Forum Moderators: martinibuster
Google applies retroactive unappealable loss of earned income. No writer, artist, musician or actor would allow themselves to be keelhauled in such a fashion. And they do it out of SHEER LAZINESS. They HAVE THE ABILITY to make the system less gameable but... they choose not to. They choose to collect the profits. If your site is gamed, well... too bad.
This is wrong in every field of endeavor, and ONLY if publishers VOICE DISCONTENT will it be rectified. YOUR CONTENT HAS VALUE and deserves protection.
Listen to one publisher who went through being wrongly accused of click fraud and then let back in:
I wish I knew other people it had happened to because then we could start a support group...
it is a special kind of anxiety that plagues me heavily still...
For instance while inside my adsense account, checking my stats, every single link that i click gives my a teeny tiny little heart attack becasue the association of "clicking" and "adsense" and having no idea what happened in the first place triggers some kind of internal fear mechanism. The same thing often happens when clicking "adsense" titled threads around here...
Maybe I should use my adsense checks to seek professional help. hehe.
What kind of relationship is THIS to have with the company YOU CREATE PROFITS FOR?! How many "teeeny tiny little heart attacks" a day is your life worth? The current system is little better than feudalism.
Tell AdSense that if they can make it easier for AdWords users, then they can make it easier for publishers.
If a couple thousands can do this and send google an email saying that they are going to try other ads on their site for a week because their site has developed and is getting some traffic and they are affraid of click fraud from competitor sites as google doesn't protect them,I'm sure they are going to act.
I don't want to look as if I'm against adsense.All I want is just a system that cares for his publishers.If a bot or a hacker tried to attack my sites they should stand beside me and protect my account not cancel it!
alika, you fail to miss the point. This week, it's "Revenge by click fraud - what to do?", the week before it was: "I was kicked out because of click fraud". And in each case the publisher has no rights at all.
Yes, it's true - there is no certainty with Adsense. Just like the stock market. Just like the banner advertising space before. Just like the Internet business in general. And one other certainty - if you leave, someone else will get your space, will get your income. That's just the way it is.
I've been with the program since it started. But unlike you, I am not losing sleep over it. I do not wake up scared stiff if I still have my account. I do what I do best -- creating my content, thinking about my users, and trying to maximize the revenue of our website, and yes, roll with the punches.
As my grandma used to say, "Nice lofty goals, sure ... but I need cash." o:)
But it boggles my mind that so many people who have no other reasonable option for earning money than Google, who probably couldn't have afforded to be full-time webmasters at all before AdSense came along, could me so angry with their benefactor. Jay Smith claims he makes $150,000 a year from Google, and simultaneously feels so downtrodden that he has compiled a list of demands for them to accede to. Where's the logic? Where does this self-righteous rage come from?
But it boggles my mind that so many people who have no other reasonable option for earning money than Google, who probably couldn't have afforded to be full-time webmasters at all before AdSense came along, could me so angry with their benefactor.
Google is not my benefactor. Google is my business partner. When Google sees fit to drop a nice check in my mailbox every month for no reason other than that they like me, then we can talk about them being my benefactor. Until that happy day arrives, though, I have to create, maintain, and promote a web site, a process that looks suspiciously like business to me.
I might be a little more inclined to be grateful if AdSense were a Google-run charity. According to their annual reports, they're a little beyond the nonprofit stage.
Where's the logic? Where does this self-righteous rage come from?
Bad business practice on Google's end? A degree of obfuscation and caprice that no one would tolerate if Google weren't so big as to practically constitute a monopoly? A general belief that Google and its publishers have a professional relationship, and professional relationships shouldn't involve gag orders, hiding vital information, or kicking people out of the program without explanation or recourse?
kicking people out of the program without explanation or recourse?
Hmmm ... check this out [webmasterworld.com...] - only shows that THERE IS recourse. Unless of course G has reason to believe that there is indeed something fishy with the account, as we have found out in some of the "I kicked out for no reason" threads.
[edited by: alika at 8:12 pm (utc) on May 13, 2005]
The force of the rage comes from the fact that people hate to feel like they're being taken advantage of, and hate even more to feel like they don't have any recourse. A number of Google's practices have this effect, and as you said, many of us don't have a viable option other than AdSense. So: We're trapped. And when AdSense is the only truly lucrative PPC program out there, the only way out of this bind is to give up web income altogether. Is that fair to ask when there are feasible solutions that are already common elsewhere in the industry?
Yes, Google can legally do what it likes, and we have to follow the ToS if we want to stay in the program. But that doesn't mean we have to act as though we believe that Google's practices are right.
Hmmm ... check this out [webmasterworld.com...] - only shows that there is recourse.
*nods* A few people have gotten back in--a very few. There are even more people who say that Google won't even answer their emails or give them any details about their case. It seems to be a crap shoot whether Google will listen to you. A just system of recourse would tell everyone with a cancelled account the real reason that they were thrown out, and would have more consistency and transparency than the current process.
No one is doing no one any favors. It's a business deal for both ends. Too many people act like Google is doing us a favor. They're doing themselves a service and have made themselves bery rich in the process.
When Yahoo comes out, I will be first in line, site unseen.
I find it mildly amusing that people feel Google owes them something, yet they are so quick to point out that the instant Yahoo offers a comparable program they will be out the door, "site unseen."
Perhaps Google is doing the same thing you are, only in private, telling themselves, "I don't like how these publishers are always clicking their own ads and then whining that it wasn't click fruad, b*tching about our business practices even though they're all set out and agreed to in the TOS, and complaining about the income they get through us, even though they wouldn't be getting ANY income if we weren't here. I'll tell you what, I'm dropping site X from my program as soon as another decent publisher comes along, site unseen."
If you have no loyalty to Google, why exactly should Google have any loyalty to you?
cEM
I'll tell you what, I'm dropping site X from my program as soon as another decent publisher comes along, site unseen.
I don't get that. Why would Google have to wait for Yahoo or another decent publisher to come along before dropping a site? If Google didn't like the site, they'd just drop them anyway, right?
createErrorMsg
I find it mildly amusing that people feel Google owes them something, yet they are so quick to point out that the instant Yahoo offers a comparable program they will be out the door, "site unseen."
Google does owe us something. Are you saying they don’t? And that is at least protection from losing the value of our work without recourse when THAT IS TECHNICALLY POSSIBLE. Don't the people you work for owe you something, or can they keep your wages for a week, just because they say you look suspicious. Can you do the same to your employees? Google CAN redesign the system to make it safer for publishers, but they choose not to. They COULD offer alternatives, but they choose not to, CERTAIN, that another publisher will line up right behind the one that gets clicked out of the program.
Did you find it mildly amusing when player Alex Rodriguez left the the Texas Rangers? The reason why we are willing to leave AdSense is because they are not dealing fairly with publishers, while they are wildly profiting from the work of publishers. There is no denying the fact that the BILLIONS of dollars they are making is derived from OUR work. How is it amusing that we would ask for protection, or be so dissatisfied as to take our work elsewhere as soon as the opportunity presents itself?
jomaxx
I agree there are things I would change about the program if I ran the world, but my point is that you are not "trapped" in any sense. You have a choice and you are incredibly lucky to have that choice.
The things that you would change about the program will ONLY be changed when publishers apply pressure. I suspect that the income derived from adwords would drop precipitously were there no sites showing AdSense for a week.
qbert
We're lucky, but also keep in mind, that we put those ugly ads on our sites. So where we make money, they are also getting a VERY low costing form of advertisment...at the expense of the look of our sites.No one is doing no one any favors. It's a business deal for both ends. Too many people act like Google is doing us a favor. They're doing themselves a service and have made themselves bery rich in the process.
This is half of the point, that Google is "also getting a VERY low costing form of advertisment", but echoes something joemaxx says in his post, which is very problematic and virtually against the ideas of capitalism: the position that publishers are “lucky” to have AdSense. This is the same defense used for every type of labor expoitation throughout history:
Sharecropping: You’re LUCKY to get this land!
Radio: You’re LUCKY to be able to BE on the air!
Factories: You’re LUCKY to HAVE a job...
Baseball: You’re LUCKY to be able to play the game.
People who provide the labor for a farm or factory, content for a radio station or the show in baseball league are GIVEN PROTECTION. That is the ONLY WAY to have equality in the system. Without it, you'd have people working for free or for pennies, afraid that the next guy would take their place if they spoke up. These issues have LONG been settled. The novelty of the internet does not in any way mitigate the validity that people deserve protection for the value of their work, nor the established principles upon which these ideals are built. What Google is doing is exploitative.
We deserve rights to a system that offers protection to our work, and Google has the ability and the responsibility to create such a system that can't be so easily gamed when they are making BILLIONS of dollars from our work. History shows that the only way to get it is to ASK for it and INSIST upon it.
something joemaxx says in his post, which is very problematic and virtually against the ideas of capitalism...LOL, that requires a response of some kind.
You want protection? Get a job. Mommy government will give you all the protection you need. But you're an entrepreneur now, thvi, with all the risks and rewards that entails. Contracts that are freely entered into by both sides can be enforced, but other than that you can't rely on the government providing any safety net at all. On the other hand, the rewards can be virtually unlimited, and that's why we're all in this business. Sharecropper indeed.
As for luck: I am a smart human being and a hard worker and believe me I've earned everything I've made in the 6 years since I gave up 8-hour days for 12-hour ones, but nonetheless I do feel damn lucky for my life and my lifestyle.
Abraham Lincoln:
Passion has helped us; but can do so no more. It will in future be our enemy. Reason, cold, calculating, unimpassioned reason, must furnish all the materials
for our future support and defense.
You fail to grasp the issue. This week it is “Revenge by click fraud - what to do?” and the more recently added “google disable my account. i didnt break any rules”. Last week it was “I was kicked out because of click fraud”. Every AdSense publisher is fully at the mercy of Google: earned funds can be retroactively taken and no appeal is possible. That you are happy with this arrangement is without question, but your and others’ assertion that the arrangement is a lucky one for publishers is without merit. It is only THE arrangement that is in place.
Your position is that Google is the distributor. And so, I am at their mercy, and happy and lucky. How you can defend that position, which is dangerously similar to sharecropping, is beyond belief. It is a demonstrably bad one for publishers, and one which can be REVERSED to the advantage of BOTH SIDES if only publishers would SPEAK UP.
$45,000 was the average salary for a major league baseball player in 1975. In 1983 it was $289,000. Why? Because the players agitated for free agency, and got an equitable proportion of the VALUE they were bringing to distributors. Would you say to these players, “Be happy, you're lucky to be playing ball at all; maybe you should just go get a job.” Being in a bad contract doesn’t mean you are not working.
For publishers, it is no different. We are in a system that is earning BILLIONS, literally, for a distributor. Billions. Google has the resources to develop a system that can protect their inventory providers from being defrauded is without question. They CAN do it. They choose not to, content in the knowledge that another publisher is waiting for the “special” relationship. It is wrong. And CAN be addressed. If we ASK for and INSIST on new technology and options that protect publishers. We provide the contextual environment to which they add the advertisements. AdWords purchasers got a system redesign BECAUSE THEY ASKED FOR IT. We must do the same.
Read this agian:
For instance while inside my adsense account, checking my stats, every single link that i click gives my a teeny tiny little heart attack becasue the association of "clicking" and "adsense" and having no idea what happened in the first place triggers some kind of internal fear mechanism. The same thing often happens when clicking "adsense" titled threads around here...
Do no evil...
People who provide the labor for a farm or factory, content for a radio station or the show in baseball league are GIVEN PROTECTION.
By the government, yes. If you feel you are being exploited in this way, you are barking up the wrong tree in expecting Google, itself, to fix the problem. Workers in factories didn't change a thing by complaining to the factory owner; sharecroppers never got any rights by not working in their fields for a week to punish the absentee landlord. Why? Because, as you said, there was always another worker, another sharecropper, waiting in the wings to take their place.
The fact is, this is an industry in which most publishers are dispensable. Google can afford to kick people out for whatever reasons they deem necessary, because any given publisher is imminently replacable. If they couldn't afford to do it, they wouldn't do it.
As a brief aside, I have to know: is this news to you? Didn't you know that this was how things were when you got involved with Adsense? Isn't having a problem with it now rather like jumping into a lion's den, then getting pissed off when the lion eats you? What were you expecting the lion to do, after all, bake you a birthday cake?
jomaxx really said it best: you want protection? Get a job in a federally regulated industry.
The bottom line is that if you want Google controlled, your going to have to get an outside agency to do the controlling. You call upon past history for your examples, but in all those examples it has always been an outside source (read, government) that has stepped in to establish regulations and protections. Insisting that Google do it themselves shows a real lack of historical perspective.
Don't the people you work for owe you something, or can they keep your wages for a week, just because they say you look suspicious.
virtually against the ideas of capitalism: the position that publishers are “lucky” to have AdSense.
Sorry, but this does not run against the ideas of capitalism. It is the desire that Google be regulated (which I am not saying is the wrong answer) that runs counter to those ideals, since regulation can only come from a government body, and such government intervention is the antithesis of laissez-faire capitalism.
cEM
Thanks for your reply.
You wrote:
If you feel you are being exploited in this way, you are barking up the wrong tree in expecting Google, itself, to fix the problem.
You misunderstand what I am suggesting, and I disagree with your depiction of the past somewhat. The turnaround in most of those industries occured when the workers stopped providing labor.
Far from expecting Google to fix the problem themselves, I am saying that publishers have the ability to encourage Google to revise the system so that it protects publishers. By, first, making known our dissatisfaction. And second, by not displaying AdSense for a day or a week once a month.
I would be the last to argue for government intervention. I am saying that this is a bad agreement, and publishers HAVE the ability to turn it around in the exact same way baseball players did and actors still do.
[edited by: alika at 12:52 pm (utc) on May 14, 2005]
Thanks again for your message. One thing I thought I would point out in regard to your position. When I wrote:
People who provide the labor for a farm or factory, content for a radio station or the show in baseball league are GIVEN PROTECTION.
You wrote:
By the government, yes.
That's not true. The protection that these groups get, as do actors and even football players, comes from the people THEMSELVES organizing. These groups are not organized by the government.
You wrote:
Google can afford to kick people out for whatever reasons they deem necessary, because any given publisher is imminently replacable. If they couldn't afford to do it, they wouldn't do it.
Just because they CAN do it, doesn't make it right. Standing up for what's right and fair is very easily done.
============
Google has not quite made enough people angry at what they are doing. There is not quite a "critical mass" being generated by what Google has been doing, so people will not stand up yet. Most people need it to happen to them before they will stand up and be counted. It takes many people being unfairly treated before there is enough people pissed off enough to stand up and do "strikes" and such things. *I have* the impression that there is not enough pissed off people yet.
I find it mildly amusing that people feel Google owes them something, yet they are so quick to point out that the instant Yahoo offers a comparable program they will be out the door, "site unseen."Perhaps Google is doing the same thing you are, only in private, telling themselves, "I don't like how these publishers are always clicking their own ads and then whining that it wasn't click fruad, b*tching about our business practices even though they're all set out and agreed to in the TOS, and complaining about the income they get through us, even though they wouldn't be getting ANY income if we weren't here. I'll tell you what, I'm dropping site X from my program as soon as another decent publisher comes along, site unseen."
If you have no loyalty to Google, why exactly should Google have any loyalty to you?
cEM
with all my respect,I totally disagree.Google is not giving money for free.
Have you ever thought of what you are doing to get the money and what is google doing?
You : have to build sites,SEO it,drive traffic to it,contact others for link exchange
Google : linking advertisers with publishers and taking 50% of the money.
Sounds fair?!
So why not spend a bit of this money on protecting there publishers as they did with their advertisers
No doubt you agree that profanity and distasteful Freudian references do little to advance your position?
LOL, Wrong again! Those are two of the key tools of every skilled debater. The others are schoolmarmish tut-tutting, and quitting when you're ahead - which I am as of this moment goodbye.
Thanks for your reply. I think the last week of every month is a good start. I hope others will do the same.
There was one other thing that came from this thread I wanted to add to my earlier reply to you, but forgot to. It was what another AdSense publisher said. I think it's really compelling, and hopefully it indicates that that critical mass has been reached.
“But it boggles my mind that so many people who have no other reasonable option for earning money than Google, who probably couldn't have afforded to be full-time webmasters at all before AdSense came along, could me so angry with their benefactor.”Google is not my benefactor. Google is my business partner. When Google sees fit to drop a nice check in my mailbox every month for no reason other than that they like me, then we can talk about them being my benefactor. Until that happy day arrives, though, I have to create, maintain, and promote a web site, a process that looks suspiciously like business to me.
I might be a little more inclined to be grateful if AdSense were a Google-run charity. According to their annual reports, they're a little beyond the nonprofit stage.
“Where's the logic? Where does this self-righteous rage come from?”
Bad business practice on Google's end? A degree of obfuscation and caprice that no one would tolerate if Google weren't so big as to practically constitute a monopoly? A general belief that Google and its publishers have a professional relationship, and professional relationships shouldn't involve gag orders, hiding vital information, or kicking people out of the program without explanation or recourse?
==============
By the way you have worded your reply I would make the guess that even you have not reached your own personal "critical mass" point. I base that guess on the way you have worded your above statement. If you had reached your own personal "critical mass" point, you would do more than "hope others do the same"... you would take the steps necessary to help others to organize into a powerful force, but you are not doing that, now are you. You are still at the point of "hoping" that others will "do the same".
Thanks for your replies. Mike, you're quite wrong. I wont be showing ads during that week.
I think this discussion is a great way to let others know that such sentiments such as the ones I've expressed and quoted from others are broadly held.
alika you wrote
Critical mass? Because of a few disgruntled posts? Remember, those who have an axe to grind are the ones who are the most vocal in this forum.
It is absurd. That these publishers fall by the wayside and are replaced each week with more of the same only illustrates further the prevalence of this kind of treatment and how easily websites are targeted. Google CAN fix the system.
Instead, they foist all of the responsibility on we who provide the content, paying publishers pennies on the BILLIONS they make, and then refusing to modify the MANIFEST holes in the code code or offer publishers any options. They CAN AFFORD to revise this. They revised the system for AdWords users because AdWords users spoke up.
You are quite right that if I choose not to show ads for that week, another will be right behind me to help support Google. But... if we ALL, even for one DAY, say to Google we MUST have a system that is less gameable or options to protect publishers, Google will respond.
Google is not my benefactor. Google is my business partner. When Google sees fit to drop a nice check in my mailbox every month for no reason other than that they like me, then we can talk about them being my benefactor. Until that happy day arrives, though, I have to create, maintain, and promote a web site, a process that looks suspiciously like business to me.I might be a little more inclined to be grateful if AdSense were a Google-run charity. According to their annual reports, they're a little beyond the nonprofit stage.
“Where's the logic? Where does this self-righteous rage come from?”
Bad business practice on Google's end? A degree of obfuscation and caprice that no one would tolerate if Google weren't so big as to practically constitute a monopoly? A general belief that Google and its publishers have a professional relationship, and professional relationships shouldn't involve gag orders, hiding vital information, or kicking people out of the program without explanation or recourse?
I wish I knew other people it had happened to because then we could start a support group...
it is a special kind of anxiety that plagues me heavily still...
For instance while inside my adsense account, checking my stats, every single link that i click gives my a teeny tiny little heart attack becasue the association of "clicking" and "adsense" and having no idea what happened in the first place triggers some kind of internal fear mechanism. The same thing often happens when clicking "adsense" titled threads around here...
Maybe I should use my adsense checks to seek professional help. hehe.
Thanks for your reply. I wouldn’t presume to speak for others and I am surprised that you do.
You are happy with a very poor deal, and an indefensible one. Your site is just as vulnerable as are all of ours. Google is shafting you.
Search the terms "dreaded letter" on Webmasterworld and see what I mean. Watch the forum this week. Is your site next? You will continue to earn money only as long as Google tells you can. Until they turn off your account, and retroactively take your earnings without explanation or appeal, while using your content right up to the last minute and earning a billion dollars in the process. And that is ridiculous.
[edited by: thvi at 7:47 am (utc) on May 15, 2005]
Click not unto others before thy site is clicketh
He who clicketh on my links clicketh trash.
Yea verily the road to payments is narrow, do not click off the path to wealthiness.
More pearls of wisdom after I open my fortune cookies....
I wouldn’t presume to speak for others and I am surprised that you do.
Hmmm ... after claiming that you have reached critical mass you say that you do not presume to speak for others?
