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When people browse a webpage with Opera browser google mediapartner will visit that page just a couple minutes later.
If there is a second visitor that also use Opera the user will see your page but it will also see adwords in the advertisement box from opera.
This is really bothering since the ads are very good on topic and are from competitors.
I strongly believe this is not the way of fair business. If I want to have advertisements on my page I place them myself and I get paid for them.
The fact is that people want to use a free browser and that the webmasters of the pages they visit have to pay for their pleasure of using opera browser.
OK...my questions:
Does it hurt to block the mediapartner spider?. I mean will your google ranking drop or no regular googlebot visits anymore.
Anyone experience with this? By blocking only the mediapartner bot. Does it solve the issue of displaying advertisements in Opera?
What is the robots.txt entry you have to add to ban this bot?
... there is very little real world difference between Opera and a AdWare/Scumware/Malware laced version of IE
I think it is appropriate to post a correction to this wrongly projected notion of Opera being an 'Adware/Scumware/Malware' here, even though it might slightly be off topic to the thread.
Opera was chosen as the 'Best Browser of 2004' by PC World, US.
Opera is not adware / scumware / or malware.
--> Opera will neither download itself nor install itself automatically on your system. If you don't manually install Opera, you will never find it on your system.
--> The Ads : Opera clearly mentions that free version is ad supported. Infact, if you install opera and run it for the first time it will not only inform you of this but will also give you an option to chose the ad you would prefer : banner image ads or Google text ads.
--> Opera does not come bundled with any other adware or spywares ... nor does it bundle any of its own.
Some webmasters would like you to belive that the google ads displayed on Opera are spywares or malwares. Seeing the first post of this thread will tell you why ...
... continued ...
That said, lets go on to correct the damage done ... I believe opera is the best browser in the world.
I'll keep my focus on two of the most popular activities all of us do online (browse and email) and tell you how Opera makes these task an enjoyable experience.
OPERA : Everything you need online!
Browsing :
When you hear opera, you think browser. But Opera also offers a top-notch e-mailer, newsreader,IRC-compatible chat client, contact database, support for RSS newsfeeds and much, much more.
Still, with all the features, Opera remains the fastest, best coded, small browsing application in the world, weighing in at 3.5 MB.
The opera rendering engine is very powerful and sophisticated and seeing it in action while loading a site will make you think you are watching a streaming movie. Ofcourse if you have a broadband connection, you will notice this only when opera is rendering huge size images.
Opera was one of the first to offer tabbed browsing. Open a number of windows without cluttering your taskbar (windows). (I currently have 8 other sites opened ...)
Oh, by the way, you don't need a 'Google or Yahoo toolbar' or any other 'extention' to stop pop-up ads. I guess some webmasters should start a thread on how that is so 'unfair' of Opera since it leads to ad revenue loss on their site ...
To cut it short, here's a list of opera features : [opera.com...] ...
A tip for web designers: Build your sites to work on Opera and you will have a 97% 'all browser compatible' site. Some minor CSS issues like with all the other major browsers remain ...
(I am basing this on my experience. I am old fashioned and do belive that browser compatibility and loading speed is important while designing a site ...)
I am sure your tired of my babbling. Here are what some others say :
"To duplicate what Opera has, Firefox needs a huge list of extensions ... Plus they have to be downloaded, vastly upping the size of the browser. Now think: Opera has most of these extensions built-in yet it's still a 3Mb download! That's with a built-in newsreader, chat program and email client as well."
For all firefox users who assert that Opera is no better than Firefox :Opera vs Firefox [tntluoma.com] (Yes, its a link)
... Continued ...
I say use Opera M2. Why? To put it in a simple, cryptic explanation: 'its simple & different'.
Opera handles all your mails in such a fashion that creating folders and sorting your mail manually becomes *unnecessary*.
An example to illustrate this better : Suppose you do business with a company called 'XYZ Sales'. You receive a mail from your friend 'James' that contains some top secret information about 'XYZ Sales'. You might want to use the info that James provided while replying to a mail from XYZ Sales. How do you sort such a mail? If you are using outlook, you can put that mail either in James folder or in XYZ Sales folder. But with Opera M2 you can make the mail appear in both James 'folder' or XYZ Sales 'folder' automatically!
Technically, Opera M2, has no such things as 'Folders'. You have views and filters. Unlike other mail clients, Opera stores all your messages in a single database. All your messages are stored in one place, but you can sort and read them from different 'views'.
Opera also automatically sorts mail you receive from someone you know. Just click on the 'Contact' persons name or email ID stored in the Address book and Opera will show you all mail you received from that person, and all the mail that you sent to that person.
Another cool feature is the 'threaded view'. It will show you related messages in a thread view. A simple example : You send me a mail. I reply. You reply back to me. I reply again to it (and so on). Well, with the threaded view, I can see the mail we sent back and forth like a conversation (your mail, my mail, your reply, my reply).
Feeds - Yes, you can even subscribe and read all you newsfeeds and RSS feeds using Opera M2.
Spam protection - Each time you mark a mail 'spam', opera analyzes it to learn which mails you consider as spam. Over time, it learns from you and takes over that job.
Now all this might be ringing a bell in your mind, right? It all sounds very familiar. You have heard this somewhere - no folders, conversation view of email ....
Google Mail! Yes, Opera M2 has had all these features long before Gmail (perhaps) copied them.
So here's a cool tip for all of you.
Do you want a GMail type account with all its features and MORE for free!?
--> Download Opera 7.5 - (3.5 MB - [opera.com...] )
--> Configure Opera M2 to your Pop 3 or IMAP email account.
Happy mailing!
P.S : I've never used Gmail myself, only read reviews about its features. I have no connection with Opera developers / marketing team. Any error regretted.
No need when there's an in-house propaganda machine - sfxmystica!
Personally I see those ads as Google eating the cheese from my bread or should I say pick the raisans out of my poridge.
Don't take me wrong but I do my best to keep my homepage bannerfree and adfree. And google/opera are just sticking the ads in the browser and take credit for my hard work.
It is that they benefit with their ads on our copyrighted webpages without giving credit to us or pay us compensation for them to make extra revenue.
First, Opera/Google ads are not even in the viewport, they're up in browser chrome. In the default Opera setup, they're separated from the viewport by the browser's address bar. Since they're always in exactly the same spot and away from the reading area, you become blind to them very quickly. Ads that are actually on the page must have an enormous advantage (unless the page is so boring that people are looking at their browser chrome rather than at the viewport!). Also, if you browse in full-screen mode, there are no Opera/Google ads. I'm not an ad person, but I would be surprised if Opera was making much money off these.
Second, and purely personal opinion--I have ran into only one site that actually denied access to Opera users because of the ads. A message came up explaining that they didn't allow Opera because of perceived loss of ad revenue. All it did was make the webmaster look like a crank. I never went back.
Of course, I'm a bigtime Opera fan, so you can take what I say with a grain of salt!
Some webmasters would like you to belive that the google ads displayed on Opera are spywares or malwares. Seeing the first post of this thread will tell you why ...
It's "informed spyware". That is, the browser is sending data about your browsing habits to someone else. What's scary about that is that browsing activity can be tied to an IP and and IP can be tied to a person's identity. Want to find out something about someone? Opera will sell you the data. They might not do that *today* but they could in the future. In fact, I can't think of a law that would prevent them from doing just that.
What interests me about this is that it basically removes Google's ability to determine where its ads appear -- isn't that important to Google? If not, can I now put my adsense code anywhere? Also, isn't this kind of a slap in the face to Adsense publishers?
Another disturbing thing I heard about today is that you can block affiliate ad images in Firefox. Thanks guys.
Anyone concerned about the ads being generated by their content and its effect on their adsense ads might want to see this:
"This script doesn't block the AdSense ads inside Opera 7.2x/7.3 - it blocks Opera 7.2/7.3 unregistered users from a website and registers a complaint to Opera's server logs via the parameter."
It's "informed spyware".
If the user makes a conscious decision to allow it, which he has to in Opera, it is not spyware. If the user is informed, it is not spyware.
Want to find out something about someone? Opera will sell you the data. They might not do that *today* but they could in the future.
Want to find out something about someone? Their ISP will sell you the data.
Opera has a privacy policy. Let's not make this out to be more than it is.
Also, isn't this kind of a slap in the face to Adsense publishers?
This has been discussed in this thread. The ads do not touch the page at all, and they are out of the way and out of sight. When you use a browser, the page is in focus right? Do you really assume that people keep looking around the user interface instead of at the page?
That doesn't make sense.
Opera has a privacy policy. Let's not make this out to be more than it is.
Since a privacy policy can be changed at will, privacy policies are basically meaningless. What's to stop them from selling the data to the highest bidder? Nothing.
This has been discussed in this thread. The ads do not touch the page at all, and they are out of the way and out of sight. When you use a browser, the page is in focus right? Do you really assume that people keep looking around the user interface instead of at the page?
So you don't see any problem with a company allowing another company to possibly cause you lost revenue?
I notice you didn't address the Adsense quality issue and how Google removes sites or running Adsense in violation of the TOS but will let Adsense ads appear for any site the browser hits.
I don't think it is any different than gator.
There are lots of differences. Opera doesn't secretly install itself or open popups. It has a static banner outside the page viewing area.
Since a privacy policy can be changed at will, privacy policies are basically meaningless. What's to stop them from selling the data to the highest bidder? Nothing.
Opera's track record shows that they won't. And if they did, they'd go out of business. Opera has spent a long time building trust. I don't think you realize how alert Opera's user community is about changes either. The Google ads were thoroughly questioned and investigated when they were first introduced in a preview version.
So you don't see any problem with a company allowing another company to possibly cause you lost revenue?
Who loses revenue, and how? Opera doesn't prevent your ads from being displayed (unlike the ad blockers that are available for Firefox).
The Google ad strip in Opera is a narrow one outside the viewing area. When you browser, do you watch the web page or the user interface? What do you think gets more focus? The ads on the page of course.
And another point is that Opera is what brings revenue to you in the first place. If someone hadn's spent time creating a browser, no one would see your pages, and you wouldn't get any revenue.
I know that you will probably point out how Firefox and MSIE are free and don't do this, but the fact is that all these browsers need funding. They spend a lot of time working on these programd and have different approaches. But if you look a the principle of this, the browser is the tool the user uses to visit your page and view your ads in the first place.
And further, if you argue that Firefox and MSIE don't do this and therefore Opera can't either, then you are basically arguing that you are allowed to make money from your work, but browser makers aren't allowed to make money from their work.
When I visit your site using Opera, Opera gets ad revenue for spending time working on the browser, and you get ad revenue for working on the content.
If only webmasters were allowed to make money then browsers wouldn't exist and you wouldn't make money beucase no one would be able to view your ads.
I notice you didn't address the Adsense quality issue
Adsense quality issue?
and how Google removes sites or running Adsense in violation of the TOS but will let Adsense ads appear for any site the browser hits.
Opera has a contract with Google, don't they? I don't see how this is relevant.
