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why is nobody talking about the fact that google adsense runs the exact same scam ads? they even run on techcrunch, twitpic, mashable and many other "reputable"

why is nobody talking about the fact that google adsense runs the exact same scam ads? they even run on techcrunch, twitpic, mashable and many other "reputable" websites.

electromagnetic 17y ago
Because people are stupid and Facebook gets thousands of page hits by the same people daily, generally by morons who barely got past typing "face book" into google. Techcrunch users have likely been around on the internet for a long time and know these things are scams without being ripped off. There's thousands of warnings about spam scams and phishers, everyone who read techcrunch or similar sites likely knew they were scams on the first email they ever received of the nature.
patio11 17y ago
Aaron Wall bangs this drum all the time, but I suppose most people write it off as "Bah, he's an SEO." (Possible conflict of interest note: I moderate on his forum.) See, for example, here: http://www.seobook.com/danny-sullivan-highlights-googles-2-tier-justice-system-it-only-spam-if-you-are-poor http://www.seobook.com/danny-sullivan-highlights-googles-2-t...
DarkShikari 17y ago
Google makes ungodly amounts of money off scams. One of the main Videolan project devs told me recently that their update tool stats show that 15% of all VLC builds downloaded are from scam sites--sites that charge money for VLC or include spyware in the installation, and promote themselves using Google Ads. Google refuses to stop serving ads on the keyword and it's impossible to go after the sites legally (they're all based in Russia or whatnot, whack-a-mole and all that). Now consider the fact that there were 80 million VLC downloads in the period after the 1.0 release. And OpenOffice apparently has the problem even worse. It's really quite sickening the way that AdSense profits off these sorts of scams.
pkaler 17y ago
Google AdWords has a policy against "Negative option or unclear billing practices". There is also a section on "Support advertised prices, discounts, and free offers." http://adwords.google.com/support/aw/bin/static.py?page=guidelines.cs http://adwords.google.com/support/aw/bin/static.py?page=guid... I'm going to assume that Scamville offers would fall under one of those categories. Hard to say without actual legal precedent.
- aaronwall 17y ago
  "Google AdWords has a policy" ... but the problem is policies which are loosely enforced may as well not exist. Google was quick to point out their policies to the FTC on the scammy government grant ads, and yet months later Google was running the very same scam ads http://www.seobook.com/buying-links-vs-buying-rankings http://www.seobook.com/buying-links-vs-buying-rankings some more background on Google's ads http://www.benedelman.org/ppc-scams/ http://www.benedelman.org/ppc-scams/ http://www.seobook.com/how-make-easy-money-google http://www.seobook.com/how-make-easy-money-google

why is nobody talking about the fact that google adsense runs the exact same scam ads? they even run on techcrunch, twitpic, mashable and many other "reputable" websites.

electromagnetic 17y ago

Because people are stupid and Facebook gets thousands of page hits by the same people daily, generally by morons who barely got past typing "face book" into google. Techcrunch users have likely been around on the internet for a long time and know these things are scams without being ripped off. There's thousands of warnings about spam scams and phishers, everyone who read techcrunch or similar sites likely knew they were scams on the first email they ever received of the nature.

patio11 17y ago

Aaron Wall bangs this drum all the time, but I suppose most people write it off as "Bah, he's an SEO." (Possible conflict of interest note: I moderate on his forum.) See, for example, here: http://www.seobook.com/danny-sullivan-highlights-googles-2-tier-justice-system-it-only-spam-if-you-are-poor http://www.seobook.com/danny-sullivan-highlights-googles-2-t...

DarkShikari 17y ago

Google makes ungodly amounts of money off scams. One of the main Videolan project devs told me recently that their update tool stats show that 15% of all VLC builds downloaded are from scam sites--sites that charge money for VLC or include spyware in the installation, and promote themselves using Google Ads. Google refuses to stop serving ads on the keyword and it's impossible to go after the sites legally (they're all based in Russia or whatnot, whack-a-mole and all that). Now consider the fact that there were 80 million VLC downloads in the period after the 1.0 release. And OpenOffice apparently has the problem even worse. It's really quite sickening the way that AdSense profits off these sorts of scams.

pkaler 17y ago

Google AdWords has a policy against "Negative option or unclear billing practices". There is also a section on "Support advertised prices, discounts, and free offers." http://adwords.google.com/support/aw/bin/static.py?page=guidelines.cs http://adwords.google.com/support/aw/bin/static.py?page=guid... I'm going to assume that Scamville offers would fall under one of those categories. Hard to say without actual legal precedent.

aaronwall 17y ago
"Google AdWords has a policy" ... but the problem is policies which are loosely enforced may as well not exist. Google was quick to point out their policies to the FTC on the scammy government grant ads, and yet months later Google was running the very same scam ads http://www.seobook.com/buying-links-vs-buying-rankings http://www.seobook.com/buying-links-vs-buying-rankings some more background on Google's ads http://www.benedelman.org/ppc-scams/ http://www.benedelman.org/ppc-scams/ http://www.seobook.com/how-make-easy-money-google http://www.seobook.com/how-make-easy-money-google