Found a definitely grey-hat site.

Should I report?

[sven1977]

I just stumbled over a site related in topic and content to my own. I have to say that I was quite unimpressed by the crappy content and layout of their site.

This is what they do: On the top, they have a google AdSense leaderboard. Then in the body, they describe "their" products, but it's obvious that they don't sell anything and offer no products whatsoever. They clearly want their visitors to click on the Ads thinking that the ads lead to this scammy "website's products".

I would love to report them. What do you think, is this aganist the google TOS? I hope it is. These guys make me sick.

[rden17]

Just because you are 'unimpressed' by the content, do you feel you are the google police? If they have google adsense on their site, then they have been spidered by google, and google is aware of what they are. If they are still up, then it would appear they are working within google's acceptable guidlines. If they are not, then they will be down soon enough. No offense, but who are you to dictate what they can do? As long as they are not directly harming you, it's none of your business

[Lipik]

Just keep in mind who's fine with it :

Someone google's for 'widget', lands on this site, find some info about the widget he's looking for, clicks on one of the adsense ads and lands on a site that sells 'widgets'.
The owner of the widget-site who buys adwords is happy, google is happy, the owner of the grey-hat site is happy, google is happy again and the surfer is happy becouse he found what he was looking for. (it's almost Peter GABRIEL - Games Without Frontiers)
In fact this is some kind of affiliate site over google adsense/adwords.
The only thing what makes it gray is that they are making you think they sell the widgets.
And yes, you're not happy. But none of those above care about that...
It do understand that you don't feel ok with it, if you put lots of efforts in making good quality pages, but that's life...

[crick]

Let people be the judge of what is and isn't good content.

[Jafo]

This is like complaining the Toyota when you see one of their commercials on CNN or some other such channel with lousy programming. :)

[Garfieldt]

If you feel it's a site without real content, thus a MFA site, then report them and let google make the call whether to let them stay or kick them out.

[Green_Grass]

Prima facie it does not seem that the site is doing anything against TOS .. They may not have a 'good to look at site' or 'attractive content' but then there are hundreds and thousands of such site ..... They are called MFA's...

[alephh]

Are you sure you want to start reporting sites like that? Because, then there would be a lot of sites worth reporting.

Maybe even your site...

Because basically almost anything can be interpret as a violation of TOS, if you're having a bad day or you are just plain evil.

Have image somewhere on your site? Why not to interpret that as balancing layout in a way that points attention toward ads - Google doesn't allow "direct" pointing to ads, but where is the line drawn?

Reportings sites too easily may lead to a phenomena where angry webmasters report more sites, and the cycle is ready.

[hyperkik]

I think it is fair to assume that Google knows how to handle valid complaints, and it knows how to ignore those it doesn't find to be valid.

[rden17]

I think it's also fair to assume that google can handle this themselves in the first place if they choose to. Others are right... start blowing people in for content 'you' don't like, and your competetors will likely start doing the same to you.

Site content can be very subjective.

That said, if there is a site out there (which there are) that are blatantly breaking the rules and are directly affecting your site, by all means, you have the right to complain to google. Know where to draw that line.

[alephh]

-- "I think it is fair to assume that Google knows how to handle valid complaints, and it knows how to ignore those it doesn't find to be valid."

Then why is web and forums filled with people (some experienced with web and google) complaining and wondering why their account was banned from adsense after running seemingly fine site? ;-)

Considering that many aspects of google-world are slow, some of them painfully so, one might assume that there is not too much staff available. If there is too many complaints coming in, they have one option - judge with speed.

[Edge]

sven1977

Anybody that looks scammy, spammy, or is breaking the TOS - REPORT THEM!. We should work together to help the Adsense program be SUCCESSFULL for the advertisers, Google, and our selves.

[jomaxx]

If the text on the page is actually drawing attention to the ads or encouraging clicking, then report them. If there's no real content on the page, report them.

OTOH, if it's less about TOS violations than about the fact that there's no justice in the world, I suggest you deal with it and move on with your life. The fact that a lousy site exists isn't your problem.

[hdpt00]

I was wondering if you could report every site in my niche for me, maybe, just maybe 1 will get taken down out of the 100,000 you can report.

PM me if you are up for it.

[hyperkik]

Sure. Send me the URL of your site and I'll try to get it taken down. (That's what you meant, right? ;-)

[jpservicez1]

You can debate/analysis whether you should report a site to google or not. But has anybody thought of what would you do if there were NO ADSENSE ads on this site...

I have notice generally that if site surfers notice either "spamming" or "anything-hat" site the first port of call is i will report to Google via ADSENSE link and in most cases its the webmaster/website owners that does this.

An innocent site surfer will visit this site and leave immediately if the content displeases them.

OR

Let me ask this question another way...

will you be thinking of reporting this site if the site has AMAZON or any other afiliate related ads on the site..

If we are unhappy about what a site does WHY don't we email the site owner and let the person know what we feel.

Thinking of stopping someone adsense program to me only works in the short term..Have seen a site lose its adsense this week and nexk week they have YAHOO ads showing..you report them again and they will move to overture's ads..

Think of helping the site owner understand what having a valuable site is about not pushing him to mask his crime...

just my opinion

[sven1977]

jpservicez1, it is true, what you say, but google usually sends a warning to the publisher first before just banning them.

Anyway, I have not done anything toward reporting the mentioned site. For me, it is more a general issue. We all know that drawing attention to the ads is prohibited and publishers that do so should be warned, banned, etc..
The guy that I referred to in my OP is not saying explicitly to click on his ads. BUT: He describes "his" products, by which he means the products behind the adsense ads on his site. Any user, who doesn't know, what adsense is (probably way more than 80-85%) will think: "Oh, that was a nice description of the thing I want. Let's see, where do I go from here. Oh here is a link that says "buy our blabla". Let me click here to see the actual product!"

I mean, come on, that's clearly pushing your users to click on the ads, no?