I figured it out. Very easy! Thanks. You should see the changes in a sec.

Hi Chief,

I agree with the decision of judging whether posts to forum links are appropriate or not. Some links that I've seen should probably be allowed because I feel they may be helpful to the users.

But it looks like you figured it out without my link. In that case, I don't have to repost it!

P.S. Are you going to respond to my PM?

Im not following what you guys are saying? Are link to other Forums not allowed? And what if the site we won is a forum? Arggh, I seem to be lost.

Originally posted by Darkfire001
Im not following what you guys are saying? Are link to other Forums not allowed?

That's correct. You are not allowed to link to competitor forums from Webmaster-Talk. However, the moderators are currently considering this decision.

And what if the site we won is a forum?

Now you've lost me. Could you explain what you mean by "winning" a forum?

I think one of the main purposes of this forum as well any for that matter is to build community HERE. If people want to find other forums, it's not too difficult. Search on Google.

I like the idea of having links in the signature as long as they are appropriate.

I think it's a good policy for a moderator to send a private email to the person whose post or signature they are editing, rather than responding openly. This tends to reduce emotion levels and keep things positive. Something like:
"Sorry, we had to remove the link in your post. We really appreciate your comments in the forums. Hope you'll understand."

The trick or technique the thread starter pointed out is pretty good, but can be abused by people posting topics that makes no sense just to get exposure of their signature. I do agree though, that when used wisely, you can get "free" exposure monetary wise for your site through your signature.

Hi abctracker,

I agree with you. I've been on many forums, and I have seen major abuses of the privilege. The old technique was spamming, but soon, the spammers figured out that they lost exposure when moderators deleted their posts and banned them. So they resorted to posting nonsense like "lol" or "yeah". And unfortunately, many boards haven't figured out to delete those types of messages. However, by making quality posts, you gives users more trust, and I feel that the overall benefit is rewarding.

Originally posted by conkermaniac
However, by making quality posts, you gives users more trust, and I feel that the overall benefit is rewarding.

**Dave says heartfelt, "Amen!"**

I agree the quality, meaningful posts will build up more trust and can really be beneficial to your site, your business, and even your friendship!

Dave

quality is what the web should be about. sadly it has fallen into quantity. getting hundreds of links on guestbooks, message boards, even in unrelated forums seems to be the name of the game, its sad but true.
gone are the days that never arose where webmasters linked to other sites purely because they thought they were of good content. now it is an eternal struggle to keep people on your site, make them return, and keep them away from competitors. the web has become a business, a giant business, rather than a pool of information that is freely available for all to tap.
and while yes, some need to make a living, many many others charge ridiculous prices for advertising that doesn't deliver, hosting that goes down, submission and optomisation that never live up to expected standards.
the internet is now about visibility in a dark street. you can stay in the dark and hope that some day, some how, someone will stumble across you as you stand there, and stop to say hello. otherwise, you pay lots of money so that you can stand under a search engine street lamp, so that people can see you and know you're there. its an eternal battle of cost against gain.

Well as you can see I have yet to put a link to my site in my Sig up until now, But seeing as how I just got hold of the news that PHPBB is very unfreindly to search engines like google, I must put it in, in a sad attempt to boost my google ranking. LOL, Even sadder is the fact that this might not even help as this has very little to do with Gaming, but then again itis a messageboard too. Also who ever mentioned gaming messageboards are a bad place to post links to websites is certainly right. I have a gaming related site and recieve nearly 0 traffic from those sites. What I found best is a merchant account with surf-bar site such as cashfiesta. I have sort of given up on putting my link in my signatures unless I do it moment I join. In this case it is because my user panel hasnt been working for like a couple days and too lazy to find out why.