# All Advantage and similar surf-for-cash sites



## Gram123 (Mar 15, 2001)

The content of this e-mail is only my personal opinion of this type of software, and if representatives of any such company wish to respond, I'd be delighted to read what they have to say...

Some time ago I was fooled by All Advantage, a company that offers you "free money for surfing the net".
I'm aware of a few companies of this type, and I'm sure they all operate in the same way.

It involved the downloading of a so-called Viewbar, which sits docked at the bottom (or top) of your screen and monitors active and inactive periods of internet use.
Active supposedly means clicking on links, and it allows you short periods between clicks before it becomes inactive (i.e. when you stop getting paid).

There are several problems with this software:

1) The rate for UK was something like 25p per hour of active time (about 30-35c?). The rate that this money clocks up is alarmingly poor, as most internet time is of the inactive type. After months of use (it took me a while to learn my lesson), I'd still clocked up only a paltry £6.00.
This isn't exactly how the active time works - I found that sometimes when revisiting my favourite sites, the viewbar would show inactive, as though they're saying that the site you are viewing has already been logged and you can earn no more there.
How much time do you think you spend on the net, clicking on links, but only to sites you've never been to before? I imagine the total time is pretty small.

2) They only pay out after you have earned a certain amount of money - in All Advantage's case it was £18.00 ($23-£25? i.e. after 72 hours of active time).

3) Once you have earned that pathetic sum, it takes them anything up to 2 months to send you your cheque.

4) The program works by monitoring the web sites you go to. They can then pass on (sell) your e-mail address to any companies that they deem relevant to your 'interests'.
In other words, if you came to this here site whilst using the viewbar, you may end up getting tons of e-mails from PC companies, software companies, high street stores and web shopping sites of any variety, insurance sites, price quotes, so-called money-making opportunities, and discounts for products that do not interest you in the slightest, etc etc
These companies (I would hazard to presume) are then also able to sell your e-mail address to their associates and so on, and so on...
Your Inbox fills up with spam galore. There's no use blocking specific senders, because in many cases the senders' e-mail addresses change daily.
End result? Change your e-mail address.

5) Whilst using the vierwbar, your screen is reduced in size by a portion. In the case of All Advantage, this was about a 5th or a 6th of the screen. This doesn't sound much, but when viewing appelets, playing online games or watching online videos etc, then depending on the design of the web site, the full picture is often not visible and you have to scroll to see the bottom (or top) part.
It's like having an extra frame, flashing away with more stupid advertisements.

6) The alternative to losing this screen portion is to undock the viewbar. The problem with doing this is you then can't tell if you are getting paid or not for whatever you are doing.

7) They will try to tempt you into referring your friends and associates, with the lure of extra money. Sign up your friend and earn half of everything they earn on top of your own earnings. This may work for cynical web site owners, who can get fool lot of their members/customers into also using the software, but for an individual it just means causing your friends the very same trouble the damn thing has caused you.

As a result of my experience, I can heartily recommend that nobody use these awful things, and if you are already using one, don't inflict it on your friends. Go to Add/Remove programs and delete it. Close your account.

Thanks for reading my rant!!

Gram


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## 4239 (Oct 20, 1999)

of life on the net. At least it is optional. A number of people on this board were using these programs regularly a while back. I don't know if they still do.
Many people take the attitude that whatever extra they can get for something they are already doing anyway is worth the small intrusion.
Many [like you and I ] don't think so.
Bob


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## TechGuy (Feb 12, 1999)

bd, you might remember that quit a while ago, I used AllAdvantage myself. It was great... for about two months. Then they reduced the payments. Then they reduced it again. Then they notified that my future payments would be delayed. Then I never heard from them again, so I finally stopped using their software. *shrugs* After all of the payment cuts, it wasn't such a loss anyway. It was a wonderful idea and started off so well... too bad they killed it like that.


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## RT (Aug 20, 2000)

Maybe they didn't kill it - maybe it killed them. I don't know much about how an endeavor like that could remain profitable for them in the long term... (I'm not business savvy - found out the hard way)... it just seems like you would reach a point of diminishing return, then a point of no return. The delays and reductions sounds like a sort of desperate attempt to keep a sinking ship afloat. So many dot coms going down these days...but I agree with bd - not worth it, just like free ISPs.

I wonder if poor Gram or Techguy ever realized enough rewards from risking carpal tunnel syndrome to pay for their Internet connection.

(I can just envision Mr. Cermak furiously clicking away trying to earn a few free bucks whilst (I like that, Gram) juggling his online stocks in Red Hat and Linux and at the same time administering this site!  )


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## Davey7549 (Feb 28, 2001)

Hey Gang
Just got an E-mail from my brother-in-law from Texas.
He's all up about this site/service.
When I read it I remembered you guys talking about another pay you to surf site. The site he's up on is:
http://www.goingplatinum.com
Is this the same kindof stuff?


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## quiz (Feb 3, 2000)

I discovered this thread doing a search on alladvantage.

I agree with it losing its original 'gloss', lowering payments, adding a gambling component etc but now it seems to have disappeared altogether.

Does anyone know what happened to it? Does anyone have a bar that still works or can anyone get access to the alladvantage URL? My e-mails to them were just returned too, undeliverable.


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