Pageflakes forcing advertising onto users

I have long been a fan of Pageflakes, but had concerns when I saw that it had been sold onto Live Universe earlier this year. Until then there had been a very lively group of beta testers, and lots of interaction with the company. After the acquisition everything went silent on that front. There have recently been problems with access - I lost a entire day (ironically it was a teaching day, so I had to use Netvibes instead, so that's a group of people who are already going down another track) and I'm aware that other people have lost even more time because of one reason or another. The blog hasn't been updated in a long while, the Pageflakes community pages have closed, the press pages haven't been updated either. Not good.

I noticed that new users were having advertising flakes put onto pages when they created new accounts, but it was just on the very first page, and secondary tabs didn't have advertising. None of my pages had advertising at all. Today however in the space of a few moments I've got advertising on every single page, and it's large, intrusive and I can't move it or close it down. Screenshot below:

Pageflakes - what on earth do you think that you're doing? You want to make money - fine, I can deal with that. I like (liked?) the resource enough to pay money to use it, but I'm not being given that choice. You've not consulted your users and are just going ahead with sponsored content.

Given the attitude, the lack of contact with users and the up/down nature of the product, I think it's time to consider a switch to Netvibes. I really do hope that you change your minds, but I'm doubtful. What's really stupid is that if you'd said you wanted money - I'd have given it willingly. I would advise everyone to start to explore other options - I have a listing of them on my 'I want to' pages which I'm currently updating. You can also check out my Web 2.0 weblog for other more recent start page offerings.

Comments

[Betty]

Thanks for coming by! You are right about Pageflakes, there is an advertisement on every tab now. Trying to make up my mind what to do now. Might see you over at NetVibes..I think I have an account, but have not used it yet. (Created one when Pageflakes did not work last week)

[Karen Blakeman]

UKeiG has already started moving its Pageflakes content to Netvibes
http://www.netvibes.com/ukeig1

[Melanie Ellis]

Hi Phil
I'm using Pageflakes as a home page on our LRC Pcs - I've looked at Netvibes T&C and they state for personal non-commercial use only. So I'm not sure that we can use for our purpose.
I see UKeiG have moved to Netvibes

[Wonka]

huggh hate those advertisings...I'm thinking about moving to Netvibes an ad-free service

[WasAFan]

I logged on to pageflakes last night and it said it was going through updates. So i gave it a few minutes and when i finally got back to my page it indeed had a big block advertisment. Wow! I thought it was updating to something good, but instead you just lost me Pageflakes, (unless someone makes a fix?)

[Debra Kolah]

I too was shocked! I'm using it as a graded assignment for a graduate level Physics class--and suddenly I have ads on my assignment page!!
http://www.pageflakes.com/dkolah/24549111

This is a terrible development!

Debra

[Eddie Byrne]

I too have formally moved the Dublin City Public Libraries''portal' from Pageflakes to Netvibes.
SEE http://www.netvibes.com/dublincitypubliclibraries

The likelihood of moving back is receding as I write. I am disappointed of course. This I would term a mild warning; Libraries using web 2.0 web-based apps must be prepared for upheaval on occasion, and ought to have contingency plans in place at any rate. It has been an interesting couple of weeks at any rate!

[Jo Alcock]

I was annoyed about it too, I use PageFlakes all the time and the bright yellow and red advertisements were extremely frustrating - and looked totally unprofessional. I notice today that there are no advertisements although I am still tempted to make a move now that ToodleDo have a NetVibes gadget.

[Joe]

The sponsored content box disappeared from our pagecast this morning (11/21). Any idea what's up? Is Pageflakes reconsidering?

[Petter]

I've moved my "best of library blogs" page to Netvibes.(www.netvibes.com/knowbodies) The interruption of access for 2 weeks was an annoyance, and I note that no action has been taken on many requests - from me and others - to make the titles of the flakes active links, the way they are at netvibes.

[Estefan]

I heard that most of the original staff was laid off by LiveUniverse back in July/August 2008 which explains why Pageflakes has been quiet, there is no one to update the content. Also, LiveUniverse is notorious of slapping advertising in users faces. Too bad. I really loved Pageflakes. :(