Political Banner Ad

Google sending a political banner ad via adsense

[DaveLite]

I was shocked today when a banner ad was sent to my site from G that was and advertisement for one of the politicians running for president of the United States.

I don't display many G banner ads because I have my own banner ads that run at a very high percentage compared to G's.

I'm saying it may appear that my site is supporting this candidate. Even if a banner ad appeared from a political candidate that I was supporting, I don't work this way. My site does not support any candidate and I don't feel like writing a disclaimer stating so.

If I see this again, it looks like the banner will be shut down until after the elections. Shame they are so far away.

[farmboy]

People who have political blogs often have this problem. They support candidate X and oppose candidate Y. They write about the shortcomings of candidate Y on their blog and AdSense then displays a correctly targeted ad for candidate Y.

Maybe you could try filtering out the advertiser.

FarmBoy

[ecmedia]

If you take this logic, then maybe you are showing Pepsi ads, but does it mean that you recommend Pepsi? Choosing to display automatically generated ads (as you did by participating in AdSense) means that you will have these interesting scenarios. There is an article in today's new York Times about how Mitt Romney ads are showing up on Gay.com (for a confirmed homophobe not the best way to advertise).

You can simply add a disclaimer (I doubt if anyone reads it or even cares if an ad that you display indicates endorsement) that you do not necessarily recommend advertisers that show up on your page.