Does AS return ads to spiders?

[Sanenet]

Thinking...

Does AdSense returns adverts to spiders when they visit? e.g, if MSNBot pays a visit, and Adsense realises from the IP & UserAgent info that it's MSNBot, does it bother to go to all the trouble of processing and returning the ads?

[dmz17]

The serving/display of ads is the result of the execution of AS javascript code. I don't believe any spiders execute javascript code, so no, spiders don't see ads...

[Sanenet]

True, the bot wouldn't show the display, but would Google return the completed HTML output if a major bot requested the file? Although I suppose MSN & Yahoo would skip over the Google AS include instead of requesting it. I was thinking more about the bandwidth involved for AS and the bots.

[jetteroheller]

When I look with Google on cached pages from me, I see adds targeted for US, not for Germany.

[Galtego]

I think when viewing cached pages the AdSense script is re-executed (the ads are not cached).

[gengar56]

Bots usually cannot execute Javascript code, which is entirely client-side. It's same for all Javascript; AdSense is not a special case with these bots.

In other words, if a bot requested ads, yes, AdSense would return it. But bots don't, so they don't see them.

[fischermx]

Hi,

The javascript code that you have in the page is sent with the whole page you have, no way to strip it from there.

Now, the code that google sends to clients, is not being sent to the spiders, since the spiders are not executing the javascript code.