Verified affiliate programs/representatives

THE Bull

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Since the leading management of WJunction forum (@JR, @Tango, and @M) said that there will be some changes on the forum, I'd like to suggest the first one regarding affiliate representatives.

There is a countless number of affiliate representatives active here, on WJunction, which ease webmasters to receive some 1st-hand support from them. You've recognized a need for sticking out the affiliate representatives with proper rank, but I believe there is also a need for good moderation on those threads (file hosting, image hosting, URL shortener, etc) threads.

Why?

Since I am new to the forum, I've been doing some research on affiliate programs here, and find out that many of them claim that they have several fraud detection methods, and with those in place, they're identifying and banning WJ users for fraudulent activities on their accounts. And that's great, they should protect their business.

But what worries me is that many of those affiliate owners are also doing some unethical activities, and some of them are:

- Banning users due to low-quality traffic, while they're not explicitly mentioning those rules in their ToS, or here, in their advertising thread.
- Falsely advertising affiliate revenue model, by using third-party tools to "shave" actual revenue from their users, while claiming to have none of those tools active (to be precise, picbaron and all affiliated sites with them have those in place, publicly admitting on a local forum, which you may find here, on the first post), and probably others as well. This also is rugged by the "adblock detection algorithm", while insufficient proof is shown that there is any.
- Running away with the webmaster's cash.

While the first two are not reasons to ban affiliate, I believe there should be an option to differentiate fully transparent affiliate programs from unethical ones. And I believe that solution for those would be a "Verified" Badge for the affiliate thread or for the affiliate representative. If affiliate representatives are interested in providing some level of transparency to the moderator here on WJ in order to show all of their members that they're indeed running a clean affiliate model, they can initiate verification with that moderator.

Outcome? Fewer people screaming "scam" or "shaving" to the honest affiliate representatives and recognition to those as well.

I'd like to open a discussion for this, so please let me know if you would like to see something like this on WJ, and also if the staff is interested to implement something like that in the future.

Moocheers! :cow:
 
25 comments
Corporate Membership may have a different tier to it but.. we are discussing it but good to have a thread to see what members think

Lets look at Google as an example.. they used different methodologies to be Google and when you join AdSense it states ads should clearly be differentiated and noticeable that it’s ads but if you go to their email service or search sometimes some of their ads are not differentiated but guess what Google is Google nobody can compete with it

cheating is not right but cheating is only cheating if one states in their rules it is cheating

Y knows a better method to milk a cow a quicker one but it may harm the cow in the long term but this would make Y rich quickly what will Y do or really what SHOULD Y continue to do that is more better for cows
 
There's one slight difference:
- I advertise up to $10/1000 views or $50/1000 downloads;
- I add a plugin that actually counts 70% of unique traffic instead of 100%;
- I never mention that I do take 30% of traffic just for myself and my profit-justification;
- I don't cheat, I steal

I have no problem with those affiliates using any sort of shady techniques nor I am imposer of rules here, or anywhere else, but in case I do, I would not like to see any user-misleading information for my users. Many of them justify here "we have an advanced algorithm that identifies low-quality traffic or adblock detection", but why don't they implement a reporting method for invalid traffic as well for their customers?

Simple answer - they can't. There is no advanced algorithm available in their system, it's just misleading information so they could retain "reliable affiliate manager" status here.

Looking at every affiliate thread here on WJ, you may see numbers of inflammatory posts like "this affiliate is scamming users" or this "they using shaving mod", even for the affiliates that don't have such thing, and this is a byproduct of those affiliates that do have those techniques.

Corporate Membership rank is completely valid here - it differentiates managers of those affiliate programs and identifies them to the affiliates, so I am not proposing the changes on such. But instead, I am proposing to implement some sort of "verification", where users are indeed interested in taking place on that affiliate program because it does count every legal traffic, it proves that there is a valid ad-blocking detection method and doesn't steal from users.
 
We will be introducing a verified version of the Corporate Membership soon.

Corporate Membership currently includes;
  1. Web hosts
  2. File hosts
  3. Image hosts
  4. Other businesses (exchangers, URL shortener etc.)
We (management and staff) will be discussing the proposed requirements with our veterans. If members would like to chip in on what the requirements should be for the verified group, then by all means do by replying to this thread.

We have a tremendous amount planned for WJunction and will be introducing changes in stages.
 
Hey.
I am of the opinion that an affiliate should also comment on this and since my thread is one of the most active here I would like to give my opinion on this topic.

First of all, I would like to comment on Cow's statements. Of course there are algorithms that can recognize whether the traffic comes from VPN / proxies which is then not counted. The problem I see is that we (streamtape) generally do not count VPN / proxy traffic, but other hosts count them and only say it when users request a payout that it is VPN traffic and is therefore not paid. Here I can understand users if it is not clearly described in the ToS. Another point is of course there are black sheep in the file / video hosting scene. But if I had made a list how many users have already tried to generate views with faketraffic, I would probably be at 100+.

What do I want to say of course you should protect the user from fraud but you should also take into account the video host and filehost. My way would be if there are clear complaints a staff member should get the logs of how the traffic of the user looked like if it is actually fake traffic there shouldnt be a problem with sharing this. I would be cautious here personally, because I don't want to give any staff member the user's logs. Here I see @JR, @M or @Hyperz as trustworthy members who could check this.

Of course, Wjunction is an important step for any host to get as much attention as possible in the beginning. But you shouldn't forget that well known hosts don't necessarily need Wjunction and can also provide support via group chats or their own board. Therefore you shouldn't drive out hosts who were always fair to Wjunction. I don't want to compile any statistics, but I'm sure that 50% of the users are here because of the support threads

And what I also don't like is that hosts are allowed that start with one or two servers here. It's only a matter of time before they run away with the users' money. Whoever starts a file or video host should have at least 20-50k budget in servers or money in any form.

Maybe you should also take feedback from existing hosts more seriously if we warn you that this host does not look professional but more like a hobby project without security you should check this host one more time or ask a few more questions about it :).

Nevertheless, I see the forum as an important exchange place for the user and the actual service.
 
I personally do not believe that WJunction should intervene on what a business should and should not do.

Yes, the forum should introduce a set of forum rules that busineses should follow but the forum should not get involved in events that it has no jurisdiction.

The forum provides a platform for members whether they are business users, business owners, webmasters, members that wish to learn etc.
 
I agree with @Streamtape, To make it simple you should do away with "Corporate Membership" and instead incorporate a "Verified" group (maybe in dark green) for all serious well established and long standing web hosts, video / file hosts, url shorteners etc and leave non-verified with no group in which "Verified" members can discuss in private who can become verified only when staff brings a business to their attention.

This will do away with all the scammy business' and ones which do well to start with but eventually break down.

I don't agree with @Streamtape 's point about well known hosts don't necessarily need WJ. Yes hosts can come up with alternative ways to support their users i.e their own forum board but this will not be trusted by users.

If Clipwatching or Evoload done this do you seriously think users will be active there. They will come here as it's run by third parties and is more trusted.
 
I personally do not believe that WJunction should intervene on what a business should and should not do.

Yes, the forum should introduce a set of forum rules that busineses should follow but the forum should not get involved in events that it has no jurisdiction.

The forum provides a platform for members whether they are business users, business owners, webmasters, members that wish to learn etc.
Yes
 
I agree with some of @Streamtape and @Kind's arguments. If someone starts a host with virtually no budget you know that it's probably not going to be around for very long. I agree that WJ shouldn't dictate how hosts do business, but I do think there should be requirements, and repercussions for actual scams. While hosts might not technically need WJ, without it they lose a lot of credibility. At least in my view. If I were running a site and looking for a host, there's no way I'd pick one that doesn't have a WJ presence for obvious reasons. WJ acts as a 3rd party that helps keep hosts and their users honest (to a certain degree anyway).

The issue, IMO, has always been a lack of transparency. Lots of people assume scamming or stats shaving when they see a dip in their views. I think this would be less of an issue with more transparant stats. By this I mean things like more detailed stats (views for every source/referer, stats of uncounted views, etc. The same info the host has access to). If a user submits links to 10 sites for example, and one goes down overnight without the uploader noticing, he'll wake up to a drop in views, have no way of knowing why, and jump to the wrong conclusion. And TBH you can't really blame them if you look at the amount of hosts that exit-scammed or w/e.
 
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registered for 6 months like we had before
business open for atleast 1+ years..
clear tos on their website.?
Im with Santa on this, clean, simple and to the point . They should have a established site , plan, terms , and with transparency to all stats like Hyperz stated. WJ cannot dictate what they do elsewhere , only what they do here.
 
Sorry @Peekabo(o), but saying that WJunction should not intervene in how adult hosts operate is the same as saying Google should not intervene with advertisement review and allow anything and everything to advertise in their network.

To put it simply - WJunction is a go-to forum for:
- advertising file hosting business
- -||- image hosting business
- advertising affiliate programs and
- ad networks

basically, because there is a lot of silent webmasters who are here for the sole purpose of finding the best place to store files, images, to join the best CPA/CPS or ad network that will provide major revenue apart from the current one.

I love decentralization, but in order to keep this forum clean and trustworthy source, there should be some requirements for advertising such businesses. Even budget-wise requirements should also be considered as one of the requirements.

There are too many flies by night affiliate hosts added from the same guy who ran away with his previous affiliate programs (not sure if he advertised them here) and apart from him, others too. Basically, there's now an affiliate program for running an affiliate image site created by PicBaron (also known as the operator of imageteam, damimage, imgstudio) and his "expertise" in this field is advertising "easy money generated" for many people on the local forum. And not only him, but others as well.

If you cannot justify that you have a starting capital, you shouldn't be able to advertise, to put it simply. This budget justification could be verified by either providing proof of funds or simply paying either a "refundable" or "non-refundable" deposit.

Of course, all of this wouldn't be closely true to verify the good faith and belief of the affiliate manager but would close down the opportunity for tricksters.


@Streamtape - You have a good point on taking affiliate managers into account but not before your users. WJunction relies on users first, later on, affiliate representatives. If (for example) I, as board manager, allows any kind of hosts to use my members for their profit and not verify them accordingly, then I am not putting the interests of those members first. I must say that WJ did a pretty good job on that front, protecting users, but that's mostly after incidents occurred. There needs to be a proper identification system to avoid those incidents. Same as you have a traffic detection system. Why would you not let VPN's to be counted for? The same goes for why would WJunction allow numerous affiliates to be advertised.

And for that reason, I would go on deposit requirement, and that would be either one lumpsum payment, refundable, or some type of subscription, non-refundable. Even before that subscription, there should be verification in place. Many would say that it would scare many affiliate representatives and run away, but if you're bold enough to get half of your traffic from WJ webmasters, be thankful enough to contribute to the forum.

You know why many of the major file hosts have representatives here, even though they (in some terms outgrew) WJunction webmaster base? Because this is a GO-TO forum for such affiliates, and having a negative reputation here - you're lost in the file-hosting business.

Google "affiliate file hosts" and you'll understand.

@Santa - I am not sure if this is an appropriate way for verifying one of the biggest farmers who (in some terms) milk out Wjunction.


Anyways, these are only my humble mooopinions and it doesn't mean it's the right thing to do :)
 
I think you’re fighting a battle that can’t be won. In order to have drastic change you must make drastic changes.

WJ isn’t the first website to encounter this issue. It’s been solved many times before. You just have to decide on whether you are willing to accept that the size of traffic will most likely reduce and in return aim for a gain in traffic quality.
 
You have to ask yourself: what is wjunction? Is it a “safe haven” for illegal websites, illegal or underhand activity, and any other topic surrounding that “grey area” or is it aiming at legitimate startups and established businesses with genuine lawful and legal goals?

If it’s the former, then you can’t complain that people running these setups are acting like the people you’re happy to attract. What did you expect?

If it’s the latter, there’s a lot of cleaning up to do. And a lot of continued effort to push that ethos.
 
@Streamtape - You have a good point on taking affiliate managers into account but not before your users. WJunction relies on users first, later on, affiliate representatives. If (for example) I, as board manager, allows any kind of hosts to use my members for their profit and not verify them accordingly, then I am not putting the interests of those members first. I must say that WJ did a pretty good job on that front, protecting users, but that's mostly after incidents occurred. There needs to be a proper identification system to avoid those incidents. Same as you have a traffic detection system. Why would you not let VPN's to be counted for? The same goes for why would WJunction allow numerous affiliates to be advertised.

And for that reason, I would go on deposit requirement, and that would be either one lumpsum payment, refundable, or some type of subscription, non-refundable. Even before that subscription, there should be verification in place. Many would say that it would scare many affiliate representatives and run away, but if you're bold enough to get half of your traffic from WJ webmasters, be thankful enough to contribute to the forum.

You know why many of the major file hosts have representatives here, even though they (in some terms outgrew) WJunction webmaster base? Because this is a GO-TO forum for such affiliates, and having a negative reputation here - you're lost in the file-hosting business.

Google "affiliate file hosts" and you'll understand.

Proxy/VPN traffic wont be counted from the most adnetworks and if they count it you get usually a far less good rate compared to non proxy/vpn traffic which is not possible to pay users for it if you add servers and other costs to it.

And again just to give you an example hosts like fembed,dood or mystream are not here and still on every big content site. Wjunction is a great tool for the start but if you reach a size you dont need it anymore. You wont lose and wont gain more users with wjunction at our size. What i give you is that you have an direct contact with users which already trust this board.

In the end i want to stay on wjunction to give my users as many places as possible to interact with us. But if i ever leave wjunction my service will still run and get the same growth without it.

But we talk about an ,,underground" board not everything will be here legit. And if you want that you are probably in the wrong board.
 
Sorry, but that's exactly my point.

The number of starters/runners ratio here on WJ is pretty great. What would happen if you've been started Streamtape and at some point, due to your lack of finance management, had to run away?

If WJunction was your stepping stone, all I can say to you is you will not be thankful to this community for leaving it.

And another point from those you've mentioned above - I'm pretty sure I am familiar with one of the founders from those you've mentioned and he is already running community-related to his traffic from which he is gaining such traction, so WJ was not needed for him just so he could start.

Have you been able, or many other WJ-present file hosts been able to gain an audience at the very beginning without WJunction webmasters? I don't think so.
 
Sorry, but that's exactly my point.

The number of starters/runners ratio here on WJ is pretty great. What would happen if you've been started Streamtape and at some point, due to your lack of finance management, had to run away?

If WJunction was your stepping stone, all I can say to you is you will not be thankful to this community for leaving it.

And another point from those you've mentioned above - I'm pretty sure I am familiar with one of the founders from those you've mentioned and he is already running community-related to his traffic from which he is gaining such traction, so WJ was not needed for him just so he could start.

Have you been able, or many other WJ-present file hosts been able to gain an audience at the very beginning without WJunction webmasters? I don't think so.

Okay lets go your route.

Lets imagine every host would have to do an KYC like we have to do in an bank. I invite @JR to a nice cafe and hes asking me questions etc (and we fall in love). Of course this was an hyperbole and wjunction already has the right steps in place to collect information about the affiliates here.

Wjunction gave me an place to advertise my service where i gained traffic from. Now i give wjunction traffic because some people just come to this board to ask question in my support thread. How long do i owe something to wjunction because they helped me in the start? Or even a better case what if i would paid wjunction from the start for a sticky thread and ads? I dont think im part of this community like a normal user is. Im just here to get feedback from my users and write some annoucement whats happening atm with my service.

Im not here to be anybodies friend. Im here to help users who are using my service. Of course i will from time to time help some people here but i would although be fine just to interact in my thread and ignore everything else.

And if you really think you could stop scamming with harder rules / backgrounds check i think i have to disappoint you (take a look at wirecard ;) ). If anyone wants to scam users there will be always a way to do it even with wjunction.
 
First and foremost, you need to understand the difference between Know Your Customer and advertising control, so I wouldn't bother engaging in that conversation.

Second of all, YOU came to this forum to START with your service, probably with minimal BUDGET and once you've jumpstarted it, you no longer require WJunction? Yep, you're right, you don't require it, but out of respect to all webmasters that helped you get that jumpstart, provide some valuable content in return.


And I am sorry if I am being a bit nervous here, but you're the exact "dump" I would like to get rid of from the very beginning - those that care only about their F-ING asses and don't give a F-K how did they come to that place.

Lord, forgive me (JR, M, and others too).

End of the discussion with you, you've successfully come to my "dump list" here, not that you care :cow:
 
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First and foremost, you need to understand the difference between Know Your Customer and advertising control, so I wouldn't bother engaging in that conversation.

Second of all, YOU came to this forum to START with your service, probably with minimal BUDGET and once you've jumpstarted it, you no longer require WJunction? Yep, you're right, you don't require it, but out of respect to all webmasters that helped you get that jumpstart, provide some valuable content in return.


And I am sorry if I am being a bit nervous here, but you're the exact "dump" I would like to get rid of from the very beginning - those that care only about their F-ING asses and don't give a F-K how did they come to that place.

Lord, forgive me (JR, M, and others too).

End of the discussion with you, you've successfully come to my "dump list" here, not that you care :cow:

Both of your assumptions are wrong i didnt start with minimal budget and i know the difference.

You asked for opinions and you got them. Most of them were against your opinion which are not from f-ing asses like me (your words)
If you ask me you try to be the white knight because with your changes everything is perfect. There will be no scam and its the fault of the bad filehosts/videohosts.
Maybe have a well known service first with a lot of feedback from your beloved wjunction community before you try to teach me any basics how to run a business.

I came not in this thread to get offended by an clown like you. I actually tried to give you my opinion in the best way i could. Normally i dont take part in discussions like that (got reminded again why).

To make it short @JR you are free to delete my posts if you think they dont give anything meaningful to this discussion thats my last post in that thread. Good luck with changing the internet and the world (this is not an barn little tip)
 
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