OpenAds
 

I wanted to ask if it was easy enough to run. Im only looking to possibly use it 3 - 5 zones. And basic banner sizes .

Easy for simple configurations, relatively easy for complex configurations AFTER you get that configuration set.

Basics:

Inventory, Advertisers & Campaigns

Advertiser = Sponsor
Campaign = Site

Inventory, Websites & Zones

Website = site
Zone = Location of banner on site, zone for top 500x100 banner, right 300x300 banner, etc.

Add your banners in for the site, the size will determine the zone that it will be displayed in.

Sponsor not converting well? Disable the advertiser. Site not converting well? Disable the campaign. Banner not doing well? Disable the banner.

You can do scheduled changes, i.e. promote this sponsor only on Thursday for the extra payout. Its an easy way to test a new sponsor or a new site -- just enable it for 12 hours, look at your displays, clicks, figure out your ratio, etc.

It seems simple enough, Ive been reading the literature. I just honestly never worked with anything like it..that I recall. Im just not used to things being on "auto-pilot"

You can use simpler rotation scripts if its just your own ads. Openads is a behemoth and overkill for a single advertiser.

You don't get the stats with rotation scripts do you? I am thinking of using Openads to run HFS anf FHG - will that work?

Not with any I've used. But if I were you and was going to use it, I wouldnt do a google search for "openads exploits" first. It maght make you paranoid. LOL. Seiously though, I might use it again someday on a dedicated domain to serve ads for all my sites.... when I am lord god king of pornography and have some extra time.

OpenAds comes with it's own little happy set of idiotic design flaws so it is in fact quite exploitable. As witnessed by the sheer number of updates that have been put out in the last few months.

It's also a big pain in the ass to update, because you can't do a "live" update. Doing any sort of update requires that you shut it down while you do it, which means for about 10 minutes you'll be losing out on banner rotations and such things.