Webmaster offers us money to retract plagiarism complaint

Amazing. Does he think this will work?

[beren]

One great thing about Google’s AdSense program is that if a site copies your content you can complain to AdSense. In the past, you had to send a cease and desist to the site owner, and half the time they would ignore you. But if you complain to AdSense, the offending material comes down every time. It’s great. Google’s website tells you how to file a complaint. I end up sending in 6 or 7 complaints a month and I always get results.

Anyway, a couple weeks ago I sent in a complaint about a site that copied my client’s site. And the AdSense publisher sleazeball has the audacity to call my client and ask that the complaint against him be "retracted" because Google is kicking him out of AdSense. He’s not saying he didn’t plagiarize; he admits he did. He just says that since he took down the site, we should remove our complaint. Incredible! I guess Google kicked him out of AdSense altogether, including his other sites. He wants to play the sympathy card with us, how he’s losing his AdSense money.

The dispute is between him and Google, and I don’t think that if I "retracted" the complaint that anything would be different. I doubt Google would pay any attention to me as far as letting him back into AdSense. He still plagiarized. Am I supposed to say: oh, it’s OK because he took his site down? Because they all take their sites down after a complaint. I don’t know how I would even go about withdrawing a complaint, and I doubt Google would consider my withdrawal when it comes to dealing with this guy anyway.

Then he offers us $5000 to retract the complaint. I guess he makes big bucks on AdSense. My client rejected that offer, and I’m glad.

I can’t believe the low quality of person they allow into AdSense, and the whole incident makes me glad we don’t run our ads on Google’s content match.

[sonjay]

I can’t believe the low quality of person they allow into AdSense

Actually, it sounds to me like they are making an honest effort to keep the "low quality" persons out. After all, they kicked the guy completely out of AdSense, right?

[hunderdown]

I'm an AdSense publisher and I think I'm typical of many--my site has lots of content, complies (more than complies) with AdSense policies, and gets extremely relevant traffic).

If you were an advertiser in my area, you would WANT to be on sites like mine--that's the flip side of not advertising on the content network.

Of course, there may be more problem sites in your area, but please don't assume that all AdSense sites are like that bozo's.

[edited by: engine at 4:38 pm (utc) on Aug. 1, 2005]
[edit reason] TOS [/edit]

[justgowithit]

Uh Oh, Beren - You'd better put your shields up - ;)

I can’t believe the low quality of person they allow into AdSense, and the whole incident makes me glad we don’t run our ads on Google’s content match.

You’re judging millions of professional webmasters on the basis of one persons greed and ignorance. The finer points have already been made. Google is not a babysitter, and they do their best to impose strict regulation where needed.

In a perfect world regulations would not be needed, but it’s nice to see that they’re enforced.

Gee, I wonder if your clients are losing money because you refuse to use content match?

You sound pretty angry with this guy, and you are justified. With that said, I wouldn’t let your emotions cloud your better business (ad)sense.

[beren]

Oh, Google didn't kick this guy out of AdSense. I didn't think they would, and I looked at his sites today and they have ads on them. The site where he copied material is down, probably for good.

Google is pretty lax when it comes to dealing with publishers as far as I can tell. They don't want to lose them. I tracked down this publisher and on another webmaster board (not webmasterworld) he said he made $6K to $7K a month from AdSense. This was back in October of last year. Google doesn't punish big earners.

But we are approaching a point where running AdSense may become a cause for stigma. I'd be leary of entering into any business relationship with someone who does so.

[EVOrange]

Are you saying that because someone is running Adsense on their site, you consider them to be unethical and a poor business prospect?

EVO

[hunderdown]

But we are approaching a point where running AdSense may become a cause for stigma. I'd be leary of entering into any business relationship with someone who does so.

You're way, way overgeneralizing from one very bad experience. See my earlier comment.