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Yikes, not sure what I did to set that off. I'm not angry at Google, I'm just stating the fact that as someone who does business with Google I am constantly awa
by jonknee 14y ago
Yikes, not sure what I did to set that off. I'm not angry at Google, I'm just stating the fact that as someone who does business with Google I am constantly aware that our arrangement could be gone at any moment at no-fault of my own and without any recourse.
> If not for Google, you may not have a dime of that money you've earned. I mean, maybe not, right? If so, then you'd have to have gotten that money through someone else doing what Google is doing right? Why not just switch to them if Google does you dirty?
And likewise, Google wouldn't have had their cut for that money either. As best as I can tell it's a mutually beneficial relationship, but Google's lack of transparency does shift the balance (while I can yank all my inventory, that only works going forwards, Google can unilaterally decide to not pay you for what they have already taken).
> How many articles have we seen about Facebook doing exactly that? That's much worse IMO. If I'm giving you money, you better be taking it legitimately. If I'm taking your money, the onus is on me to prove I have taken it honestly. If not, I'd totally expect Google to keep the money -- and they don't keep the money -- they give it back to the advertiser or never charge them to begin with.
All of the tools, methods and results of legitimacy are stacked on Google's side and are kept completely secret. If their secret sauce decides to boot you, they don't even let you know what happened, which is especially rich. The same applies to AdWords, Google hosts an auction but keeps everyone in the dark and asks for their trust. Advertisers don't have any say in click fraud either, it's all left to the secret black box.
It's a pretty ridiculous thing on its face. Imagine an employeer takes you into the conference room in the middle of the month and states that they're not happy with something (but won't say what) and that they're going to have to take your past three pay checks and send you on your way. Frustrating to say the least.
AdSense is great, but not perfect.
- chimi 14y agoI think years and years of people focusing on the tiny percentage of people who are wrongly accused by the googleplex is what set me off. Everyone knows. It's boring. Get over it. It's exactly the way it is supposed to be and there is no better way. All the proposals to get a human involved slow everything down and Google would never have gotten to where they are if they had people wasting their time on every case that cried about being an exception to the rule -- especially since even those who cry about being the exception really aren't the exception. It's a waste of time and these blog posts are a waste of time and here I am wasting more time.
- jonknee 14y ago> Everyone knows. It's boring. Get over it. It's exactly the way it is supposed to be an there is no better way. All the proposals to get a human involved slow everything down and Google would never have gotten to where they are if they had people wasting their time on every case that cried about being an exception to the rule -- especially since even those who cry about being the exception really aren't the exception. There is a better way, but it's against Google's ethos to not use engineering to solve a problem. That itself is the problem this thread is speaking to. Algorithms are great, except when they're not. Most companies have a way to deal with that, but Google makes it a point of pride to not. Other fraud systems are not completely controlled by an algorithm. Imagine if Visa banned you from ever being able to accept Visa without an appeals process or even providing any information about what you did wrong? If Visa detects a pattern of fraud they open an investigation and the merchant is a part of this process. It's slow and expensive, but also necessary and has not prevented credit card companies to operate at huge scale.