I’ve seen several large brands pull all contentual advertising from AdWords.

This leads to less advertisers, less competition, and lower payouts for legitimate customers.

Splogs will hurt legit publishers, it’s just a matter of how much.

You’re completely right. I just misinterpreted something else you had said incorrectly. I see now!

Jeremy

“I’ve got an idea – get that Volunteer Army together and get Google to pay out all click-through funds generated by a splog to the first person that reported a confirmed splog.”

Here’s a better idea – instead of donating your time to Google, how about donating it to a cause that could really use it.

On a related note, you gotta love how Google so effortlessly was able to convince this “Volunteer Army” to do Google’s job – completely FREE OF CHARGE! Kool aid anyone?

At no point do I suggest click fraud, what I suggested is that when bloggers receive spam postings they go to the sources of those sites and click the ads there. It would not target legitimate Blogspot (or other hosts that facilitate splogs) publishers, just the abusers. It would not be “random.”

This would create pain for advertisers—it won’t drive them away, because AdSense works—but it will make them demand Google explain why they are getting much lower conversion rates. They will petition Google for relief, which is what advertising customers do (and I speak from experience as a publisher). These kinds of campaigns could be conducted in narrow timeframes by groups of bloggers who are tired, as I am, of cleaning spam postings out of their comments and trackbacks.

Finally, there is a general tone that this is wrong because it is bad business. I am suggesting a political statement, not a business decision. If Google bans me for clicking other people’s ads, they would have to prove I was commiting fraud, which is not the case if I am clicking on ads on other people’s sites. I’m justs surfing. But, frankly, if Google cut off AdSense on my site it would do nothing to my ability to earn money from the site. There are other ad programs that will pay me a few dollars a month, too.

We shouldn’t be so timid about the information environment we live in. Google’s contributing to information pollution and we should act to stop them.

Heh…if it worked properly (knowing the way spammer’s minds work), you’d end up having spammers building bots to automate the hunting sploggers in order to steal clickthrough cash. Nice little thought, that. T’would keep them all twisting around each other in a spamaliscious double-helix of death.

I have no problem with people doing what you do and using the ads to shop around because you have an interest in the products and if you saw the right deal I’m sure you’d buy one – but what Mitch is suggesting is that we go out and click random ads with the intention of causing pain. To me that just doesn’t sound like the solution to anything.

And Darren, for what it’s worth, fraud can be theft, so you were perfectly correct to call it that.

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cacodes/pen/484-502.9.html

Sorry Nicholas. ;)

A magazine is paid by advertisers to show their advertisements in the magazine. A company sets aside money for their advertising budget with the hopes that they get enough purchases (and then some) to cover that cost alone. I haven’t paid to advertise my blog yet (all of it has been word of mouth, or being linked by more popular basketball blogs), but likely will – I have nothing to sell, but the hope is by paying and attracting more visitors, it’ll create a larger audience and create more advertising revenue – or hopefully cover the costs that I spent promoting the site.

I have been to many sites and clicked on an ad to compare prices of various products. iPods, computers, cell phones, sports memorabillia, etc. Have I purchased anything yet? No, likely cause I’ve been in no real rush to get any of those things yet, but will be as Christmas draws near.

A company takes a risk when they pay to run an ad through Google. If someone clicks but doesn’t purchase anything they need to expect that. I will expect that when I start up some of my other sites. Maybe they’ll come back later and purchase something. Or maybe, they’ll see that site is offering a better deal than another site and refer someone to it, and that will equal a sale.

It’s just like watching TV or buying a magazine. A company may advertise on it, and many people may see it, but they’re taking the risk of nobody buying something and that’s all about setting money aside for an advertising budget. I understand I’ll be taking the exact same risk.

By the way, Darren – great site. Been coming here for about seven months, and your wealth of knowledge never ceases to amaze me.

Jeremy

Looking back at my comment, I can’t believe I wrote that. I have a constant change of minds when it comes to commenting. Anyway, my point (I think) was that in this case you’re not taking the money for yourself. In fact, you’re hoping the clicks will be detected as fraudulent. Sure, it’s a dumb idea, but it doesn’t equate to theft. I don’t think click fraud is even an illegal action. Come to think of it, I’m not sure it’s even morally wrong either. As a web surfer, shouldn’t users be able to click on anything they want.

As a matter of fact, I don’t even think that click fraud is a problem for online advertising. Look at it this way, it’s the equivalent of people flipping the channel during television ads. The price of them is equated into the price of the medium.

Nicholas

There are plenty of people, including myself, who have legitimate and useful blogs on BlogSpot and who have AdSense added to try to make a little extra money.

It’s against the TOS for adwords/adsense and it unethical.

Why is it that the solution is scorched earth or nothing at all?

I’m finishing up moving what started out as a blog, onto its own domain (it will still be a blog, but it didn’t have a seperate domain, and now I can post more information). I’ve become very hesitant about posting my personal reviews, because last week somebody made me aware of a site that covers a larger area than mine (mine is a niche site).

This site is taking reviews from many other sites, including some very large tech magazine sites, and posting them as their own. All the while they are running AdSense, etc. Thankfully, none of my reviews had been picked up (I took mine offline temporarily once I saw the site).

They aren’t even changing the wording – you can take a sentence or two from every “review” they have posted and Google will turn up the proper owners. They’ve pulled off a PR of 5 as well. There is no credit given anywhere on their site (not that they would – I don’t know of any major site that would say “you can reprint our entire review”).

I was actually going to email Darren and get his opinion on what to do, because it could affect a site that he runs as well. I’m hesitant to say anything to Google, because I’ve gotten the impression they are aren’t too concerned from what others have said. I’m tempted to contact the publishers of the original reviews, and may go down that path.

Andrew

I know that’s not a legal definition – but it’s how I see it.

Fraud is fraud NOT theft. Sure, it may be considered just as wrong as theft, but that does not make it the same thing. This is similar to the “copyright infringement is theft” argument. No, copyright infringement is copyright infringement; theft is theft. There’s a distinction between the three for a reason; it’s a disservice to confuse it.

Here’s a few online definitions for the two:

http://www.answers.com/theft
theft: n. 1. The act or an instance of stealing; larceny.

http://www.answers.com/fraud
fraud: n. 1. A deception deliberately practiced in order to secure unfair or unlawful gain.

If I’m looking for a new DVD player and I type DVD player in google and I get to a site that links to DVD players and I find an ad on it linking me to the dvd store. The advertiser shouldn’t mind.. infact i’m sure they love that.

Before something can be done there needs to be a clear cut definition of what a blog is and what a splog is. Does simply having an RSS feed convert a web page into a “blog”? does linking to latest gadgets while having an RSS feed make it a splog?

SplogSpot.com had some real “blogs” in their list.

Since we’re on the topic of categorizing blogs vs splogs.. can any one give me an example of a “splog”? Also.. no offense to anyway… but are sites like slashdot and darrens photolog site example of splogs? because neither has actual CONTENT just latest NEWS… and whats wrong with that?