[Spinball]

Originally Posted by ConqSoft

High numbers, with no content to back it up, shouldn't be any threat to you at all...

It's not and I never said it was.
My point - which you missed completely - is that one site (e.g. our competitior I mentioned) publishing false stats besmirches all forums/websites.
Look, any large forum requires an expensive server or servers. 3 in our case with a fat pipe. How do we pay for this? Subscriptions are one model but in the age of free content, the most common way is banner advertising.
Now my experience is that most advertisers are on the ball and will cancel their campaign if they don't see the impressions/clicks they are paying for. But some are not. And the only stats they may have will be those presented by the forum in question. It would be nice to think that as a whole, the vbulletin forum running community was recognised as being trustworthy. This hack will have the opposite effect. By publishing false stats, a forum owner calls in to doubt our genuine stats.
Not everyone can afford independent reports (like Hitwise at over ?1000/$1770) each and every month.
P.S. Wish I still had my black Blade!