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Google AdSense Terms and Conditions Changes

February 26, 2008

         

Noel

11:26 pm on Feb 25, 2008 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Is it juts me?

Just now when I logged in I got a new "Google AdSenseTM Online Standard Terms and Conditions" page from AdSense

farmboy

2:56 pm on Mar 1, 2008 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



I linked from a main "hub" page on my site... a page that leads to all the other areas of my site.

Is your "hub" page basically the same thing as a site map?

How do visitors find your hub page - is there a link to it on all pages?

FarmBoy

wheel

3:21 pm on Mar 1, 2008 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



>>> Has anyone in the whole history of adsense NOT accepted their changes. I don't think so.

Sure. I'm 50-50 that I'm about to decline. Granted, I'm not a big adsense player but I had intentions of growing that area substantially over the coming year. Now however I'm going to consider starting to pull adsense ads off all my quality sites. And seriously considering pulling them off a few junk MFA's I've got. (and by junk MFA's site's that I've got, I mean to say 'a friend of mine's sites').

So, ads come off some of my top quality sites in competitive industries. Ads come off some MFA's (though they're not really that bad). And I decide to grow in a different direction instead of doing more adsense.

Admittedly, I'm only considering this because I'm starting to become a conspiracy theorist about the amount of info Google's collecting. Used to be worried about just myself, but this TOS change raises the spectre of my contributing to Google tracking of my visitors. It's easier for me to dump out than worry about my visitors being tracked by some third party company - particularly when there's precious little info about what's actually going on.

One of the link development forum moderators here, sugarrae, recently blogged about folks like me - to lazy-assed to monetize a site through anything other than adsense. Time to get off my wide butt and do something else with these sites. It's actually a good time for us all to consider if we couldn't make more money by monetizing things differently. Me, maybe I'll sell unprotected links...(I'm kidding!).

europeforvisitors

3:27 pm on Mar 1, 2008 (gmt 0)



Time to get off my wide butt and do something else with these sites. It's actually a good time for us all to consider if we couldn't make more money by monetizing things differently.

OK, but if you're really concerned about your "visitors being tracked by some third-party company," you'd better not use any ad networks, third-party ad servers like DoubleClick or ZEDO, or affiliate programs.

wheel

5:49 pm on Mar 1, 2008 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



Not sure why you're presenting it like an ultimatum. THe fact is, I don't use any of that stuff, because I treat my data as my own.

But it's not as black or white as what you've stated. There's a world of difference between affiliate tracking and broad tracking of visitors across a wide variety of sites. Particularly when it's something as deeply integrated into the web as adsense.

europeforvisitors

6:04 pm on Mar 1, 2008 (gmt 0)



There's a world of difference between affiliate tracking and broad tracking of visitors across a wide variety of sites. Particularly when it's something as deeply integrated into the web as adsense.

What about other ad servers and ad networks?

If you're genuinely serious (or paranoid) about user privacy, why risk outsourcing ad serving to any third party?

menial

6:54 pm on Mar 1, 2008 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



If you're genuinely serious (or paranoid) about user privacy, why risk outsourcing ad serving to any third party?

You sound like an upset salesman. If you don't see the difference between the information Google has versus some other, even big ad networks, there's no point to argue with you.

celgins

8:54 pm on Mar 1, 2008 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



I wonder how many users think twice before registering for online newspapers, social-networking sites, or forums like this one that can easily track the interests of their readers if they want to do so?

Well, the millions of Myspace users probably don't think much about it. This weekend, Myspace sent out an update to its privacy policy and guess what it focuses on?

Cookies and "third-party pixel tags".

Malkovich

9:24 pm on Mar 1, 2008 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



What about privacy policy on bilingual sites?
To some sites G sends me ads in at least 3 languages.
Should I have two or more PPs?
Should I translate them myself?
(I hardly speak some of the languages I use for my sites)

Miamacs

12:36 am on Mar 2, 2008 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



this is so s**pid.

I've been following this thread and one thing is clear, Google did't tell us what to do.
Well, it's either they *don't know* or they simply *don't care*
did you consider this? they might not care?

If they don't, how/why should I?

*click* AGREE *pffft* heh

...

accounts I know of got this new T&C in all kinds of languages.
The text made no sense. ( and this is not a pun )
It's like as if someone sent out the draft instead of the final version.
Oh legally it's top notch. It's just the details that are as good as leaving them __________ instead of filling them up with the overly generic stuff and saying 'ok, we passed the word'.

if Google wants us to clear *them* to be EU (or anything else) compliant so bad, they should post some guidelines and not just this generic legal whatever. Oh I get it they were probably 'forced' to do this.

But oh, wait. Who the hell cares?
I need to make THEM compliant?
Cool, but of course it's not up to me to guess HOW I should do this, right?

...

You know this coming from the company that has blackmailed the industry into the 'don't post/don't test half-finished sites live' policy, is kind of amazing. I'm part amazed part curious when it comes to their business practices, but this one... wow. It's not the impact, it's the tendency... the trend of one department being two weeks ahead of another and playing with their main products as if these half-baked releases didn't affect sites, people and nerves.

Apart of this coming at a time at which I am aleady checking into alternatives for a wide variety of sites... in general, making people angry is not good. Especially not if you're an SE, and the person is an SEO.

...

bah. whatever.
pushed the button already anyway

tim222

8:13 am on Mar 2, 2008 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



What about privacy policy on bilingual sites?
To some sites G sends me ads in at least 3 languages.
Should I have two or more PPs?
Should I translate them myself?
(I hardly speak some of the languages I use for my sites)

Well it's fairly easy to find a generic privacy policy in english, so start with that. Run it through BabelFish to get translations in your other two languages. Then, just to be consistent, run one of the translated versions through BabelFish again to convert it back to English, and post the retranslated version on your site.

Malkovich

9:06 am on Mar 2, 2008 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member




Well, it's either they *don't know* or they simply *don't care*

I totally agree with Miamacs. Now I feel angry with myself for falling into the trap of guessing what to do with PP.
I'm sure Google is aware of this threat. I can imagine how they are laughing and feeling even more "powerful" about how they can affect our thinking.
I also feel angry with the government for failing to regulate the industry and allowing monsters like Google to keep on with cheating and abuse of both consumers and webmasters.

chrisv1963

10:01 am on Mar 2, 2008 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



"I also feel angry with the government for failing to regulate the industry and allowing monsters like Google to keep on with cheating and abuse of both consumers and webmasters."

A "monster" like Google? Google cheating and abusing? If you don't like them avoid them and don't make money with Adsense, created by a monster that cheats and abuses ...

potentialgeek

11:04 am on Mar 2, 2008 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



Privacy Policy

Under Construction

(Hoping to hear back from Google. Will keep you posted.)

Scurramunga

11:09 am on Mar 2, 2008 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



I also feel angry with the government for failing to regulate the industry and allowing monsters like Google to keep on with cheating and abuse of both consumers and webmasters.

Don't you think that your statement is just a little overdramatic?

farmboy

1:48 pm on Mar 2, 2008 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but so far at least one person in this thread has received a response from Google indicating the text of his/her privacy policy is adequate.

But no one has reported to have directly asked Google
and receiving a direct response as to whether the privacy policy has to be linked from all pages showing AdSense?

FarmBoy

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