LOL, very well put. This paid stuff really kills the overall potential of LV. One of the key factors that makes a link/ad network successful is the number of sites it includes. I haven't seen a LV affiliate ID over 2,000, and I'm sure a lot of the signups aren't actually active in the program. How's asking people to pay going to help this # increase? Requiring people to pay for basic functionality does two things IMO: 1) Stunts/reverses growth of the network. 2) Opens the door for competition. I'm still on the fence - I'm going to see hwo things shake out over the next week or so before I decide if I'll continue in the LV network. I was contemplaying leaving before, this may very well be the deciding point for me.
Having posted and read this forum all day I am personaly aware of 10 other webmasters ( with whom I work ) who are considering pulling link valut code from their sites over the weekend. I agree with the point above regarding the number of new sign-ups slowing down if the charges come in to place. I also think "paypal" looks bad due to their refund record. Regards Eddie
The problem is that there aren't enough new members to replace those leaving. It becomes exponential. As more people leave and there are less sites, it makes more people leave, etc. The Coop survived when a lot of people left for LV because there is a steady stream of new signups. I've noticed the majority of my refferals that disappeared when LV was announced have come back in the last few weeks.
Exactly. A lot of people that join the coop don't know much at all, if anything, about SEO. The find it through the SE's while looking for ways to advertise. In other words, the coop has a very diverse user base. From what I can tell LV doesn't have the privlage of holding top spots in the serps for advertising related search queries....they have been growing due to word of mouth from within the webmaster community. I think their recent change is slap in the face to the community that helped them get as big as they are and will be looked back upon as the first step that sent LV into oblivion.
The list of paid features has been changed so that you get just about the same as you used to with the free account. Seems fair enough to me now. If you want the extra features then I see no reason why no to charge for them.