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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.

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 :-)