I'm a fan of them, it's just that every network, no matter who they are, how long they've been around for, or how great they are, an issue will always come up that can drastically effect your business and earnings. The networks that treat their affiliates with more respect and fairness are the ones who get points in my book, but without forums to publicly call a network out or seek help, they would just run all over us and fuck us whenever they please.
If you're going to come and bitch about something that happened, you have to say who it is, and give both sides of the story as well. The best thing, and something I hope that always happens is that both sides come to a compromise, and the affiliate or network is given a second chance to make good. But if you're going to be very general, and not come out and give details, then you're just venting, and you won't get much help from anyone, because you look like a whiner.
Affiliates use the forums to see if other people have had the same issues, and how to fix it, or to warn others, that's the best type of system we have now. I've thought about creating some type of union for affiliates, but it's a pretty big undertaking, and quite frankly, I don't have the time or the drive to really get into something like that now. Until something like that happens, it sucks, but forums are our only public solution to warn eachother and make sure if an ad network, affiliate program or merchant fucks you, that everyone knows about it, and that they come around and fix the problem or else people will just avoid them in the future. We are a lot more valuable than advertisers, because it's a hell of a lot easier to find new advertisers, than it is to find good affiliates.
