Topline

Good day everyone!  It has come to my attention that many users are not receiving ads anymore on Topline, and their ads are being replaced with a message that there are no ads currently available for their region.  Topline has noted that they are actively seeking international advertisers, but at this time they only have ads for US members.  This is sadly disappointing, and apparently they've gone the way of GiftHulk and decided to ignore their international users.  Most of the ads I was seeing were for websites I could visit anyway, and for products that I would be interested in.

But while you may see these "we have no ads for you ads", I on the other hand am only seeing the "refer a friend" ad on everything I view, and I thought at first I was experiencing the same problems as others, but it appears this is not the case.

I reached out to Topline, inquiring what was going on and I received this message:

"Hi Debbie Spence, thanks for contacting TopLine Support. 

TopLine uses a security algorithm to detect abnormal browsing activities such as frequent refreshing, automated browsing, bots, scripts, macros, etc. Depending on your browsing, your account may stop receiving points and begin seeing ads for TopLine. If the activity is deemed excessive, your account will be disabled all together.
 
After further review, it seems your account has entered an alarm state due to your browsing pattern so you will see TopLine ads and your point accrual is throttled. The good news is that your account will return to normal over the course of normal browsing. If you know you will be refreshing pages on the same websites or in some type of identifiable pattern, be sure to temporarily disable TopLine using the extension panel in your browser which will help to avoid account disruption.
 
Thanks for your interest in TopLine.
 
Regards,
TopLine Team"

My response to them was this:

"Good day.

"The good news is that your account will return to normal over the course of normal browsing"

I can assure you, that I am browsing in a manner entirely normal to me.  I have been doing so since before I ever started using Topline.

I understand your algorithms are there to detect cheaters, however if you actually look at my browsing/usage, it's pretty "regular", with very high activity during the day Monday-Friday, busy sometimes in the evenings.  Weekends much quieter, but sometimes still pretty active.   The only thing I turned off was the Superpoints website, in which I spin a button daily 100 times a day and look at ads.  I even tried spreading out my spins.  I should not have to turn Topline off on this website, as it is part of my regular day, and therefore part of my normal browsing.

You will also notice that my pattern isn't like I am running a bot or refreshing pages just to get ads.  If you look at the data, I have multiple windows open where I am doing things like posting in Facebook, checking Hotmail, watching videos, doing spins, etc.  I am a multi-tasker, but I also sleep.  If I was a bot, you would see a constant pattern of refreshing with no down-time or lag time, and it would be static, not staggered.  You will also notice that my data is pretty regular over the same sort of periods each day while I am working 9AM - 5PM CST, and then later into the evenings when I'm on my personal time.

While I understand you need to use these algorithms to detect abnormal activity for bots, scripts, etc.  I am not doing anything on the sort.  I do refresh a single page constantly, but this page has no ads whatsover and should not affect my Topline activity.  I refresh constantly between 5:45PM - 6:15 and again between 6:30PM - 6:45 or so PM Mon-Fri because of certain tasks I'm waiting for on a site I use.  Again, this site has no ads with which Topline can replace so this shouldn't be an issue.

I respectfully request you look at your data again.  You will see I do indeed consistently use your service because I am on multiple websites at once doing various tasks, but that I am not in any way using anything that could be considered a bot.  I do refresh my Facebook regularly as I also have a page that I run, and I view some other Facebook pages regularly.  I don't feel that this should be used against me, or that I should turn Topline off when I am doing my normal tasks, as it would have to consistently keep it off as I am constantly busy on my websites.  While I may be "more active" than you're used to, I most certainly am browsing in a "normal" way for me.

Thank you,
Debbie Spence"

It really is frustrating when a website tells you that you're not "normal", say in the case of GiftHulk telling people their searching patterns aren't normal because they don't always click on the link.  Sometimes the information you need is right in the search itself without going to the website.  In the case of Topline, my multitasker nature is apparently "abnormal".  Hopefully they will remove the "flag" on my account as abnormal activity and once Canadian ads are available again I can multitask and earn points to my heart's content.