Written on August 18th, 2005 at 01:08 pm by Darren Rowse
Engadget – 5 Adsense Adblocks Per page
Adrants observes that Engadget is running more than the normally allowed 3 ad blocks per page (I see four plus an ad unit on most individual pages and five on their main page) and wonders if it violates the Adsense TOS. Jason Calacanis answers in comments:
‘I can assure you we are not violating any terms with them.
I can not discuss the issue beyond on that.’
This either means they can do it because they are a premium publisher (because of their size these publishers can negotiate their own deals directly with Adsense on placement, ad sizes, design etc) OR that they are testing something new for Adsense (ie more than 3 adblocks per page). Of course either way they will have signed a NDA.
update – more on this at Dave’s where it gets quite heated and Jason’s where he gives the official line again.
13 Responses to “Engadget – 5 Adsense Adblocks Per page” - Add Yours
Andy Merrett
August 18th, 2005 3:20 pm
The standard line we’re all receiving from Jason is:
But he has also taken some time out to answer specific issues.
I got the line, and I never actually accused Jason of breaking Google TOS – I’ve just been following it here and there.
duncan
August 18th, 2005 4:15 pm
I’m think he has a private agreement with Google, its just disappointing that it obviously seems to include a privacy clause that prevents him from speaking about it.
AdMoolah News and Views » Engadget Runs More Than 3 AdSense Ads Per Page
August 18th, 2005 4:18 pm
[...] Also see: ProBlogger [...]
Dave
August 18th, 2005 5:25 pm
Interesting in that 5 ad units is getting close to overkill. I’m more surprised that they are doing it from a ‘annoying-your-regulars’ view point.
But I guess if your main priority is chasing the money, anything goes.
Andy Merrett
August 18th, 2005 5:49 pm
It was interesting that Dave Naylor said something along the lines of ‘heck if I had 6 ad blocks on a page I’d be making $1m a year with AdSense’.
Not strictly true though, as often clickthru goes up with less ads on a page.
I can understand having more ads on a page with lots and lots of content on one page, spread out, but I would wonder at the effectiveness of the contextual ads, and generally would prefer a lower volume of more highly-targeted content per page.
For me, 3 ad blocks is plenty. I actually reduced it to 2 on my personal blog as it was getting too crowded and not worth the space.
Comic Strip Blogger
August 18th, 2005 7:00 pm
I think that it is issue between Calacanis/WeblogsInc and Google and that other people should not feel overly righteous and shouldn’t whine about it.
And I am not fan of Calacanis: he is nasty person, who spreads lies about me and even stolen one of my comic strips – removed copyright text and placed it without links on his server.
But still I think that in this issue Calacanis should not be attacked. It’s internal issue between Calacanis and Google. Calacanis shouldn’t be forced to disclose private agreements. We must respect privacy for god’s sake!
Cellounge Admin
August 18th, 2005 9:10 pm
Dave and Jason are probably best friends who call each other everyday just to see how much buzz they can create about their blogs. End of story.
Andy Merrett
August 18th, 2005 10:01 pm
Hehe. Maybe.
Dean
August 18th, 2005 10:05 pm
I personally don’t like engadget either they steal stories about gadgets form sites and calm that some guy name “Dave” found it
Andre Fiebig
August 18th, 2005 11:31 pm
Actually I can not see any Adsense-ad on Engadget.
Andy Merrett
August 19th, 2005 1:20 am
My that Dave gets around a bit :)
Andy Merrett
August 19th, 2005 6:44 am
I saw 6 on the front page tonight.
Arun
August 20th, 2005 9:23 pm
Perhaps if anyone cared to read about the “Premium AdSense” program Google offers to large publilshers, This little spat wouldn’t have started in the first place.
I think its more than fair to say that the Weblogs, Inc. network receives more than 20 million+ content page views a month.
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