It may be a different thing, but someone posted a reflink today that wasn't from a person but from the site to give a bonus discount for people clicking on it, without giving some sort of a bonus to a specific person.
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I honestly agree with you, but how would you oppose it? And some people are still happy with getting a key just for clicking a few buttons... It's just hard to manage and maintain at the same time as well...
I do hope something'll change and these fishy giveaways which do not even state what they are actually giving away will be gone (at least from this site), but I think rising attention wont be enough...
Also good luck lvl 5+ members!
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Referals usually require you to do something on the landing page before the referrer gets credit, right? With Gleam, I just click then ctrl+w, so nothing of value was gained or lost.
But yeah, it's still scummy.
I don't even notice the referrals. Haha
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I used to use the Ctrl+W method, but then I figured out a much easier method: just right click the link. Gleam still detects it as a normal click and you can press Continue without actually visiting the website!
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No problem, I figured it out because middle click doesn't work, but many such scripts for some reason don't make a difference between left and right clicks. Finally a good use for this :D
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Well, I only liked your ref links for a gleam.io giveaway. Didn't even bother to look at other threads. ¯\(ツ)/¯.
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The rule is to prevent people from shitposting referral links.
gleam giveaways give you a key immediately for clicking a few links and joining a few groups and tweeting a few tweets and are similar to giveaways by gaming blogs and Bundle Stars.
It's different.
(Yes, it is acceptable.)
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But the rules even forbid people from posting referral links on giveaways they created. I think that one is a bit off, since it seems unlikely that someone will flood the site with giveaways just to get their referral link out there.
(Although I guess you never know.)
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Yes but there is a distinction between linking to a gleam giveaway and posting an actual referral link. Apparently that distinction is the difference between being allowed and being prohibited.
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One could (and there have been people doing this) post a hyper wanted giveaway, make it last for 4 weeks and delete it in the last few hours. If there's a ref-link on those, you can imagine how many people click on those. Giveaways like that can easily get 10'000 entries. That's why it's forbidden.
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how is that different from people here distributing dev keys to raise their level?
both sides are using promotional keys to get profit, some with refs and others with levels.
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After the tenth copy, the CV drop is so large, it is almost meaningless. By the 50th copy, you get less than 0.1 cent for CV. Not so long after that, the site literally just uses 0 for calculation.
Sure, it boosts levels, but sometimes less than a simple non-bundle giveaway.
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exactly :O
princess of peasantry is always right ;_;
*kisses feet*
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Because game developers have time and resources to promote their own products? If this was true, publishers wouldn't exist.
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I have no doubt that Coca-Cola could handle making advertisements on their own but instead of doing that they try to maximize their return by utilizing advertising professionals. Similarly devs may know a bit about developing a game, but myabe not so much about promoting it and maximizing an audience. Now, a lot of these giveaway and promotion sites don't seem know too much about maximizing the return either, but that is still ostensibly their pitch when they solicit "business" from devs.
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I think both ways have to be censored or both allowed then everyone is free to do whatever they want, i mean, to use the ref links or not.
The gleams are just camouflaging it with free games, also forcing you to join 349232349203804 groups if you want the "prize", I usually take the games then I leave the groups because the spam of these groups are literally ridiculous and dont let you play a single game without spam.
Thankies for the gib! :3
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Same. The actions they require generally aren't worth it, and the vast majority of the keys they offer are for games I'd really rather not taint my library with anyway.
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same here for reasons steffke said already. gleam.io is free trash key bait for personal infos or clicks.
In most cases someone is trying to make profit out of trash.
And giving personal information for a key doesn´t make it free.
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I hate reff links spamers but clear gleam links should be allowed. Just blacklist and report that users.
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usually not connected to the people behind the giveaways
I think this is the key part. The anti ref-link rule is to avoid having people (as in individual users on SG) spam ref-links in an attempt to profit from them.
That said, a lot of glem giveaways seem really scummy, and I wish devs would be a bit more careful with who they team up with.
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You have a point, but people like me just click the links and close the page before it even loads. It's worth the +1 and the cards for me.
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Hm, i didn't know that these giveaways had referral links.
The few ones i tried had "join the group" or "visit this greenlight page" actions.
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That's why I don't really use gleam.io anymore. I hate the ref links and the absurd number of steam groups you have to join just to get a key for a game that isn't very good but has cards. It's just a way for devs to promote bad games, that are passed from Greenlight because of mass giveaways.
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Hm, wouldn't that fall under
does not contain unethical or unwanted commercial content designed to drive traffic to third party sites
in ToS? Using gleam to bypass SG rule is unethical...
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The referral rule seems to be a little tricky, as there have been many instances where people have asked/been allowed to promote a youtube channel, which in some ways could be seen as a referral.
For the Gleam links, as far as I know, the people linking to them here on the forums aren't actually profiting in any way, which isn't seen as bad.
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I agree with you totally. Ref links should be banned regardless of the medium through which they're promoted because in the end, they are still against the rules. I stopped entering these mass giveaways a long time ago.
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That's a good point. If ref links are fine as long as they are not directly on SG, what's to stop people from making extremely easy ITH or jigsaw puzzles, basically like a bot checker, and then putting the ref link there? Hopefully that's not allowed.
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I never paid attention to this, o_O
I always thought as people were only telling about the free keys with no interests (like Indiegala giveaways, where there's nothing related to referrals), but now that you mentioned it I'll keep an eye in the next gleam.io links.
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I agree wholeheartedly. I usually avoid them altogether, but the spam does bug me a little.
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There is only one solution and that is to ban them all.
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I don't know what's more annoying: these endless gleam "giveaways" or a total lack of quality control from Steam. I used to not care but so much crap (presented by digital homicide and friends) is added DAILY for the sole purpose of making a few pennies off each sale and most of us (that often includes me) are jumping on this bandwagon to nowhere just to get free cards.
Oh wait... I think someone is giving away a free game around the corner. Gotta go. Bye.
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I find gleam giveaways just as scummy as ref links to be fair. I'd be happy if the links to gleam were automatically blocked.
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