FTC Disclosure Introduction

At TheTechMentor.com we love that we can help people, in many cases for free even though some alternatives to our solutions may have substantial costs charged by others. That can be in the form of our free-to-access articles for the computer novice through to the computer technician or computer network installation expert or cyber security expert (or really any tech expert). We are not offering professional legal advice or accounting advice or other professional advice (you can see the Terms Of Service if you want to read more about that).

We get a kick out of people letting us know in the comments that something in the article helped them. Truly. You can read more about us on the not so secretly named About Us page.

This service (the website) has many costs to operate and maintain in good working order, comply with laws etc. It’s time consuming and requires resources such as server hosting (and a whole lot more).

It is a considerable investment of time and money. Without sufficient financial support the website and the service would not exist.

US FTC (Federal Trade Commission) law require sites tell you of affiliate links (so you see advice like this on good sites).

How do we pay for these costs and investment?

1. We charge for access to courses for computer technicians who want to start their own IT business (or part-time business on the side). This gives access to parts of this website that non-paying visitors do not have access to.
2. We typically run advertising via Google Adsense on free-to-view pages. We place ads with the intention of you being able to see them and recognize them as ads, but do not want so many as to be messy or ugly.
3. On some pages we provide affiliate links (such as to Amazon), which if you click through places a special cookie that identifies us as the source so we can receive a commission (which is normally very small) if you buy according to the rules of the Affiliate company. We do not receive any information about you personally from the affiliate company (see the Privacy Policy for more information about personal information and EU GDPR). As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.

The affiliate process does not cost you more money and in some cases our deals will save you money. That is our preference! We could claim to be impartial ’til the cows come home, however we inform you so you can form your own judgment as to how much weight to give our endorsement. Having said that in probably all cases our endorsement is based on our research, judgment based on personal experience and/or personal ownership; in other cases we clearly do not give our endorsement (i.e. do not say the product is ‘good’) but rather the affiliate links are there so you can find those and possibly similar items more easily (and we still earn a commission on qualifying purchases). Not all links are affiliate links. Many exist to allow you to more easily find and open the mentioned site or document (typically at the destination location).

At the time of writing we have not accepted sponsored (paid) guest posts. On the basis that we may do in future, we commit that sponsored posts will be identified as such, again so that you might form your own opinion about any potential bias with that knowledge. We have interacted with some professional companies that we respect, believe to be helpful or relevant, and have provided information and interviews about them as a result.

We do not ask for donations. That is just the way we do it ’round here!

Review Quality

We do not accept payment for favorable reviews.

We do not always own or use items in our reviews, but one of us has if we say we have. In cases where we have not used the device or service ourselves we rely on other relevant experience, judgment and/or research that we undertake with the aim of saving you time repeating the same or similar research (and hopefully we are better at it!). We will not state we have used an item if none of us have.

As stated above we commit that sponsored posts (including sponsored reviews) will be identified as such, if we do have them in future.

Notification At source

This information in this FTC disclosure is to provide more in-depth information in one place.

All new pages that provide affiliate links will display comments to that effect in an obvious way if the links form part of a product recommendation. Older pages are going through review over time to back-wards comply with new rules.

Can you Help Us?

Yes, you can help by using the affiliate links you find on our site if you are interested in the product or service they relate to. This will not cost you anything.

Also you can click or tap on an ad if you are interested in it.

You may help us feel good by letting us know in the comments if an article helped you. We really do like this!

You can help us and others by sharing to them anything you found interesting good or helpful on our website.

You can help us and others if you place a relevant link to our site on your (or others’) websites (eg. forums) if you similarly found it useful good or helpful. If you want these to be no-follow links that is up to you. If it forms a noteworthy reference or uses something on this site that states it is required please provide a follow link.

You can help others by adding relevant helpful comments. Do not make ‘spammy’ comments as we take the time to review and moderate all comments.

You are not obliged to do any of the above in order to view the free-to-view information.