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Decline Links to GOG embedded with adtraction.com

racofer

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As I reported here: https://rpgcodex.net/forums/threads/gog-com.69065/page-484#post-7544439

^
they still gained some dosh in the meantime

https://af.gog.com/partner/scummvm?as=1649904300

Some SCUMMs for sale

Weekend sale, feat. Street Fighter Alpha, Mortal Kombat, Hotline Miami, etc: https://af.gog.com/promo/20211008_weekend_sale?as=1649904300

What is going on with GOG links on the Codex? They are all embedded with an adtraction URL since these last few days, e.g., from the above links translates to:

https://track.adtraction.com/t/t?a=1578845458&as=1649904300&t=2&tk=1&cl=1&atag=1&at_gd=5D12955C7F7FBD61DABBA066F8B51BDBE4D5740F&url=https://www.gog.com/promo/20211008_weekend_sale

upon clicking.

uBlock Origin is rightfully denying access to any links

IuVzVZp.png


I have checked links from a few pages back when this wasn't an issue and now everything linking from the Codex to GOG comes with this shit.

uBlock Origin and Brave adblocker are rightfully blocking this. This wasn't an issue until a few days ago, but now every link posted here to GOG comes with this crap.
 
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Taluntain

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There is no "trackerware", please stop the drama generators. Until we can mass replace all the old GOG affiliate links, I've installed the official script from AdTraction (which is now handling the GOG affiliate system), that affiliates the old GOG links, which would otherwise not register Codex sales any more.

The script doesn't do anything else besides affiliating the old GOG links on the fly, so you can safely exempt it in any overzealous blocker list. So please stop posting ways of blocking it, as you're not blocking anything malicious. After I mass replace all the old affiliate links, the script will be removed as it will no longer be needed.
 
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Rean

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Infi has deleted the posts that show how to stop these redirects, why bubba? Redirects are not good practice.

edit: it was someone else :nocountryforshitposters:
 
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There is no "trackerware", please stop the drama generators. Until we can mass replace all the old GOG affiliate links, I've installed the official script from AdTraction (which is now handling the GOG affiliate system), that affiliates the old GOG links, which would otherwise not register Codex sales any more.

The script doesn't do anything else besides affiliating the old GOG links on the fly, so you can safely exempt it in any overzealous blocker list. So please stop posting way of blocking it, as you're not blocking anything malicious. After I mass replace all the old affiliate links, the script will be removed as it will no longer be needed.
maybe you guys should reconsider taking Brave cryptoshekels
https://rpgcodex.net/forums/threads/accept-brave-bucks.132518/
 

Taluntain

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Infi has deleted the posts that show how to stop these redirects, why bubba? Redirects are not good practice.

edit: it was someone else :nocountryforshitposters:

I deleted them as there's no reason to block it as I explained above as this is only a temporary measure. The only thing that you're doing with that is depriving the Codex of a small source of revenue used to pay the hosting bills. And you wouldn't want that, would you?
 

Rean

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Infi has deleted the posts that show how to stop these redirects, why bubba? Redirects are not good practice.

edit: it was someone else :nocountryforshitposters:

I deleted them as there's no reason to block it as I explained above as this is only a temporary measure. The only thing that you're doing with that is depriving the Codex of a small source of revenue used to pay the hosting bills. And you wouldn't want that, would you?

Don't speak to me of such unpleasant matters. We're all trying to have a good time here, at least I am. I'm merely trying to better our brothers' browsing experience. I've said it before that I love this place, you want a tater to stop with the accusations? I'll give you a tater.
 

Taluntain

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I've replaced all the old GOG links on the forum pages with new ones and taken down the AdTraction helper script. If anything's still triggering any of the myriad of adblockers on the forum pages, post here so that I can take a look.

Big thanks to Infinitron for helping with the regex and various modifications to the addons needed to sort this out.
 

Non-Edgy Gamer

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I see admins have made the affiliated links sneakier.

Sorry, nothing I can do about it besides breaking the URL. You could always copy paste the text into your browser instead, if you prefer.
You could just use a url shortener. But then no one would want to click it. Or you could just past in the url without making it a link and people could just paste it into their url bar as you said.

www.gog.com/promo/20211011_weekly_sale

Given the headache of running a site like this, I don't begrudge Infinitron DarkUnderlord his due, but their tracker seems to block my VPN, ruining any chance of revenue from my purchases, ironically. :M
It edited my text url and turned it into a hyperlink and its still broken.

This entire thread is filled with broken links now, FYI. Probably due to my VPN.

Again, I'm not obsessing over it, but if you want your links to work, you might want to mention it to your affiliate manager so that you can get a different link.

Sometimes there are other options as far as tracking is concerned. But maybe not in this case. IDK.
 
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Narushima

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The only thing that you're doing with that is depriving the Codex of a small source of revenue used to pay the hosting bills. And you wouldn't want that, would you?
Just sell the whole website for 4.5 million $.

If anything's still triggering any of the myriad of adblockers on the forum pages, post here so that I can take a look.
I think most people use uBlock Origin, so it's not about "overzealous" blockers, it's the default. Any URL with "adtraction.com" gets blocked.

Test: https://af.gog.com/game/vampire_the_masquerade_bloodlines?as=1649904300

The above gives this:

HR7YXpM.png


Again, I personnaly don't particularly care, I'm just providing this example because you asked.
 
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racofer

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The only thing that you're doing with that is depriving the Codex of a small source of revenue used to pay the hosting bills. And you wouldn't want that, would you?
Just sell the whole website for 4.5 million $.

If anything's still triggering any of the myriad of adblockers on the forum pages, post here so that I can take a look.
I think most people use uBlock Origin, so it's not about "overzealous" blockers, it's the default. Any URL with "adtraction.com" gets blocked.

Test: https://af.gog.com/game/vampire_the_masquerade_bloodlines?as=1649904300

The above gives this:

HR7YXpM.png


Again, I personnaly don't particularly care, I'm just providing this example because you asked.

I simply ended up writing a small Violentmonkey script that replaces the new af.gog.com links back to www.gog.com on any links present on the Codex.

As per GOG's own statement (Transition from Old to New GOG Affiliates Program), they are now running all affiliate links through adtraction. Bad move on them, but it is what it is.
 
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Taluntain

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The problem here is basically that "Peter Lowe", whoever he is, decided that AdTraction as a whole needs to be blocked completely, so even legitimate uses such as in this case are not possible unless you disable his block list. So yea, this actually is the definition of overzealous, basically blocking everything, regardless of whether it's legitimate or not.

I'm going to report this to GOG, but I don't think that there's really anything that can be done given that AdTraction handles the affiliate system now. Anyone who wants to continue to support the Codex via GOG's links needs only hit the disable blocking button on such uBlock pages, however.
 

Skdursh

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Has this always been a thing? I tried to just post a GOG link and no matter what I did it kept forcing the tracker decline. Probably wouldn't have even noticed if it wasn't for UBlock throwing up a warning.
 

Taluntain

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It's always been there, GOG just changed their affiliation middleman to one that happens to be on uBlock's overzealous block list. Nothing we can do about it unfortunately.

There is no "tracking" beyond giving credit to the Codex for any sales, basically supporting the Codex for free.
 

Non-Edgy Gamer

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Lazy affiliate company meets lazy adblock. Using the same tracker urls for groups of campaigns is asking for trouble. In email marketing, people know that reputation management is essential for deliverability, but everywhere else managers are lazy and barely know what they're doing.

Ideally the tracking pixel should be on GOG and a URL parameter could pass the value to the page. But then it'd be a 3rd party cookie etc etc. Would probably require backend work that neither company wants to mess with.
 

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