lies.. (greetings, cycy.. bye.)

yea nvm just checked discord

yeah, cycy made a new account to get around the wait times for guests and then deleted it

So cycy didn't actually leave, they just wanted to be dramatic and will come back on new accounts as they see fit..?

Or they really did leave and came back to share this actually valuable information with the rest of us before leaving again

That's literally exactly what I said you just worded it more positively <.<
'
Clearly cycy has been spending a good deal of time trying to find dirt on funsubstance. They didn't just happen upon them on godaddy by accident.
'
So they demanded answers from Zeus, threw a fit, deleted their account, and then scoured the internet for anything they could find to stir the pot, and then speedled back over here to create a new account they intended to delete, posting their finding without any actual verification on what's going on, all without any intention of sticking around to answer any questions people may have for them.
'
And you're telling me they won't do this exact same thing again the next Time the mood takes them?

So just so everyone is aware, cycy was one of the participants in a string of extremely pornographic posts just added to the site. She (as well as several other people) created a fake account specifically to post them with the intent of fucking the site and the community over. Your fucking heroes lived long enough to become the villains.

Don't lie? She specifically posted one picture ( with NSFW) and deleted it after a minute because she felt bad.

I didn't lie? They talked about it for a decent period of time PRIOR to posting the content. I never said she was the only person involved. That does not negate her involvement.
'
So which part was a lie?
-they planned how to help fuck over the funsub community
-they created fake accounts
-they posted pornography. The NSFW filter is not so people can post blatant porn, but thanks for trying to explain which of the evils was "lesser" considering not all the porn was NSFW, and some involved actual eating shit.
-they deleted the accounts
-cycy was (far from the only one (and I will provide the names of the others)) nvolved in this every step of the way.
'
It's great she felt bad. Doesn't change that she took part. And considering this is more or less what I'd JUST predicted would happen in the previous post, it seemed relevant.
'
I have removed "main ringleaders" and exchanged it with "participants" if that helps abate your indignation since it's quite likely others were more "in charge"

if we wanted soulless memes, we would've been on 8gag

9*

But what has happened to suggest you won't be able to continue to be a tight knit community?

no we are scared that it might fall apart, as nobody is talking to us. We don't even know if the website is still going to exist in three months.
It would be nice to say: "hey, so I'm selling the website to this new guy, you guys can trust them, they aren't going to infect you with viruses, steal your info/whatevs, and don't stress, not much is gonna change, maybe just some more dank memes and a bit of bot posting to increase traffic for the while being. Zeus out."

I think, personally, that is what we would have done, as active members who really regards this website as something of value to us. You would think as owner, they will act the same.

cant have a tight knit community when everyone hates the site after the "new owner" ruins it

-bethorien

So, to recap: other than the extra ads which were removed when a fuss was made, nothings actually happened yet you're just all butt hurt you weren't in on the business discussions you have no business being in anyway?

So you think that communicating with the users of a site is a bad thing?

The way a business works is that it has to keep the people getting them money happy. The people that run fun substance have apparently decided that they would prefer to break ad contract and possibly commit fraud to boost income and how the site looks for purchase and completely throw the website to the shitter instead of doing that.
WE are their income. They want to keep making money legally they maintain the website to our liking. We act "entitled" because as the user base we get the final say in anything with our time and the owners wallets.
-bethorien

I think business discussions aren't your business and if the new owner wanted a little time before announcing himself then no ones going to die?

I just think you're all being incredibly dramatic about a MEME SITE

Found Zeus’s alt

so, to analogize this: imagine you always go walking in a nice public park, and now new people (aliens) bought the land, without saying anything, and are doing some renovations, but you can still walk there. You aren't sure whether all the squirrels, trees, or the flowers are real, but that's okay. You are more concerned about the possibility of landmines being planted in the ground, and nobody is saying they aren't there, but previously (say, the park in your previous town, the exact same thing happened and they just filled it with landmines) it happened, so now you ask the old/new owners: "Heyo, what's going on? Are you guys planning to plant landmines?" And you get no response. Obviously, you are going to be hyper careful, even scared, that you and your fellow members might step on a trap and set the whole thing off.

The people making a fuss are just a handful of the traffic this site gets. You thinking you control anything is entitled and ridiculous

lying to yourself don't change the reality, sorry

I'm not zeus' alt I'm just confused why you're all being so dramatic when nothing has happened yet? And comparing what's happening here to land mines? Which kill people? I think you all need to work on getting a life off the internet so a meme site isn't the be all and end all of your existence

Cool now that im logged in again,
Noramlly the whole "oh i want a little time before announcing myself" thing would fly but the "new owner" tried to make drastic changes to the site without warning whatsoever. Alienating your userbase is a sign of being a cunt.
Example: blizzard, bethesda, rockstar
If the new owner is real that means someone unaffiliated with the website has taken a cash grab (literally nothing else to assume from POP UP ADS being put on the site) and then the bots dragging out fucking 2016 memes with no relevance. It screams down the shitter. This site is dying. It'll be dead soon if the "owner/s" dont do something about it and I will be the first motherfucker to signal boost the fuck out of the fact that all the traffic is fake to all potential buyers of this site because that is not only immoral but its illegal.

we are just a handful of the traffic the site gets because they are breaking adprogram contract by using a fuck ton of bots. Their traffic went down by over 45% in a week when the new owner shit happened then the bots ramped up extremely and the traffic went up past what the original was with it. 90% of the traffic is probably bots by now. This site is dying. It will be dead soon.

@coleypoley by the way. your last post is 3 years ago and you have only 21 comments.. most of this comments got posted a rly long time ago. do you rly consider yourself as a part of the community? because i don't. some users here making 80 comments a day, posting 10 postings a day.. and even would interact more if there would be no technical blockades who prevent that. these users are the community.. not a user who litereally don't interact at all with the community. when you're a real user, you're only a leecher.. nothing more. not part of this community. so you can't rly understand us because that.

Pretty sure if someone bought the site thinking it was popular only to find out the entire website is bots then they could sue ?

Idk. there isn't much precedent for bots in law as what constitutes fraud on the internet isnt much of a topic that hits the courts much in this manner as its against the ad contract and gets people blacklisted a lot of shit corporately

First of all I never said I was part of the community.
Secondly, what is this ad contract you keep talking about? Who is it between?

it is a breach of any ad program (the people paying the website to put their ad network on the site) to use bots to generate false traffic as it gives the people paying for their ads to show up false clicks making them pay for people that don't exist to see their ads. It is a breach of their contract in such a way that tends to get people blacklisted from continued business with ad providers

if you're not part of the ommunity (or don't see yourself as one), why you argue with us about something which affects you zero but other users? the community loves funsubstance.. and the community. if you can't understand that, that's sad. you only saying it's only a business decision.. but it's not. it's a decicion which affects the community. so you don't need to wonder if the community gets mad.

I was asking a fucking question

No, you were kinda being a bitch

You asked a question, got your answer and basically told people their issues with the site weren't an issue to you and they should get over it. You weren't curiously wondering what the fuss was about.

And if you're not part of the community then why bother getting involved if you're just gonna be a bitch to people?

this site uses google ad services. They prohibit automated ad revenue and terminate contracts on that basis

Other than bots the only answer i got was "they should have told us" which they aren't under any obligation to do

They're not under any obligation but it's the polite thing to do?

We are their money source. They have shone that they are not but another corporate piece of shit that doesn't give a flying fuck about their userbase and dont deserve our time nor our energy. They would rather break contract to get a quick buck than actually communicate with their users. Walmart has better customer feedback than they do. This site should be let to die as its owners arent worth the salt spilled over it. Signal blast their bot bullshitery so no one buys this fucking site at that outrageous price

also just gonna say if we leave the only people posting memes will be bots grabbing shitty old memes from 2016 8+1gag with broken titles and references to 2016's new year.

@coleypoley probs gonna get down voted but I agree with you bud. Not everyone here thinks the same way, has the same opinions etc. and unfortunately when majority of people who are willing to voice their opinions all think the same thing you tend to get backed into an imaginary corner even when your opinion is just as valid as theirs. I love this community, I love this site, I love most of the people, just because I don't have the same "passion" against this new owner thing as others doesn't mean I love this site any less. I am willing to see where this goes because I personally think it's stupid to make a fuss over something that I don't have any say in. I also want this site to live on and by staying on here and supporting it, that is more likely to happen. I understand the anger and frustration about the sudden neglect from the owners but as Coley said, it really isn't our say whether we like it or not.

@coleypoley You are correct. The previous and new owners were and are not obligated in any way to discuss business dealing with the users. I personally think that a well-functioning content collection system is a boon to the site and take no offense to it existence.
The real issue is that the site isn’t being run as competently as it was before. Tasteful advertising was replaced with intrusive. What was fresh and interesting content is now out of date and recycled. Customer service requests are not being answered the way they used to....

...Whether you feel personally betrayed or whatever, these facts are all bad news. The ads and content can drive away the casual readers. If they start to leave and revenues go down then it could cause more changes to compensate and the death spiral begins.
People here have gotten to know one another and have a legitimate concern that the platform that they use to communicate could shut down. The admins have no obligation to give a shit but listening to the most vocal of your user base is usually a good idea.

But what's actually happening right now is scare mongering. You say you love the community but so many people have deleted their accounts before anything has happened. It's like when it's mentioned there MIGHT be a SLIGHT drop in petrol supply so everyone and their mother rushes out and fills their cars and countless jerry cans. Guess what? They create the shortage that way. If everyone jumps ship before anything has even happened then your killing the site yourselves

A couple other things to point out:
1. The GoDaddy thing is for domain name not the website. It’s a proposed price to purchase. It’s not actively up for auction.
2. FS is not a high traffic website. That where site that was relatively recently opened actually gets more visitors already and the no-no site is in a totally different league.

Holy fuck there's too many replies for me to read. So just responding to original comment. I didn't really care (and still don't particularly) who runs the website. If it's garbage, it's garbage, if it's not, it's not. It's nice to have an explanation for the pop-up ads, and seeing them be dealt with is great. I didn't come here to have a buddy-buddy relationship with a website owner. The pop-up ads were annoying as fuck, and had they stayed I probably wouldn't have. Now the bots are the annoying thing, and they're what I want to see dealt with. Idc if they're eliminated entirely but at least tone it down a notch or twelve and monitor wtf they're posting so we don't end up with content that hasn't been relevant since 2014 and unfinished titles that say just enough to give you no real clue what's going on-- or no title at all

All gather around the evidence that a long time user everyone knows was secretly a bot sent 6 years ago to infiltrate funsub so that when this happened they could manipulate events from the inside with our trust?!?!maybe I’m a bot, or the new owner is paying me to say all this? Except no... secretly it isn’t the new owner, I said that to throw you off the trail of the fact Zeus is paying me to say that because there is no new owner! Except wait... Zeus is really Keyser Söze and I’m really DB cooper- and the entire existence of funsub was a way to cover up that we stole all that money and time traveled to the future and that’s why we can’t be caught! Like damn man. It’s amazing how much y’all can do with too little facts and too much time. But I guess the site is called funsubstance, so if the way y’all have your fun is to gossip like hens in the dark- enjoy I suppose. Users come, users go, sites get “hot” and then they get cold. Ask MySpace Tom about that one. Off to browse memes.

@bethorien- has anyone shown hard proof that the entity running funsub, or an entity they have specified to do so, using bots? Lots of bot talk. Lots of people counting posts and suspecting this or that of being bots- any proof? Real proof that would hold up even in civil court? And since when did TOS violations become the interest of the user base? Have we also investigated the tax records for the site, do we know of there are any parking tickets for vehicles registered as work vehicles under the corporation? Whoever is running the site, buying or selling it needs to be concerned with the paperwork- I just need to know if it works or not and if there are new funny memes or not. If anyone seriously suspects and is offended by TOS violating bots- report it to google or whoever, jizzypoofs369 on the boards can’t do much but bitch about it or get huffed up- so if there’s serious evidence of wrong doing take it to someone who can act on it. If people care enough to beat their head on the..

.. same wall and make their free time about obsessing over it- the beurocratic red tape of pursuing a review and action are going to require the same time and dedication- but could actually result in something other than a circle jerk. I go to a lot of meetings. From that perspective- if we frame this whole “subgate” scandal as a thing- what is the purpose of all the discussion and investigation and what not? What do people hope to gain from it? If they want some information or positive change- idle speculation and redressing a few sporadic tidbits of info mixed with garbage piles of guessing goes nowhere. It’s a big circle with no purpose than to waste time and get worked up. As for a business that serves the consumer- how in the last week has funsub changed its service? Ads? What else? Let’s say there are bots posting shitty memes. There were always guests and users posting shitty memes. Some memes are shitty. So that’s not really new, and it isn’t even 1/10 memes is a supposed bot-

... so what asides personal perception based on speculation generated in the mind is so different today right now that funsub is suddenly anti consumer? And as to being upset about owner involvement or information- when was Zeus so active? Go count theor posts. Zeus wasn’t in the running to hold a star even if they were allowed to. Zeus would sometimes answer questions or make anouncments when there was something that impacted users. Zeus made a change of ownership announcement. Zeus can’t really tell us what the new owner is going to do with their website after Zeus is gone can they? And while a “funsub has changed owners- same great fun... blah blah” generic press release from the new owner is always a fluff- it generally serves no real purpose, and if the new guy IS flipping the site, they aren’t going to announce it, and the new new owner may be better. There’s nothing right now. It’s all just nothing, but some people can’t deal with the idea that sometimes we need to...

“Wait and see” and they have to feel empowered because they are powerless on the inside. So they don’t care if they are moving the right direction or not- just that they are moving so that they feel like they are in control. It’s got nothing to do with pro consumerism. It’s just a conduit for feelings we want to project or exercise in other areas of life but can’t or are inadequate to do so. For a site with so many “I want to speak to a manager” memes- I swear that too many people on here should go get that haircut because lately it’s all about that. “There are pop ups on my free website and I demand to speak to a manager!” Consumer? Are we? I’ve never actually paid anything to be here. I’m sore not a customer. Customers buy things. I’m a user. And the thing about being a user is that only a moron believes that a for profit entity is paying bills so I can laugh at alligators in sun glasses and butt jokes for free. There’s always a profit model, I’m not paying cash and having a good ...

... time. Why would I bitch about that?

Well said @guest_

"any proofs?" - https double-dot //i dot imgur dot com/ R55DVww dot png do we need to say more? the bots copy 0gag posts and don't even change the titles.. they just removing special characters from the titles and post them here. they even post the same picture 2 times at the same time. sorry but.. if you don't see by yourself that these things are bots you're naive @guest_

@fwahz @fireworkbaby are both bots who copy content from 0gag and other sources.. even with the same title

i like putting 8+1gag myself, doesnt look like a typo and demonstrates the stupid censorship that is done here

@guest- I would say that sounds like pretty substantial evidence that at least some people are bots. I haven’t seen a chat room yet that was totally free of bots though... as for reposting memes from where- plenty of human users repost memes they see other places. In fact, part of the nature of internet memes relies on people reposting them. Would you feel better if the bots changed the titles? And I don’t know if the term”naive” quite applies here. I don’t go to where, or tumblr, or twitter, or even google for memes. I come here. That’s why I come here. It’s easy to just view a bunch of memes in one place without lots of links and sub directories and blah blah. Just “all,” then next page or last. “Oblivious” would probably be more apt than “naive.”

The problem isnt that they are reposting memes. It's that
1. they are reposting memes from previous years that only have relevance to previous years like the 2017 new years ones and such and they are reposting selfies with title that are obviously meant for a different site with that sites name cut out of the title.
2. They are also being used for false ad impressions which is unethical and a breach of google policy.

I’ve seen some turkeys, and given the talks going on I had a sort of “ah ha” moment that they were probably bots. Yeah. Multi posts and Turkey ass memes suck. But so far, at least what I’ve seen- has been a drop in the bucket. Now look- I’m not or have never been saying any of this is right, and I’m not saying nothing should be done. I’m saying that before we even had much more to go on than “Zeus is selling” people were already gathered at the castle walls with rotten eggs and flaming torches in hand. I’m saying people need to slow down. There is that initial outrage or strong reaction we have to change- good or bad. A host of emotions and personalities...

And now the dissenters have been posting actual porn because they're fuckbags, and timebender25 had to plea for them to take it down.

.... and having a host of people in one place feel that at once can take an already powerful emotional state and amplify it as people feed off each other. But instead of letting that initial anger or fear or etc emotion subside a bit, and steeping back to get solid data, reliable and proven facts, and to put all the pieces together- people are just riding a wave of unchecked emotions in a pool full of other people doing the same, and those waves are combining together and growing, based off tid bits. I’m saying that a response must be proportional to the stimulus, and while upsetting (if true,) even the worst theories thus far do not require an I mediate and strong response. We aren’t on a timer here. I’m pretty sure that regardless of what anyone does- or doesn’t do right now, in a week they won’t likely see a response to it.

So no one needs to be in some huge rush to do anything. Lives are not on the line, and the more time passes- the more time there is to gather information, for patterns to form, to give chances for contact to be made, to allow the new owner to find their feet and figure out how to run things- etc. people are acting like time is our enemy and yet... it’s somewhat on our side. Do you think that for the purposes of what one would be using illicit bot traffic for- it would matter if all of us quit tomorrow? Or do you think the sort of person who would use those tactics couldn’t figure out what else to do? Or that they aren’t already doing that? Perhaps the whole thing is a “turn and burn” and they don’t really care when the site inevitably crashes. If that were he case they went in with a plan to get their money back out either way. It’s all very amusing when one has nothing better to do I’m sure, but here’s a quick story:

Nothing anyone does short of coughing up $100k is going to put things back how they were. So that’s completely out. No sense discussing it or dwelling on it. And unless you have Zeus or the new owners cell phone number you probably aren’t getting an answer no matter how many times you ask, until and unless they feel like it- and put yourself in their shoes- is the current climate one you’d want to jump in for a QA in? Would you think that you’d be able to get a constructive dialog right now? Here I have been trying- see how it’s going? So that’s out for right now. So what’s left? Ok. People don’t like the changes. Fair. There are of course- other ways to make that known, and given the new owner is pretty early in their stewardship there is likely a learning curve there, or let’s at least say a grace period in which the way things are today is not a snap shot to say they’ll be that way forever.

But we don’t know do we? We don’t know if these bots are the new owners minions (probably are...) we don’t know if they have some sort of learning algorithm- and a fun fact for anyone who skipped business class or never worked at a big business- business decisions are rarely made very quickly and on a whim. It’s called “forecasting” there are many systems- but they all require a sample of data over a given period of time. Data is studied and tweaks are made- curiously enough, some of the worst business decisions are made off direct feedback and focus groups, and some of the most successful are made off data, because if you never noticed- people are really unreliable in that sense. So you watch behavior and adjust accordingly. And another fun fact? Right now is kinda a lousy time to be trying to skew statistics. A new owner always causes instability. As you may have noticed- just the mention of change is enough to cause people to frenzy. You can’t get reliable focus data during a...

.... switch over on users because you don’t actually know what’s effecting it until the dust settles. Humans are also bad at tracking things. Put a conversation on the phone on hold for 120 seconds and that person will feel like it’s been forever if they aren’t tracking time and have something they want to get taken care of. Ask someone how many glasses of water they’ve had who isn’t tracking it, how many hours they perform an activity- so on and on. Humans are reliably shown to warp our answers to mood and perception. So... of all the times to act, when you’re freshly upset, acting on mostly conjecture and speculation, and it’s mid change so you can GUESS where things will land but have no idea, and the one making the changes might not be done yet and can’t even get an accurate picture of the effect of their changes.... and for what? No one short $100k can bring it back from the current owner, and without Zeus and users who have already left it still wouldn’t be exactly the same...

... and if one cares enough to save a version that they see as better than what it is right now for the future, grenading the site, mass exodus, etc will not do that. If your landlord sells the place your renting and the new owner decides to paint it green, but you love the apartment and hate green- leaving doesn’t solve the problem, but you may find somewhere else you like that isn’t green. Staying and being a grade A cunt doesn’t solve the problem. You have green walls you hate, the land lord is miserable, and your neighbors have to put up with your tantrums and antics, when many of them may not even care the wall color changed. And burning the place down REALLY doesn’t solve anything because possible worst of the 3, not only do you not have the place the whole point was that you liked- but now no one has it or can have it.

All I see is thrashing in the dark and wailing. That’s all I see. Every plan I’ve heard is some variation of “let’s pee in the pool to show them who’s boss.” If the people who cared so much about this wanted to do something- track down a contact for the new owner and contact them to POLITELY and REASONABLY make them aware of the feelings and what is going on, and what people would like. Maybe try and set up a dialog. Or if people think and have solid evidence of wrong doing, take that to someone who can act on it. The people at Google might care about bot scamming if it’s going on, and they have the actual and legal power and resources to end it. A verified report with evidence to the right email address and the bots are gone- poof. Not quite that fast, but close enough, and if they ever come back... the community would know where to send the report to no?

But I don’t see or hear that. I see and hear whining and mental mastirbation and pontification on the finer points of digital etiquette and most of all just demonizing. A total demonizing of an entity no one- to my knowledge, as of yet has even spoken to. A boogie man invented, effigied, and burned at the stake... all without them having to put down their scone. I’m sure that if this new owner is uncaring and uninvolved that t hurts them so deeply that people are upset and tearing up the board and making their free thoughts about this person and how awful they are. The new owner may even loose sleep over it. And wow. A handful of users may leave... some of those bot posts have over 200 likes. 0 came from veterans who are upset... if they leave... the bots get... 200 likes still. Popular as ever. I doubt they’re 200 fake likes either.

Because here is the truth of modern consumerism- people want money. Ask yourself- if you are a staple of the local game store- always there, trading, playing, but mostly you buy online... everyone knows you, likes you, values you. What is that value worth in money? The owner may be sad if you left- but they’d also likely loose maybe a couple hundred dollars tops? And someone would replace you. Not the same no. But people leave. They always do. New ones come. The new ones don’t care about the guy that was “the man” 5 years before they started coming. 5 years later profits are... not effected. There is a dofference between a power user and a power customer. A difference between a sponsorship and some rando schilling. And “loyal” customers are the ones you know are most unlikely to leave anyway, velocity model. It’s 2018. The world is online now. Customers in most industries are cheap, customer retention isn’t a huge priority anymore in most industries because customers are fickle and...

... the cost to keep them is usually less than to replace them. Most customers aren’t loyal anyway. They let prove or features or hype make the final decision over brand or what you’ve done in the past. Most people won’t keep buying from the same amazon seller outside specialty goods simply because they did them right, if they search an item they’ll go cheapest price, fastest shipping. And in an industry where the profit model is based on free cost browsing of memes- what is the customer impact? You don’t need power users. You need a wide user base. You don’t care if the same people are clicking 1 million times or 1 million are clicking once, because regardless the second something better comes, or you do something they don’t like, they’ll jump ship anyway.

So what is the “win” for the new owner? They gut their revenue model they likely bought the site for- and then.... what happens in 6 months if they make a business decision to change something and people get upset again? You e seen how far this has gone without even talking to the person, and after only a couple weeks. So what do they have to look forward to, and knowing the reaction of many people talking about active sabatoge and such- why would you even want to keep users who when they get upset will try and destroy your business? People want corporate honesty- integrity. They want business to eat it when they do wrong, to put them first and reward their coming back... and yet... where does the responsibility on the consumer end fall? After this company has done everything it can while still actually making a profit- and the customer leaves when they say “no” to something, even with legitimate cause? Ever seen Zues’ s books? What were his profits or expenses like? Why did he sell?

Do we know he didn’t sell because the site was in the red? And here comes a buyer who says “things will have to change to keep this site running. I may not make much, but I’ll make enough to run the servers and pay back what I spent slowly...” how do we know? Does anyone? And then what- people get mad and tear it apart anyway after they just spent tens of thousands on the site, most likely with the intention of keeping it up and running- possibly for users, or as much for the users as for themselves? Why did they buy this site? Anyone know? Actually know- not guess? Not fill in the blanks with whatever answer allows them to act out theor revenge fantasies and “o would have told that guy off but...” that they can’t IRL? Anyone? Because I guarantee the most hurt isn’t being done to the new owner- but to the community. When veteran users leave one way or another the new owner probably doesn’t miss them- but we do.

That community the whole point is supposedly to save? Before these changes have even gotten a chance to tear it up, people are doing it on their own over what might be in store or what the future of the site might be like based off what? A couple weeks? If people want to leave they should leave. But it’s way to early for people to be as worked up as many are getting, and throwing that negativity around in a vacuum is just making it worse.