Is gaia virus free?

[Overated Titan Killer]

So... I've been on this site for the past 5 years (I got hacked last year once so yeah I sorta was off for a couple months)
But, I go on gaia now at my school... My teacher let's me since I actually get my work done.....
I've been on it since day one... and this week I saw a thing. called Webget...
I never done any gaia cash sponcer thingys... or anything... .-. Is this site virus free or not?

edit: of course it's a school computer so other students get on... could it be from another student or what?

[Labiasaurus]

Gaiaonline is safe
Loss control of user account, etc is user problem. High probability that it has nothing to do with Gaiaonline, unless someone is able to sniff information from their database. I've seen people whining about account hacks when they misplace data or leave them logged on public computers. Some safe practice is to never access personal data on public computers, if you have to, use private mode on firefox or incognito mode on google chrome and always log out and clear your web browser cache.

[Lanackse-Kanvae]

On top of what is on the above post, I suggest the Adblock Plus browser add on. Many pieces of unwanted crap are propagated by adverts these days for the reasons below.

Most sites use third party ad agencies and they don't have time to check the thousands of ads they get incoming each day. By the time a malicious one is found, let alone removed, it may well have been viewed by thousands if not millions of viewers. I keep telling mum to get an ad blocker.

[Overated Titan Killer]

Lanackse-Kanvae

On top of what is on the above post, I suggest the Adblock Plus browser add on. Many pieces of unwanted crap are propagated by adverts these days for the reasons below.

Most sites use third party ad agencies and they don't have time to check the thousands of ads they get incoming each day. By the time a malicious one is found, let alone removed, it may well have been viewed by thousands if not millions of viewers. I keep telling mum to get an ad blocker.

Oh.. Well.. I didn't get a virus from being hacked but... I was offline for a couple of months.. and I saw all the pop ups when I came back on and wondered when did this happen? because I don't remember it at all from my 5 years on this game :/

[Synapt]

It's worth keeping in mind however through all the "adblock" comments, while sure you risk potential malware through ads (realistically speaking you risk potential exploitation being online at all, whether through ads on a website, a vulnerability on your system itself, etc), a lot of sites have ads for a reason, and that reason is it's added revenue to the company.

Admittedly Gaia prob makes a notable ton more from sale of all their 'premium' stuff, but it's worth a consideration for smaller sites or even medium sites with no like 'premium' stuff.

[Explorer Lain]

Synapt

It's worth keeping in mind however through all the "adblock" comments, while sure you risk potential malware through ads (realistically speaking you risk potential exploitation being online at all, whether through ads on a website, a vulnerability on your system itself, etc), a lot of sites have ads for a reason, and that reason is it's added revenue to the company.

Admittedly Gaia prob makes a notable ton more from sale of all their 'premium' stuff, but it's worth a consideration for smaller sites or even medium sites with no like 'premium' stuff.

It's up to the advertisers to find ways to advertise that aren't so obtrusive to the user experience that the we're forced to find 3rd party programs to filter out the mass-overload of advertising these companies shove down your throat. People making a living lots of ways but that doesn't mean it's inherently the best/right way to make money.

Plus the more you let companies just do what they want the more volatile harassment they feel they can shove on you with ads. So I look at it as a way of protesting the fact that these companies are too lazy to figure out a way to work with the user to make money, not against them.

For a lot of people it's either block the ads or don't go to the site at all. I think it's an obvious choice for the site owner which one they'd rather choose?

Just my two cents as someone who's owned more than a fair share of websites that didn't have any advertising, and were still profitable...

[Synapt]

Explorer Lain

It's up to the advertisers to find ways to advertise that aren't so obtrusive to the user experience that the we're forced to find 3rd party programs to filter out the mass-overload of advertising these companies shove down your throat. People making a living lots of ways but that doesn't mean it's inherently the best/right way to make money.

Plus the more you let companies just do what they want the more volatile harassment they feel they can shove on you with ads. So I look at it as a way of protesting the fact that these companies are too lazy to figure out a way to work with the user to make money, not against them.

For a lot of people it's either block the ads or don't go to the site at all. I think it's an obvious choice for the site owner which one they'd rather choose?

Just my two cents as someone who's owned more than a fair share of websites that didn't have any advertising, and were still profitable...

Technically it's up to advertisers to make more money than they pay out. Most ads really aren't all that obtrusive, compared to the days when they'd be big epilepsy inducing GIF's and such, ads these days are pretty mild (and the website owners themselves can -normally- control the exact types, as in whether they're just plain visual-only ads, or full on audio/video ads, the latter being kinda more rare).

For most people things like adblock are considered more of a security defense than anything, and it technically is, they aren't using it just to avoid ads, they're using it because they've heard plenty of stories about malware being distributed through ads, and rather than get rid of the things that those ads exploit (such as Java more frequently than any) they throw on an adblocker and think it's all they need.

It's easy to 'own' 1000 sites and have them basically profitable, but it only even takes a moderate scale of a website before costs are inefficient to keep paying without some kind of revenue source (whether it be ads or premium services, which doesn't work for a lot of sites).

One of my current primary clients basically covers bills and my invoices from ad revenue, so when ad worth is down (which it actually is currently) I get less work myself, so as someone who often works for larger sites and gets paid from ad earnings, it's easy for a lot of people to either not realize how important ads can be or simply don't care razz