Are we on a preditory site?

[EarlG]

8. Unfortunately the ads cannot really be "policed" because

different ads are served to different people, which is how Internet advertising works. We don't know what ads are going to be served ahead of time -- they are served directly to you by the advertisers, and DU just gets a cut for providing the space that they are served in. We can attempt to filter ads after the fact, but this is kinda like playing whac-a-mole, forever. For what it's worth, we are going to be changing our ad provider at the start of next year, so that might make a difference to the quality of the ads, but the fact is that without advertising revenue DU would not make anywhere near enough money to operate.

Also unfortunately, rebuilding DU's entire payment system to allow for payments from a service other than PayPal is going to be an arduous and complicated process, which is why we've resisted doing it for so long. However, we are going to look into making this a project for 2026, especially since PayPal seems to be making it more and more complicated to make a simple payment as a guest, without creating a PayPal account.

To be clear though, you do not need a PayPal account to make a payment to DU. Instructions for doing so can be found here:

https://www.democraticunderground.com/125629039