tapatalk and security, convos, etc.

Just got this in my inbox... Looks like they are starting to listen about ad! Although I'm still not convinced

Dear Forum Owner,

Thank you once again to continue using Tapatalk. Connecting people to their passions is what we do, and we know we can’t accomplish that mission without you.

We also understand as Forum Owners you expect having full control over your forum. From the beginning, we have always provided Forum Owners the ability to control various features that we provide, for example image sharing. We are extending that control to the advertisement option.

Last month we sent out an email to you that Tapatalk was going to begin a testing Promoted Topics ad unit as a mean generate ad revenue for Forum Owners. Today, I want to assure you that Forum Owners have full control on displaying ads and receiving revenue on Tapatalk, and this control extends beyond any test period.

While over 84% of our forums have ads on their desktop site, we understand that there are many forums where ads are not appropriate. If you prefer to turn off advertising in your forum, you can go into your Tapatalk dashboard, and disable ads/revenue from Tapatalk. You can use the dashboard to change the settings at anytime.

For instructions on how to turn-off ads, go to our Support Forum/Monetization and Engagement, here is the link to the full instruction

If you previously change the settings, or previously sent a request that ads from Tapatalk be turned-off, those settings remain in place and no action is needed.

In the next update, we will provide you some of early results of our advertising tests, including the payment schedule etc.

If you have any question, please don’t hesitate to contact me directly at eric@tapatalk.com

Regards,
Eric Sternbach
Head of Community Monetization
Tapatalk
Click to expand...
 
I'm not convinced yet either.

They have also finally started to explain the confusing changes they have been making the the Tapatalk Android app (v2 becoming Tapatalk free, Tapatalk HD becoming Pro etc). However, they are a long way from explaining their whole plan for the apps and for advertising. After all, they aren't just going to give away an app for free after charging for it for years unless they plan on forcing advertising on the free app at least.

I've made a long post about this, stating the many things they really need to address

https://support.tapatalk.com/threads/sorry-we-confused-you.20939/#post-111317

Let's see if they answer these questions, ignore them or delete it like they did with two threads asking about optiing out of adverts...
 
I removed Tapatalk earlier this year before the migration to XF. Some users weren't happy about it.

Since the migration to XF, delivering a common experience across platforms has been the goal. It has been almost a month since the migration and I'm still making tweaks on the weekends; but am able to reasonably support most mobile devices today. My photoalbum is looking much better, but still challenged on vertically-oriented phones.

One shouldn't need to see an annoying pop-up to install a third-party app, just to see content.
 
The people who normally use Tapatalk haven't been posting frequently so I'm going to use this thread as an excuse to uninstall that crap.

Thanks guys.
 
Well according to my TapaTalk stats from the forum owners area, I only had 3 people using the site via TapaTalk. I've already had almost 10 people contact me to say TapaTalk isn't working on my site anymore (despite me posting it on FB and in the forum itself).
 
I have 35-50 tapatalk users per day according to TT stats - that's out of 16K uniques per day, so it's not much. But they like TT.

I started a thread about it on my forum just to get the discussion going. I'll probably axe it after a while....just can't imagine an unknown company having access to all my stuff all the time and then controlling the users.
 
Taptalk haven't yet responded to my questions (see my last post).

I've also just discovered that Taptalk have removed the option from the ACP to disallow guests. Looking back at older versions of the add-on (I keep them all seeing as you can't re-download them from Tapatalk) it was in version 1.70 but got removed in version 1.80 which was the updated version for Xenforo 1.2 and released on 7th August. They did not mention it's removal in the announcement post.

I've questioned them about why it was removed and how to disallow guests

https://support.tapatalk.com/threads/disallow-guests.21025/

I have tried adding guest_okay = 0 to the config.txt file but it hasn't worked.

So any forum owners who use Tapatalk and previously have disallowed guests on the app, be aware that they can now access your forums.
 
Martok said:
I've also just discovered that Taptalk have removed the option from the ACP to disallow guests. Looking back at older versions of the add-on (I keep them all seeing as you can't re-download them from Tapatalk) it was in version 1.70 but got removed in version 1.80 which was the updated version for Xenforo 1.2 and released on 7th August. They did not mention it's removal in the announcement post.
Click to expand...
I have v1.8.1 and still have the option to set allowed usergroups at the bottom of /admin.php?options/list/tapatalkOptions Are you saying that this is ignored now?
 
Mouth said:
I have v1.8.1 and still have the option to set allowed usergroups at the bottom of /admin.php?options/list/tapatalkOptions Are you saying that this is ignored now?
Click to expand...
No, those options are still there. However, all those options seem to do is prevent users who aren't in the listed usergroups from logging in. They will still be able to see the forums that are publically available. I tested this yesterday.

What has been removed is a separate option which was at the top of that page, a checkbox which allowed you to disable guest access. As I said, I checked back through previous versions and it was removed in the 1.8.0 version. So currently forum owners are unable to prevent guests from viewing their forums through Tapatalk.
 
Mouth said:
I have v1.8.1 and still have the option to set allowed usergroups at the bottom of /admin.php?options/list/tapatalkOptions Are you saying that this is ignored now?
Click to expand...

That's saying that those user groups are allowed to login from Tapatalk. (login to their user account at your site)

It's not talking about just browsing the site as a guest.

However, before version 1.8.0 -- there was an option that could disable guest browsing from Tapatalk:

"Allow non-registered user to access your forum via Tapatalk" << Found in v1.7.0
 
ENF said:
That's saying that those user groups are allowed to login from Tapatalk. (login to their user account at your site)

It's not talking about just browsing the site as a guest.

However, before version 1.8.0 -- there was an option that could disable guest browsing from Tapatalk:

"Allow non-registered user to access your forum via Tapatalk"
Click to expand...
That is correct.

You could have used the disallow guest option in conjunction with the allowed user group option to permit only specified usergroups from using Tapatalk at all. Now that they have removed the disallow guest option, it makes the allowed user group option much less effective in that it only prevents users who aren't allowed from viewing the non-public forums and from posting but they can still read the public forums.
 
FWIW, the code for guest blocking still appears to be in the addon, but the configuration option has been removed from the control panel.

It's possible they took the lazy route out and just removed the options and enabled everyone's guest viewing without saying so. (and not removing the rest of the guest blocking code) But maybe they did, I've not checked it all, yet.
 
Well I've finally got a response from Tapatalk about the removal of the ability to disable guest access:

This is removed. It is more of a product decision as we want to make sure that all security / access are aligned with your forum settings and behave just like a browser.

If your forum allow guest access on web browser, it will work on Tapatalk too, or vice versa.
Click to expand...

You can see it in the thread here.

https://support.tapatalk.com/threads/disallow-guests.21025/

Frankly this is a load of tosh. I reckon the real reason for removing this is so that they can ensure more Tapatalk users are using forums and they are generating income from the forthcoming advertising that they claim forum owners will be able to opt-out of but no doubt they'll revoke this at some point too.

So if you are a forum owner who has Tapatalk installed and has disallowed it for guests so that they have to use your site, in particular if you have advertising for guests then be aware that you no longer have that option as it was removed in the 1.8.0 of the Tapatalk add-on. You won't be able to revert to an earlier version if you are on Xenforo 1.2 as they aren't compatible.
 
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