This new ad system seems very unfriendly towards indie/passion developers…
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Unidirectional Robux to Ad Credit Conversion: Roblox’s new ad system allows us to spend our robux to promote our games and experiences. I just wanna say sponsors is 10x better but now I guess we cna expect ads inside our beloved games
and this comes with a problem: the inability to convert ad credits back into Robux. This system sucks and your basically just putting your robux in a prison -
Econmical problems: One big problem with this non revert robux back system is that you can lose REAL money. When people spend our Robux on ads, we hope to get something back or atleats gain a few vists and hopefully grow the game. But if we can’t turn the ad credits back into Robux, it’s like we’re stuck with OUR HARD EARNED money in the ad system, and we might not get what they expected. This will 100% make people feel unsure whether its worth advertising ot not and this might lead to Roblox making less money from this than sponsors if you think about it.
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Frustration
Over the last few months Roblox has made it obvious that they dont care about us, Us who are making roblox popular, were just like people putting money in their pockets and what do we get back from them? Bad updates and cringy metaverse things. -
I mean I think they should make a way to turn your ad credit back to Robux if so it wouldn’t be as bad, like I do somewhat like this but like you got to be over 18+ if you wanna spend REAL money and in the end people are just gonna use their robux for this lets be real, no one will use the usd thingy 99.99999999999% would rather use robux so I think Roblox should consider implementing a two way conversion system that allows users to convert ad credits back into Robux.
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Roblox sucks at protetcing our private info
Y’all remember when Roblox leaked out people’s phone numbers? I mean I’m not comfortable with Roblox having my ID as it might be leaked, now I am not a big developer so I shouldn’t care but still Roblox’s security Sucks a lot. And like I realized now when i tried to sign up, WHY do they wanna know where I live, Is it really that necessesary in order to advertise my game? Seriously? I doubt it’d get leaked but like if it does
it’s ggs for the big devs theyre gonna see penny wise at their main door the day after -
Not only Roblox’s algorthims sucks this sucks as well and even if you gain a few vists as long as you dont make a alot money Roblox wont even wanna recommend your game to others because their alogrithm works like this: High earning = Get recommended, this is why we always see the same games in the front page and sponsors was a way to get your game there to. They don’t even care about the non profit games that does have a higher player engagement so yeah small dev = not even worth advertsing especially if your young
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This is a good change from the aspect of taxes as developers are now able to appropriately deduct all advertising efforts as business expenses which basically results in additional income.
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I kind of get the sense of this sentence, and I think that this sentence was supposed to make sense of the “Why is the Robux to Ad Credit conversion rate the same as the DevEx rate?” question, but I’m struggling to see how that makes things fair.
Lets say I was one of those mentioned large brands, and have purchased Robux at retail price solely for advertising. Or I was a small developer and purchased a smaller amount (which I have done in the past), it doesn’t matter. So I’ve spent $1 per Rx100, and now that I’m forced to use Ad Credits instead of those Robux, I can convert and get 35% of my money’s worth in Ad Credits. And this is fair, how? Because some folks didn’t spend money on their Robux but earned it instead? (and that earned Robux was also paid for at retail price, and a hefty cut was taken from it each time it switched hands)
I’m not accusing, I’m genuinely wondering if I’m missing something. The only way I see this being an okay thing (unless I’m missing something) is if Robux was still one of the payment options, and if it was valued at a pre-DevEx value when it’s being used. But it doesn’t seem like that’s the situation, why would anyone want to convert in that case.
I’m fine with the other stuff, even handing out my personal information (because all the big companies either already have it, or can buy it from other big companies), I’m even excited about the new platform, and CPP sounds promising (if done right); but this 
I can’t get over. I hope I misunderstood. Say someone purchased $100k worth of Robux one of these days, before November 7th, intended to sponsor over the next month or two. What are their options? Spend it all before the 7th, have what remains after that date lose 65% of its value, DevEx it and lose 65% of it, or spend it on other types of ads (hopefully that’s still an option)? Obviously an exaggerated case but the point remains, for someone $100 will feel like $100k.
But even without exaggerating, anyone who was saving up Robux for sponsoring will lose out on 65% of its value unless they dump it before the 7th and buy “lottery tickets” as you correctly called them yourselves. Up until this point a Robux was a Robux, bought or earned, and now a Robux is a Robux if you want to spend it on anything other than sponsoring, because in that case a Robux is 35% of a Robux.
Someone please tell me I’m wrong.
14 Likes
In the previous post, I already thought it was bad enough needing to give your information and your ID. But now I see, even if I didn’t have to do ANY OF THAT, I still wouldn’t be able to use this system if I really wanted to.
Why on EARTH did you make it so sponsors require a minimum of 20 credits? The only way I would be able to get that much is if I were to grind myself to death working in the “I’ll give you R$50 if you make a whole tycoon” clown mines, aka the Talent Hub.
Please don’t do this. I don’t mean “please don’t make this site a thing”, I mean please stop making it unusable for people who:
- Don’t want to give their personal information to a company infamous for mishandling it on multiple separate occasions
- Want to advertise stuff like their groups, which this change will completely destroy
- Aren’t willing to put in less than R$5,000. This last one feels like it was guided by those people on this exact devforum parroting the same “You need a minimum 20K budget” schlock for years and years.
If this goes through as-is, I recommend other developers that became absolutely screwed over by this situation start following that one 11-and-a-half hour Clear Code video. You know which one.
24 Likes
a) A tax deduction is not additional income - it simply means the government taxes a smaller percentage of your income. For example, a $1000 tax deduction on $10k of income means the government only taxes $9k of your income for that year. It does not mean you get $1000 or save $1000 in taxes.
b) Robux spent on ads never counted as income anyway because it was never converted to fiat currency.
In conclusion, this update does not make taxes simpler or cheaper.
Obligatory “I am not a lawyer and you should consult an accountant” disclaimer.
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I highly doubt ROBLOX themselves are extremely excited for this update either, however this is a change in which has been long coming, and something that they legally need to do. Any form of online advertisement is slowly becoming more and more restricted in numerous countries (such as the United States), ensuring safety and privacy for minors. I assume it was either, restrict advertising from children, or remove it all together.
Not entirely sure how this is a privacy violation either- the third party software that ROBLOX uses in order to verify your age not only encrypts the information given to them, but it also hashes and bins information that isn’t relevant. It’s not like they save a picture of your identification on their storage. At most they have your name associated with whether or not you are within a confines of a particular age set. (Which they already have assuming you use any sort of billing and are truthful when asked about your age.)
I highly doubt ROBLOX was the cause for you being “doxxed”, not sure what your experiences are, but there has been no data leak in which would put your address on public display, etc… But I can’t speak for your alleged experiences.
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I’m optimistic about this and I think the ultimate outcome of all of this will be net good for everyone. The only thing I don’t like is the weird overreach in asking for so much personal information from developers who may not even be intending to buy ad credits outside of robux. I don’t see why what looks like a billing address is required for these users.
Maybe the hidden devex behind the scenes?
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This new bidding system gives me some hope that the new sponsored ads are much more effective (compared to the 0.007% CTR I usually get). Bought some ad credits, we’ll see how it’ll perform…
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r/unpopularopinion, but I don’t think it’s much of a concern though.
Look, you need to verify your ID & submit tax forms when you DevEx. Most professional game developers have been through this process, as we want hard cash, not some arbitrary number. And I hope it makes sense why companies need proper ID verification for payouts. (money laundering)
The same group of developers are the primary audience for sponsoring experiences. New developers starting out will have to identify themselves in the future either way. If you’re unable/unwilling to identify yourself, are you sure this business is the right place for you?
KYC laws are inevitable, and I’m glad the lowest level of garbage is held back by this barrier.
EDIT: oh wow nevermind, you don’t need an ID at all to publish ads
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Developers don’t have to pay as much “useless” tax anymore (in my country this is how we view it as not getting to political but our taxes go down the drain). You can put all the money you would give to the government into your own business to help your business grow, instead of giving it to the government all at once.
Robux isn’t real money, so it’s easy to know exactly how much money you need to pay taxes on and can control how much you convert to fiat currency.
You’re still paying the same amount of tax in reality, but it feels like you’re making more money because now when you buy an advertisement with real money like USD or GBP, you can tell the government it’s a business expense. Before, you’d use Robux, which isn’t counted as taxable income or a business expense.
Example:
Please do not use anything above/below as financial advice, it’s purely a theoretical scenario.
Developer spends 3,000,000 Robux a year on advertisements, this works out to around $10,495 give or take transaction fees. If the tax rate is 10% (not a real tax rate, just for example) and the developer earns $100,000 then they would have to pay around $10,000 in taxes to their respective government. In this scenario we are down $10,495 (3,000,000 Robux) in valuation and still have to pay $10,000 to the government.
Now instead of using the 3,000,000 Robux we use the $10,495 USD to advertise. We deduct this $10,495 USD as a business expense and now we technically only owe the federal government $495 in income taxes. In this scenario we still have spent our 3,000,000 Robux ($10,495) and only pay the federal government $450.
Obviously, I am not a lawyer/accountant either and my post is purely speculation and theoretical; but just trying to clarify how this can be benefital change to an individual who file their own tax reports.
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Hi everyone,
Apologies for the confusion. You do NOT need an age verified or ID verified account to use Ads Manager. We have updated our documentation to reflect this.
Thank you.
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That still does not explain why we need to provide our address.
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Its a nice change, tho I’m still very much against the new “Add credit” system,
Then why don’t they just buy robux with the credit card instead of buying “add credit”, this whole add credit system feels very greedy.
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User ads aren’t working for me. When I click on the ‘User Ads’ option, I get redirected to the dashboard page. However, the ‘Sponsored Ads’ button is still functional. I’m unsure how to utilize ‘User Ads’ now. Moreover, I haven’t encountered any examples of using immersive ads to promote other experiences. Why would anyone currently opt for Ads Manager? I’m confused, especially since Ads Manager appears to support ads only within other experiences, and not on the home, discover, or search pages yet.
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I have some mixed feelings about this whole system. The majority of it is actually great - it seems it’ll boost discoverability, give you more flexible options for how you use your ads, and you only pay for what you’re advertising for (only pay for each play, or impression, depending on your target).
The main thing I don’t understand about this is the ad credit system. Why not just allow us to purchase ads directly with Robux, and tax it to match roughly the same price these ad credits would provide? And USD can still be an option, and just be paid immediately rather than having to purchase ad credits with that currency?
It’s just a bit confusing, the most confusing part being that you need a minimum of roughly R$5,000 robux to start an ad (from what i’ve heard from previous posts), meanwhile you can exchange R$2,850 worth of credits. Why not just set the minimum to 20 credits so that nobody gets locked out of funds? Not only that, but such a high price barrier makes it much harder for smaller developers who aren’t willing to spend $50 USD to get started making games. When I bought my first ever advertisements nearly 2 years ago, I had to convince my parents to allow me to spend $20 USD, and then only spent about $5 of it at first because I wanted to test the waters and make sure it was a safe investment. With this new system, a person like I once was wouldn’t be able to get started developing on Roblox without taking significant risk (especially given that advertisements are one of the only ways to get players considering how punishing the algorithm is). It’s fine if you want to keep prices this high, but expect a decrease in new developers if you do.
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I agree, why do you need 5000 robux to start an ad, It just seems useless?
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Absolutely insane that it requires 11400 Robux to start a daily campaign, that’s basically over 100 USD
Why is this misleading?
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They already announced that they’re removing those.
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