TFTS Online Store – Shop with TFTS and Amazon

1. Lars | September 25th, 2007 at 6:08 am
   

   It’s a shame, but I’ve finally reached my limit with TFTS.

   Amazon? Ugh.

   Apparently another victim of its own success, TFTS has recently been on a steep downward spiral into commercial vanilla-flavored sameness. I’ve been an enthusiastic daily reader for many months, but the removal of the fun product rating scale, addition of ad banners, and generally less interesting topics have all been bitter tasting. Now TFTS is shamelessly slinging the standard amazon junk that’s already available everywhere else???

   It’s reached the point of insult.
   I won’t be back.
   Sorry.

   I doubt I’m alone among readers in disappointment with the new direction(s) of the site.

2. Andrew Tingle | September 25th, 2007 at 12:48 pm
   

   Hi Lars,

   Thank you for offering your honest thoughts concerning TFTS. Even though they are extremely negative we never get much in the way of feedback so I genuinely appreciate that you took the time to offer your thoughts.

   Whilst your mind is obviously made up, which is fair enough, there are a few points you raised concerning the site that I would like to respond to – and I have opted to do this publicly in the interests of transparency. Also, as you chose to express your thoughts by means of a comment as opposed to our contact form, I can only assume that you wanted your concerns to be seen by all and I am happy to oblige in this respect as you have made a number of points that it is only right – as someone who cares passionately about this site – should be addressed fully and frankly.

   Firstly, whilst I have asked for reader feedback in the past little, if any, has been forthcoming so it has been enormously hard to gauge whether something is seen as being positive or negative. In fact, the voting system you cite is a very good example of this. I tried to get feedback as to whether people thought it was a good idea and got nowhere. Again, fair enough, but it does rather leave me stumbling around in the dark. Add to that that it was not being used very much at all in the scheme of things and that when I removed it not one person complained I decided that it was obviously not something people were interested in. (A fair enough assumption).

   Conversely, when I received feedback concerning providing a full feed I acted to put that in place immediately – and this remains in place to this day even though I know of a number of sites that are scraping our posts using this medium.

   As for the quality of the posts. Whilst I accept that of late these are obviously not to your tastes believe me I spend 5-6 hours a day/night looking for content that I hope will either be engaging or, at the very least, will raise an eyebrow. We have not gone down the route of posting about just anything quite in the same way as a number of sites have, Lars, though, at present, truly interesting items are hard to find (unless I just fire out items constantly sourced from other sites – period). The fact that we are sourced by the likes of Gizmodo and a wide range of very highly thought of sites on a constant basis is, I hope, testament at least to some of the work I put into finding unique material which I hope will be of interest. That said, one thing I learned very quickly from a previous popular site I ran a few years back is that you cannot please all the people all of the time.

   Still - the work I put into the site (which is very much a labour of love) very much serves as evidence of me trying to at least please some of the people some of the time and, in reality, one can not truly aspire to do more.

   Finally - the ads. If I were here trying solely to make a quick buck I would be producing a very differing site to this - and any owner of any tech site will affirm that, if money were the sole object, there are better serving subject areas out there. However, I run TFTS because I love gadgets and I genuinely love writing. That said, having had to move to a dedicated server of late has seen the cost of running TFTS escalate substantially and, as I am a contract worker – and I am presently awaiting my next contract - I have had to try to get the site to pay for itself. It really is either this or the site goes down on account of the fact that the hosting bills (and other associated bills) could not be met till I’m back in a contract again.

   I have, incidentally, had numerous requests to show all manner of ads which offered fairly decent money but I have rejected them on the grounds that they would not in anyway fit in with the site (casinos, credit/loans, companies sponsoring posts, the list goes on).

   Long term readers will know that we had an Amazon Store here quite some time ago which I removed when redesigning the site even though, judging by the sales, it was by no means unpopular. However, as costs rise, I have opted to bring the store back to try to take some of the financial burden off me at this time. However, in bringing back the store I do feel that I offered an honest introduction in my recent posting as to what is in it for me/TFTS which I knew would serve to steer a great many people away from using it because I felt that being honest to the site’s readers was of more importance. I can assure you that there are a great many sites out there that post about items and offer links through to product pages that gain from affiliation with all manner of stores and services but do not make this clear to the reader.

   Lars, whilst I appreciate that obviously you have found a great deal not to your tastes as far as TFTS is concerned of late, perhaps it would have helped if you had offered feedback prior to now rather than waiting until you wanted to vent as the doors are always open here and I am always happy to listen and take on board people’s opinions and, where possible, make changes. If you are annoyed that the voting has disappeared from TFTS you perhaps could have offered some feedback then (well over a month ago) but as neither you or anyone else seemed to miss it I (understandably) assumed that it was not a feature people especially liked (or, at best, people were not fussed either way).

   Whilst I accept the passionate response (passionately negative) received from you concerning the site – and I wholly respect your opinions – you surely cannot expect me to somehow know what you are feeling without a little heads up prior to you feeling ‘insulted’ (we’ll get to your use of this term in the next paragraph). It really would have been helpful if you had have engaged with me sooner in this respect.

   Whilst my response has been honest, respectful and cordial, I do take strong exception to the fact that you maintain that TFTS has insulted you in some way. This is a harsh term and I fail to understand its use in this context. Anyone who has mailed me from the contact form and those running other sites who know me would, I hope, confirm that I go out of my way to be both friendly, polite and helpful and that when I receive criticism I not only take it on board, but I learn what I can and move forward. To imply (though its rather more than mere implication) that TFTS insults its readers is a little below the belt, Lars, and, in all honesty, is not the best closure to an otherwise well reasoned and (certainly from the way you obviously see it) not unfounded critique.

   Also, personally I don’t see TFTS as being ‘vanilla-flavoured’ – if it were my wife might actually visit more often. But, in reality, harking back to a previous point, if the flavour is so insulting to you I wish you well in your quest to find a site flavoured to your tastes though, perhaps on this occasion, you’ll take the route of engaging with the site in question should it not meet with your tastes prior to finding it an insult – and duly serving up a comment to express your disdain.

   If, on the other hand, you would like to offer me some insight as to how TFTS could be improved (whilst still managing to pay for itself – harsh economics I’m afraid) I am more than happy to listen – as I always have been. The trouble is that, if nobody talks, there’s not a lot to hear.

   Take care and, once again, thank you not only for your feedback but also for the passionate regard you obviously (once) had for the site.

3. Mike Perth | September 25th, 2007 at 11:40 pm
   

   As a reader well away from the source of TFTS (Australia - can’t get that much further away!) I felt I should add a comment. Far too often I see around me only negative comments and moaning - rarely, very rarely, does anyone take the time to say ‘thank you’ nowadays. I feel the correspondent’s negative comments are made withour much thought as to how such a site can keep viable without some form of advertising or income? Does he reaaly think there are no overheads in running a site like TFTS? Where does he think free server and storage space can be found. Get real mate. Offended??? Heck, if something like TFTS offends you, then you must be a VERY sensitive blossom.

   As to “I doubt I’m alone among readers in disappointment with the new direction(s) of the site” all I can add is that I feel you are probably right (for once!) - I reckon you are very much alone in your feelings.

   Well done TFTS - your posts (for this reader at least!) are becoming more and more interesting and I do not need the ego boosting trip that your complaining reader needs in leaving his mark in a ‘fun product rating’. Lars - you get zero out of ten from me!

4. Fred Fredrickson | September 26th, 2007 at 8:05 am
   

   I just thought I’d add, I stumbled across this site.. I think literally from stumble upon. Since then, I’ve kept your RSS feed in my Feedreader, and enjoy the random toys and gadgets that you find. I personally would not be opposed to contributing in some way, be it finding a way to make the site more financially stable.

   I personally have my own website, with quite an opinion that usually angers most of my readers once or twice, but I find people are drawn to the discussion it creates. Anyhow, I found that since my content was interesting, I considered producing products that promoted my content. Cafepress, of course, is a great idea. Additionally, I’m writing on a book that I will sell on my site. I can’t tell you if I’ll even sell one copy (and honestly it’s because I’ve had a life-long goal of writing a book), but I can see a book called the top 100 gadgets of 2006 or 2007 being a fun gift purchase. And of course, most of the content would need to be new.. but you get the idea. Contact me some time.

5. Andrew Tingle | September 26th, 2007 at 9:57 am
   

   Hi Mike and Fred,

   Thank you both for your kind feedback - its very much appreciated.

   I am glad you both still find TFTS an enjoyable experience.

   And the best of luck with your book, Fred (TFTS is not under any threat due to my circumstances thanks to it helping to keep itself, so to speak. But your offer is most kind, nonetheless )

   I was thinking of Cafe Express at one point but have never got round to it as it takes time away from time I need to spend searching for content, producing post images and reading up on developments in blogging/site design so that I don’t miss something that could serve to make TFTS a more enjoyable experience (you know how it is)).

   Thank you both for taking the time to add comments here . Most kind.

6. Teckrieg | September 26th, 2007 at 4:01 pm
   

   Hey Andrew,

   Nice face life you’ve got here. Glad to see your site up and running once again after the run in with your shared server as one of my blogger friend got stuck into the mess of server overload just a day ago.

   As a fellow site owner, I can understand the time and cost of managing one and I really can’t see the issue of having ads or even an amazon store within the site.

   The most critical thing to consider in this case is that whatever ads that were displayed here, reading experience was never really threaten as it never got in the way of the articles unlike some other sites where the ads are paste right in the middle of the post.

   Hack, I don’t even recall any blatant instances of Andrew directing the readers to the ads. If you’re interested in the ad, you can find out more, if not, you can always leave it alone.

   In an all perfect world, we would love to have an “ads free site” but at the end of the day, there’s mouths to feed and bills to pay.

   If the above is not a requirement,is it even too much for someone who put in time and effort to delivery valuable stuffs to seek a little extra revenue?

   I highly doubt that there will be a high number of readers who will find the ads “insulting” as any readers who value quality stuff will definitely have no objections as to how the site is being lay out.

   Anyway, keep up the good work here Andrew

7. Andrew Tingle | September 26th, 2007 at 10:59 pm
   

   Teckrieg,

   Thanks for your kind comments and your support.

   The only banner I’m showing - apart from the one for e-Potpourri (which is another one of my sites anyway) is for the store at the bottom of posts (just above the comments) which, in fairness, most readers won’t even see (If it was an ad from an external advertiser they’d quite rightly be asking for their money back - lol).

   Incidentally, I did email my full response to Lars but there’s been no reply. Make of that what you will.

8. Veridiana Serpa | September 27th, 2007 at 3:54 am
   

   Andrew, as always you are so polite with your readers and I know that it´s really hard to find good stuff to post and to be at least a little different from other blogs, I really don´t understand how TFTS “reached the point of insult.” for a reader. You do a great job here and I only wish you keep always this way…
   Take care

9. Al Carlton | September 30th, 2007 at 6:40 am
   

   Being another gadget site owner I follow a lot of blogs and consider TFTS to be one the best and personal favourites. Everybody is entitled to their opinions but if you hate seeing ads on websites either get an ad blocker or stop browsing the net.

   You’re doing a great job here Andrew and show way my patience and understanding to the the criticism than I would.

10. Andrew Tingle | September 30th, 2007 at 10:19 pm
    

    Al - many thanks for your lovely comments concerning TFTS (very much appreciated - and from a site such as Coolest Gadgets, a compliment indeed).

    Thank you, Al

Add Your Comment