Here is the original FB post from the first thread (thanks to reustle for copying it and posting it in the comments of the first thread):
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Hey everyone, we're going to be deleting our Facebook page in the next couple of weeks, but we wanted to explain why before we do. A couple months ago, when we were preparing to launch the new Limited Run, we started to experiment with Facebook ads. Unfortunately, while testing their ad system, we noticed some very strange things. Facebook was charging us for clicks, yet we could only verify about 20% of them actually showing up on our site. At first, we thought it was our analytics service. We tried signing up for a handful of other big name companies, and still, we couldn't verify more than 15-20% of clicks. So we did what any good developers would do. We built our own analytic software. Here's what we found: on about 80% of the clicks Facebook was charging us for, JavaScript wasn't on. And if the person clicking the ad doesn't have JavaScript, it's very difficult for an analytics service to verify the click. What's important here is that in all of our years of experience, only about 1-2% of people coming to us have JavaScript disabled, not 80% like these clicks coming from Facebook. So we did what any good developers would do. We built a page logger. Any time a page was loaded, we'd keep track of it. You know what we found? The 80% of clicks we were paying for were from bots. That's correct. Bots were loading pages and driving up our advertising costs. So we tried contacting Facebook about this. Unfortunately, they wouldn't reply. Do we know who the bots belong too? No. Are we accusing Facebook of using bots to drive up advertising revenue. No. Is it strange? Yes. But let's move on, because who the bots belong to isn't provable.
While we were testing Facebook ads, we were also trying to get Facebook to let us change our name, because we're not Limited Pressing anymore. We contacted them on many occasions about this. Finally, we got a call from someone at Facebook. They said they would allow us to change our name. NICE! But only if we agreed to spend $2000 or more in advertising a month. That's correct. Facebook was holding our name hostage. So we did what any good hardcore kids would do. We cursed that piece of shit out! Damn we were so pissed. We still are. This is why we need to delete this page and move away from Facebook. They're scumbags and we just don't have the patience for scumbags.
Thanks to everyone who has supported this page and liked our posts. We really appreciate it. If you'd like to follow us on Twitter, where we don't get shaken down, you can do so here: http://twitter.com/limitedrun
"We built our own analytic software." "We built a page logger."
wat.
Seriously, doesn't any use the technology that was given to them in the late 90s? Apache write log files. Open source packages analyze these log files. If your web server can't write compatible log files, you have a problem. If the code you are writing can't tell it's being run or that all its parts aren't being loaded, you have a problem. Don't want to go with log files? Fine, have each of your page scripts dump a row into a database table. This sorta reaches back to a comment I had about web security - why is "analytics" a non-solved problem on your server such that you need Google (et al.) to do the job for you?
Then there's these web stacks/frameworks that think they have to re-invent the web server. But that's another peeve for another thread.
eh, I enjoy a good "Damn kids!" rant as much as the next guy; And really, complaining about how kids today don't know all the basic tools we had in the '90s is about as newsworthy as complaining about click fraud on facebook.
Yes. Because Knowing Your Tools gets you to "zomg click fraud" a helluva lot faster than "wtf? analyze. wtf? write my own analyze! wtf? oh, write logging!!"
Additionally, how does that leap of logic make sense? They're no longer keeping a presence on Facebook Pages in protest of Facebook Ads, but they're proud of Twitter by comparison simply because Twitter doesn't offer a comparable advertising service at all? Who is to say that, if Twitter did offer a similar ad platform, that it wouldn't yield the same results?
The fact that there's not much of a basis of comparison between the ad services, and the fact that he used the term "shaken down", makes it pretty obvious that he's referring to the part where he tried to transfer his page to a different name and Facebook asked for a higher ad spend in return.
it probably wouldn't change at all, given that twitter's recent changes have had exactly zero impact on the average twitter user. Limited Run is not a twitter client developer.
I too find it very odd that Facebook would require a startup to spend more money with them in order to change their page name. It just doesn't seem right.
They know the gig is up and their ad platform is not as great as anyone thought it would be so now they're trying to get it while the getting is still good? My theory at least.
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Hey everyone, we're going to be deleting our Facebook page in the next couple of weeks, but we wanted to explain why before we do. A couple months ago, when we were preparing to launch the new Limited Run, we started to experiment with Facebook ads. Unfortunately, while testing their ad system, we noticed some very strange things. Facebook was charging us for clicks, yet we could only verify about 20% of them actually showing up on our site. At first, we thought it was our analytics service. We tried signing up for a handful of other big name companies, and still, we couldn't verify more than 15-20% of clicks. So we did what any good developers would do. We built our own analytic software. Here's what we found: on about 80% of the clicks Facebook was charging us for, JavaScript wasn't on. And if the person clicking the ad doesn't have JavaScript, it's very difficult for an analytics service to verify the click. What's important here is that in all of our years of experience, only about 1-2% of people coming to us have JavaScript disabled, not 80% like these clicks coming from Facebook. So we did what any good developers would do. We built a page logger. Any time a page was loaded, we'd keep track of it. You know what we found? The 80% of clicks we were paying for were from bots. That's correct. Bots were loading pages and driving up our advertising costs. So we tried contacting Facebook about this. Unfortunately, they wouldn't reply. Do we know who the bots belong too? No. Are we accusing Facebook of using bots to drive up advertising revenue. No. Is it strange? Yes. But let's move on, because who the bots belong to isn't provable. While we were testing Facebook ads, we were also trying to get Facebook to let us change our name, because we're not Limited Pressing anymore. We contacted them on many occasions about this. Finally, we got a call from someone at Facebook. They said they would allow us to change our name. NICE! But only if we agreed to spend $2000 or more in advertising a month. That's correct. Facebook was holding our name hostage. So we did what any good hardcore kids would do. We cursed that piece of shit out! Damn we were so pissed. We still are. This is why we need to delete this page and move away from Facebook. They're scumbags and we just don't have the patience for scumbags. Thanks to everyone who has supported this page and liked our posts. We really appreciate it. If you'd like to follow us on Twitter, where we don't get shaken down, you can do so here: http://twitter.com/limitedrun