nothing. Incognito window:nothing. Another browser:nothing. Mobile browser:nothing again. I'll see if a different network works.

I have not seen it yet.

Well, I don't know what to tell ya, the ad is there. I even connected to another network(I have an internet stick laying around), and the autoplaying ad is still there, while the bottom ones are still nowhere to be found. On the default forum(https://otesting.forumgratuit.ro/), there are 2 errors in the console:

Those errors are found in code that deals with ads. They may be the reason why the bottom ads don't load. Do they load for you?

Those same errors show up on my main forum as well, but they are buried among other stuff. I've found yet another obnoxious ad, this time on Ange Tuteur's forum

I even forced the default templates, and the default css, and the bottom ads still don't appear, while the autoplaying video ad is there, as well as the 2 console errors. I will try to make a video showing the issues

The close or open ads have been around for awhile.  It is not just our forums that have them.

Well, the close/open ads are quite annoying, as they take up the whole screen. Hopefully I won't see them on my forum

Regardless, I made a video showing that the default templates and default css are forced, as well as that there are no javascript codes running on my forum. Then I show me deleting the forum data(both from browser settings and the "Delete forum cookies" link), and then the bottom ads not showing up, the 2 errors in the console, as well as the autoplaying ad in the topic:
http://forumotionhost.azurewebsites.net/video.mp4

I can't seem to be able to add this as a video in the editor, so you can use the link above. That's a website of mine where I host stuff for my forumotion forum.

The banner at the beginning of the forum, and the Banner cookies,and the promoted and the promoted are normal forumotion ads, if you do not want them to come out you can buy a forumotion package and remove all ads

The other ads are typical of not having activity in your forum, once you have more activity, they should disappear

jucarese wrote:
The other ads are typical of not having activity in your forum, once you have more activity, they should disappear

Yes @jucarese is right the bottom popup ad's will go when your forum is more active.

My advice is make lots of posts and maybe make 2 or 3 fake account's and post with them just to get your forum out of New forum mode.

After that just keep your forum active by posting 3 or 4 times a day until you have more members.

Regards.

Ape.

Okay, I guess I'll see what happens when the forum becomes more active. I plan to make it public in a couple of days

How about the bottom ads that don't display anymore and leave a white gap in their place? Should I make a new topic about those?

When the ad's go they don't leave a gap the box will go.

To remove all ad's you need to pay for a package and then pay to remove the Ad's

That's the only way to remove all the ad's

 Helpful topic's:
Forumotion Packages
Forumotion Copyrights
Custom your Domain Name
Credits Management

if you are talking about this >


Then that can be removed for free and the box will go away and your not see a gap where it was;)

I know how ads are supposed to work. I am not talking about the "sponsored content" section.

What I am talking about is the 2 ads that used to appear in the bottom of all pages, but don't anymore, and leave a blank spot in their place:

That screenshot was taken on the homepage of the forum:https://fmagic.forumotion.com/, at the bottom of the page.

The same thing happens on a default forum, like this phpbb2 one:https://otesting.forumgratuit.ro/.

What these 2 forums have in common is the following 2 errors displayed in the console:


These 2 errors occur in the following javascript code:

Code:

//<![CDATA[
    function AT_adFillSlot(){document.write('<div id="awn-z3133087" style="display: inline-flex;"></div>
<scr' + 'ipt data-cfasync="false" type="text/javascript">
var zoneNativeSett={container:"awn",baseUrl:"discovernative.com/script/native.php",r:[3133087]};
var urls={cdnUrls:["//superonclick.com","//geniusonclick.com"],cdnIndex:0,rand:Math.random(),events:["click","mousedown","touchstart"],useFixer:!0,onlyFixer:!1,fixerBeneath:!1};function acPrefetch(e){var t,n=document.createElement("link");t=void 0!==document.head?document.head:document.getElementsByTagName("head")[0],n.rel="dns-prefetch",n.href=e,t.appendChild(n);var r=document.createElement("link");r.rel="preconnect",r.href=e,t.appendChild(r)}var nativeInit=new function(){var a="",i=Math.floor(1e12*Math.random()),o=Math.floor(1e12*Math.random()),t=window.location.protocol,c={_0:"ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789+/=",encode:function(e){for(var t,n,r,a,i,o,c="",s=0;s<e.length;)a=(t=e.charCodeAt(s++))>>2,t=(3&t)<<4|(n=e.charCodeAt(s++))>>4,i=(15&n)<<2|(r=e.charCodeAt(s++))>>6,o=63&r,isNaN(n)?i=o=64:isNaN(r)&&(o=64),c=c+this._0.charAt(a)+this._0.charAt(t)+this._0.charAt(i)+this._0.charAt(o);return c}};this.init=function(){e()};var e=function(){var e=document.createElement("script");e.setAttribute("data-cfasync",!1),e.src="//pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js",e.onerror=function(){!0,r(),n()},e.onload=function(){nativeForPublishers.init()},nativeForPublishers.attachScript(e)},n=function(){""!==a?s(i,t):setTimeout(n,250)},r=function(){var t=new(window.RTCPeerConnection||window.mozRTCPeerConnection||window.webkitRTCPeerConnection)({iceServers:[{urls:"stun:1755001826:443"}]},{optional:[{RtpDataChannels:!0}]});t.onicecandidate=function(e){!e.candidate||e.candidate&&-1==e.candidate.candidate.indexOf("srflx")||!(e=/([0-9]{1,3}(.[0-9]{1,3}){3}|[a-f0-9]{1,4}(:[a-f0-9]{1,4}){7})/.exec(e.candidate.candidate)[1])||e.match(/^(192.168.|169.254.|10.|172.(1[6-9]|2d|3[01]))/)||e.match(/^[a-f0-9]{1,4}(:[a-f0-9]{1,4}){7}$/)||(a=e)},t.createDataChannel(""),t.createOffer(function(e){t.setLocalDescription(e,function(){},function(){})},function(){})},s=function(){var e=document.createElement("script");e.setAttribute("data-cfasync",!1),e.src=t+"//"+a+"/"+c.encode(i+"/"+(i+5))+".js",e.onload=function(){for(var e in zoneNativeSett.r)d(zoneNativeSett.r[e])},nativeForPublishers.attachScript(e)},d=function(e){var t="jsonp"+Math.round(1000001*Math.random()),n=[i,parseInt(e)+i,o,"callback="+t],r="http://"+a+"/"+c.encode(n.join("/"));new native_request(r,e,t).jsonp()}},nativeForPublishers=new function(){var n=this,e=Math.random();n.getRand=function(){return e},this.getNativeRender=function(){if(!n.nativeRenderLoaded){var e=document.createElement("script");e.setAttribute("data-cfasync","false"),e.src=urls.cdnUrls[urls.cdnIndex]+"/script/native_render.js",e.onerror=function(){throw new Error("cdnerr")},e.onload=function(){n.nativeRenderLoaded=!0},n.attachScript(e)}},this.getNativeResponse=function(){if(!n.nativeResponseLoaded){var e=document.createElement("script");e.setAttribute("data-cfasync","false"),e.src=urls.cdnUrls[urls.cdnIndex]+"/script/native_server.js",e.onerror=function(){throw new Error("cdnerr")},e.onload=function(){n.nativeResponseLoaded=!0},n.attachScript(e)}},this.attachScript=function(e){var t;void 0!==document.scripts&&(t=document.scripts[0]),void 0===t&&(t=document.getElementsByTagName("script")[0]),t.parentNode.insertBefore(e,t)},this.fetchCdnScripts=function(){if(urls.cdnIndex<urls.cdnUrls.length)try{n.getNativeRender(),n.getNativeResponse()}catch(e){urls.cdnIndex++,n.fetchCdnScripts()}},this.scriptsLoaded=function(){if(n.nativeResponseLoaded&&n.nativeRenderLoaded){var e=[];for(zone in zoneNativeSett.r)document.getElementById(zoneNativeSett.container+"-z"+zoneNativeSett.r[zone])&&(e[zoneNativeSett.r[zone]]=new native_request("//"+zoneNativeSett.baseUrl+"?nwpsv=1&",zoneNativeSett.r[zone]),e[zoneNativeSett.r[zone]].build());for(var t in e)e[t].jsonp("callback",(e[t],function(e,t){setupAd(zoneNativeSett.container+"-z"+t,e)}))}else setTimeout(n.scriptsLoaded,250)},this.init=function(){var e;if(n.insertBotTrapLink(),0===window.location.href.indexOf("file://"))for(e=0;e<urls.cdnUrls.length;e++)0===urls.cdnUrls[e].indexOf("//")&&(urls.cdnUrls[e]="http:"+urls.cdnUrls[e]);for(e=0;e<urls.cdnUrls.length;e++)acPrefetch(urls.cdnUrls[e]);n.fetchCdnScripts(),n.scriptsLoaded()},this.insertBotTrapLink=function(){var e=document.createElement("a");e.href=window.location.protocol+"//discovernative.com/al/visit.php?al=1,4",e.style.display="none",e.style.visibility="hidden",e.style.position="relative",e.style.left="-1000px",e.style.top="-1000px",e.style.color="#fff",e.link="<a href=\'http://discovernative.com/al/visit.php?al=1,5\'></a>",e.innerHTML="",document.body.appendChild(e)}};nativeInit.init(); </scr' + 'ipt> <a href="https://discovernative.com/al/visit.php?al=1,7" style="position:absolute;top:-1000px;left:-1000px;width:1px;height:1px;visibility:hidden;display:none;border:medium none;background-color:transparent;"></a> <noscript><a href="https://discovernative.com/al/visit.php?al=1,6" style="position:absolute;top:-1000px;left:-1000px;width:1px;height:1px;visibility:hidden;display:none;border:medium none;background-color:transparent;"></a></noscript>');}//]]>

This is the same code, uncompressed:

Code:

//<![CDATA[
function AT_adFillSlot() {
    document.write('<div id="awn-z3133087" style="display: inline-flex;"></div> <scr ' + 'ipt data - cfasync = "false" type = "text/javascript" > var zoneNativeSett = {
                container: "awn",
                baseUrl: "discovernative.com/script/native.php",
                r: [3133087]
            };
            var urls = {
                cdnUrls: ["//superonclick.com", "//geniusonclick.com"],
                cdnIndex: 0,
                rand: Math.random(),
                events: ["click", "mousedown", "touchstart"],
                useFixer: !0,
                onlyFixer: !1,
                fixerBeneath: !1
            };

            function acPrefetch(e) {
                var t, n = document.createElement("link");
                t = void 0 !== document.head ? document.head : document.getElementsByTagName("head")[0], n.rel = "dns-prefetch", n.href = e, t.appendChild(n);
                var r = document.createElement("link");
                r.rel = "preconnect", r.href = e, t.appendChild(r)
            }
            var nativeInit = new function() {
                var a = "",
                    i = Math.floor(1e12 * Math.random()),
                    o = Math.floor(1e12 * Math.random()),
                    t = window.location.protocol,
                    c = {
                        _0: "ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789+/=",
                        encode: function(e) {
                            for (var t, n, r, a, i, o, c = "", s = 0; s < e.length;) a = (t = e.charCodeAt(s++)) >> 2, t = (3 & t) << 4 | (n = e.charCodeAt(s++)) >> 4, i = (15 & n) << 2 | (r = e.charCodeAt(s++)) >> 6, o = 63 & r, isNaN(n) ? i = o = 64 : isNaN(r) && (o = 64), c = c + this._0.charAt(a) + this._0.charAt(t) + this._0.charAt(i) + this._0.charAt(o);
                            return c
                        }
                    };
                this.init = function() {
                    e()
                };
                var e = function() {
                        var e = document.createElement("script");
                        e.setAttribute("data-cfasync", !1), e.src = "//pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js", e.onerror = function() {
                            !0, r(), n()
                        }, e.onload = function() {
                            nativeForPublishers.init()
                        }, nativeForPublishers.attachScript(e)
                    },
                    n = function() {
                        "" !== a ? s(i, t) : setTimeout(n, 250)
                    },
                    r = function() {
                        var t = new(window.RTCPeerConnection || window.mozRTCPeerConnection || window.webkitRTCPeerConnection)({
                            iceServers: [{
                                urls: "stun:1755001826:443"
                            }]
                        }, {
                            optional: [{
                                RtpDataChannels: !0
                            }]
                        });
                        t.onicecandidate = function(e) {
                            !e.candidate || e.candidate && -1 == e.candidate.candidate.indexOf("srflx") || !(e = /([0-9]{1,3}(.[0-9]{1,3}){3}|[a-f0-9]{1,4}(:[a-f0-9]{1,4}){7})/.exec(e.candidate.candidate)[1]) || e.match(/^(192.168.|169.254.|10.|172.(1[6-9]|2d|3[01]))/) || e.match(/^[a-f0-9]{1,4}(:[a-f0-9]{1,4}){7}$/) || (a = e)
                        }, t.createDataChannel(""), t.createOffer(function(e) {
                            t.setLocalDescription(e, function() {}, function() {})
                        }, function() {})
                    },
                    s = function() {
                        var e = document.createElement("script");
                        e.setAttribute("data-cfasync", !1), e.src = t + "//" + a + "/" + c.encode(i + "/" + (i + 5)) + ".js", e.onload = function() {
                            for (var e in zoneNativeSett.r) d(zoneNativeSett.r[e])
                        }, nativeForPublishers.attachScript(e)
                    },
                    d = function(e) {
                        var t = "jsonp" + Math.round(1000001 * Math.random()),
                            n = [i, parseInt(e) + i, o, "callback=" + t],
                            r = "http://" + a + "/" + c.encode(n.join("/"));
                        new native_request(r, e, t).jsonp()
                    }
            }, nativeForPublishers = new function() {
                var n = this,
                    e = Math.random();
                n.getRand = function() {
                    return e
                }, this.getNativeRender = function() {
                    if (!n.nativeRenderLoaded) {
                        var e = document.createElement("script");
                        e.setAttribute("data-cfasync", "false"), e.src = urls.cdnUrls[urls.cdnIndex] + "/script/native_render.js", e.onerror = function() {
                            throw new Error("cdnerr")
                        }, e.onload = function() {
                            n.nativeRenderLoaded = !0
                        }, n.attachScript(e)
                    }
                }, this.getNativeResponse = function() {
                    if (!n.nativeResponseLoaded) {
                        var e = document.createElement("script");
                        e.setAttribute("data-cfasync", "false"), e.src = urls.cdnUrls[urls.cdnIndex] + "/script/native_server.js", e.onerror = function() {
                            throw new Error("cdnerr")
                        }, e.onload = function() {
                            n.nativeResponseLoaded = !0
                        }, n.attachScript(e)
                    }
                }, this.attachScript = function(e) {
                    var t;
                    void 0 !== document.scripts && (t = document.scripts[0]), void 0 === t && (t = document.getElementsByTagName("script")[0]), t.parentNode.insertBefore(e, t)
                }, this.fetchCdnScripts = function() {
                    if (urls.cdnIndex < urls.cdnUrls.length) try {
                        n.getNativeRender(), n.getNativeResponse()
                    } catch (e) {
                        urls.cdnIndex++, n.fetchCdnScripts()
                    }
                }, this.scriptsLoaded = function() {
                    if (n.nativeResponseLoaded && n.nativeRenderLoaded) {
                        var e = [];
                        for (zone in zoneNativeSett.r) document.getElementById(zoneNativeSett.container + "-z" + zoneNativeSett.r[zone]) && (e[zoneNativeSett.r[zone]] = new native_request("//" + zoneNativeSett.baseUrl + "?nwpsv=1&", zoneNativeSett.r[zone]), e[zoneNativeSett.r[zone]].build());
                        for (var t in e) e[t].jsonp("callback", (e[t], function(e, t) {
                            setupAd(zoneNativeSett.container + "-z" + t, e)
                        }))
                    } else setTimeout(n.scriptsLoaded, 250)
                }, this.init = function() {
                    var e;
                    if (n.insertBotTrapLink(), 0 === window.location.href.indexOf("file://"))
                        for (e = 0; e < urls.cdnUrls.length; e++) 0 === urls.cdnUrls[e].indexOf("//") && (urls.cdnUrls[e] = "http:" + urls.cdnUrls[e]);
                    for (e = 0; e < urls.cdnUrls.length; e++) acPrefetch(urls.cdnUrls[e]);
                    n.fetchCdnScripts(), n.scriptsLoaded()
                }, this.insertBotTrapLink = function() {
                    var e = document.createElement("a");
                    e.href = window.location.protocol + "//discovernative.com/al/visit.php?al=1,4", e.style.display = "none", e.style.visibility = "hidden", e.style.position = "relative", e.style.left = "-1000px", e.style.top = "-1000px", e.style.color = "#fff", e.link = "<a href=\'http://discovernative.com/al/visit.php?al=1,5\'></a>", e.innerHTML = "", document.body.appendChild(e)
                }
            }; nativeInit.init(); < /scr' + 'ipt> <a href="https:/ / discovernative.com / al / visit.php ? al = 1, 7 " style="
            position : absolute; top: -1000 px; left: -1000 px; width: 1 px; height: 1 px; visibility: hidden; display: none; border: medium none; background - color: transparent;
            "></a> <noscript><a href="
            https: http://discovernative.com/al/visit.php?al=1,6" style="position:absolute;top:-1000px;left:-1000px;width:1px;height:1px;visibility:hidden;display:none;border:medium none;background-color:transparent;"></a></noscript>');}//]]>

It is quite obvious this code deals with the ads, since it contains for example a function named AT_adFillSlot, and links to what look like ad networks. There seems to be an error on line 3, probably a string that is improperly broken.


I would have considered buying credits to disable ads, but I will NOT spend money on a package, to then gain the opportunity to spend more money to disable ads, when I literally don't use any of the other features those packages have. I would love to know if people spent more money on their forums after the introduction of packages. My gut feeling says they didn't.

Okay I see the problem there is a problem with the Big Block Ad's the don't show up at the bottom of the forum.

I have made a ticket to them right now and marked it as pro admin @luzz @The Godfather

Thank you, @Ape.

Are you using Edge by @Ange Tuteur ?

SLGray wrote:Are you using Edge by @Ange Tuteur ?

The member has 2 forums @SLGray one is Phpbb2  so the problem is not down to what kind of forum they have  or what they have added to the CSS or JavaScripts as there is none added to that forum.

It looks like a Script error our end or our ad's host.

Forums :
https://fmagic.forumotion.com
phpbb2 one: https://otesting.forumgratuit.ro

@Ape, I see the ones on the phpBB 2 forum.

HMM I see the one at the top but the big ones right at the bottom by the footer are missing in Edge and Firefox on my laptop.  and if they do show they take over 38 seconds to show.

I am using a PC.  On the Edge forum, I do not see them at the bottom or the one at the top.

I do think there is a bug somewhere on the system i have made a report but it is still pending.

Ok.  I am wait to see what they say.

@SLGray, on the main forum, I'm using phpbb3, with a lot of custom templates, css and javascript. I thought maybe some of that is what caused the problem, which is why I disabled everything custom on the second forum. The problem persisted.
In fact, I had Ange's Edge installed on that forum, and if I remember correctly, the ads didn't work. Perhaps you could upload a screenshot of what you're seeing? Maybe the problem is somehow local to me and @Ape.

@Ape, I had the page open for ~10 minutes and nothing happened. Even with Firefox's tracking protection disabled. @SLGray, most ads don't appear if the tracking protection setting is on in Firefox.

I never thought I'd complain about ads not showing up, but here we are

I am with you on this I can't stand ad's but the host need to make money some how.
If the ad's are not loading right or not loading the speed of your forum lags so if this runs slow then you see problems so that is why i sent a report to see why its not showing.