Note that I've decided to suspend ad sales. These auctions will probably be permanently ended, and I'm not sure whether or in what form advertising in general will be continued. Maybe some ads will go up again fairly soon, or maybe there will never be any more ads; I haven't decided yet. The main reasons for this decision are:

Firstly, I'm finding it too difficult to determine which services are legit/safe and which are not. It takes me 30+ minutes to research each new service to reach at least some level of confidence in it, but at the end of this I often still don't feel fully confident. Bitcointalk.org is meant to be operated "as a service to the community", so it's very important to me that bitcointalk.org not be seen to be putting profit above the interests of its users. (I've been kind of shocked at the crypto-related ads that are shown on TV, which are often way beyond anything I'd accept here. And I'd like to tighten our standards.)

.....

Finally, bitcointalk.org has a large reserve of BTC, so we're able to continue operating without ad revenue for many years. It's not even necessary to cut expenses or find replacement sources of revenue anytime soon, and I currently have no solid plans to do these things. I do regard it as less than ideal to be operating at a constant loss, especially because it constraints any desired future growth in expenses. Improving this situation will be on my mind in the coming years, but luckily it need not be a high priority.