I am angry at Google.
Nay. I am furious.
As some of you may know, I am part of a production company called Jupiter Broadcasting.
At Jupiter Broadcasting we make nerdy podcasts. About Linux. About Beer. About video games. It is, as you might expect, composed predominantly of reviews and opinions.
We put out quality shows on a shoe-string budget. We are not Revision3 or TWiT. We are the little guy. The underdog. Read: We are not rich (not even a little).
We need every penny we can get just to keep afloat. Part of this means we have utilized Google’s Adsense advertising both on jupiterbroadcasting.com and in the YouTube versions of our videos.
We get good traffic, often pushing our servers to the limit, but we still don’t earn much. But those few bucks we do earn? We need. And, more importantly, we earned.
Then we received an email from Google. It begins:
“This message was sent from a notification-only email address that does notaccept incoming email. Please do not reply to this message.Hello,
While reviewing your account, we noticed that you are currently displaying Google ads in a manner that is not compliant with our policies. For instance, we found violations of AdSense policies on pages such as http://www.jupiterbroadcasting.com/?cat=377.
Please note that this URL is an example and that the same violations may exist on other pages of your website.”
Whut.
That’s right. They decided we have violated their policies on pages “such as” the one they list (they give no other example) and so have turned off AdSense revenue from that page.
Here’s the crazy thing. That particular page? It’s nothing but a list of our shows. That’s it. It’s a freaking list of episodes we have made.
The Google email continues:
“As stated in our program policies, AdSense publishers are not permitted to place Google ads on sites involved in the distribution of copyrighted materials. This includes hosting copyrighted files on your site, as well as providing links for or driving traffic to sites that contain copyrighted material.
As a result, we have disabled ad serving to the site.”
We are not distributing copyrighted material illegally. We go through great pains to make sure of that.
But… read that paragraph again. It says nothing at all about legality. It says that no website that uses AdSense is allowed to link to websites that contain Copyrighted material. This would include, drum-roll please… essentially every website on the internet. Including Google.com.
Aka: This reason is 100% bogus.
They conclude:
“Your AdSense account remains active. However, we strongly suggest that you take the time to review our program policies (https://www.google.com/adsense/policies ) to ensure that all of your remaining pages are in compliance.
Please note that we may disable your account if further violations are found in the future.
Sincerely,
The Google AdSense Team”
Note that there are a few key things missing from this email from Google:
- Any way to contact them at all. In fact they sent the email itself from an email address that cannot receive email. And they provide no indication of how to get in touch with them.
- Any real indication of what might be the reason for the supposed violation. (How can we fix a problem that Google itself doesn’t even seem sure exists?)
- Any sense of Google’s “Don’t be evil” company motto. The email threatened our ability to earn a living with no details as to why. If that’s not evil, I don’t know what is.
The use of the Google logo here is a parody. Will Google try to attack me for using "Copyrighted" material? Maybe. But they'd be WRONG for doing so.
After much digging on Google’s various webpages (which are all extremely poorly laid out… almost as if it was a conscious decision to try to prevent people from finding critical information) we found an email address that might hold some promise. To this email address, we sent the following:
“The page you link to is an entire category of a WordPress blog which represents one of our six Podcasts.
Additionally, there is nothing of copyrighted martial, OTHER THAN OUR OWN, on this site.
Can some explanation, of what the offending content is, be given to me so I can fix the issue?
I believe this an error on your part, and is the direct realization of the cold, robotic approach Google takes that directly impacts the livelihood of those of us foolish enough to hitch our wagon to Google’s cold, robotic soul.
Not only is this type of action extremely degrading to those of us who work tirelessly to produce content, but the quick, zero-warning type of approach here is making me reconsider my companies entire relationship with Google. From our Google Hosted Apps, to the Google Ad Words we purchase.
This has been a very alarming and extremely rude wakeup call.
Please work WITH me to correct this problem. And please be specific as to where the offense was made.”
No reply has come. (And, sure, the “robotic soul” part wasn’t exactly friendly. But, come on. They had it coming. They attacked us directly. Besides… it entertained us.)
It’s also critical to point out that, when reviewing something (let’s say a video game for example) information used for this purpose falls under fair use. So referencing a video game title, etc. in a review is totally fine.
Also critical: ign.com uses Google AdSense as well. And, if you go by the information Google provided to us in their email, ign.com is a far bigger violator of Google’s AdSense policies than any pages hosted on Jupiter Broadcasting. (Of course, saying ign.com is doing something illegal here would be ridiculous… but, then again, Google is being ridiculous.)
So why are we being targetted and not ign (and the many other larger websites)?
Is it because we’re the little guys? Do they think we won’t fight back?
Is it because they dislike our content? Do they dislike Linux, Beer and Video Games that much?
Who knows. All I know is this:
I am pissed off.
But I’ll give Google this one chance to redeem themselves:
I want either:
- An email explicitly outlining our violations so that we can fix them or
- An email stating that our AdSense status is fully restored and no further shenanigans as such will occur.
Then, either way, I want Google to make a statement that they are changing their policies in this regard. Specifically: “No more auto-disabling of AdSense accounts without warning and without cause, which deprives small business of income necessary for their survival.”
Seem like a lot to ask for? Seem like more than Google will be willing to do? It probably is.
But, you know what? It’s reasonable. And it’s ethical.
And, if Google truly is “not evil”, they will gladly (and quickly) do it.
May 6th, 2010 - 11:43 pm
Sadly, Google has never been much of a people’s company. At least their communication towards complaining users has always been piss poor.
I really hope that they get back to you to sort this out. Good luck.
May 6th, 2010 - 11:46 pm
If there is anything we can do as viewers and fans… a collective email maybe?… let us know. Pitch forks at the ready!
May 6th, 2010 - 11:49 pm
That really sucks – unfortunately their loyalty (and thus their pleasant service) belongs to the advertisers…
Let us know if there’s anything we can do.
May 7th, 2010 - 12:01 am
good luck, hope it turns out the best way.
May 7th, 2010 - 12:03 am
Dude… you are going a bit far there. I understand you are upset, but you might want to take a breather. Google uses “robotic” analysis and automated emails for a reason: they have a massive amount of sites serving ads as part of their adsense program and many of them are trying to make money fraudulently (you guys obviously are not) by clicking their own ads, misplacing them, etc… It isn’t possible to manually keept tabs on all those sites. In your case, there has obviously been a mistake, perhaps someone made a complaint against you for some reason.
Threatening to boycott the entire Google corporation is just silly. They have a lot good products (including their search engine) and an amazing level of open-source contributions. Perhaps you would simply be served better a different ad agency for your site (one that can offer more personal service). :/
Big and impersonal – yes; evil – no.
May 7th, 2010 - 12:04 am
I’ve used for a while google adsense and it worked well for me, but when I finally reached their 100$ minimum revenue to receive my pay, they banned me, exactly like you. I was really pissed since it took me a couple of weeks to reach this much money and I need it in order to pay for my hosting fees. They’ve sent me an email just like you stating I wasn’t respecting a rule (not telling me which) when I never did anything wrong. Now I switched to another company, but money is far more hard to get. It’s a thing that suck from them…
May 7th, 2010 - 12:06 am
Could they be upset that you are using a font on the screen shots that looks like a copyrighted Paramount font? I’m totally guessing here, I don’t see the problem. Hang in there guys, I love your shows!
May 7th, 2010 - 12:20 am
I’m sorry to hear this! This shows how dangerous it is when one company gets an almost monopoly in one area, especially one as important for peoples livelihoods as online ads.
Thankfully there are still alternatives for those that are locked out of Googles world of ads, but for how long will they be viable? I think that’s kinda scary.
If you want to try someone else, to help slow down the march against total domination (and power over people like you) for Google, or if you just need to chose someone else because Google won’t do the right thing and do one of the two things you ask of them, I’ve had some good experiences with Text link Ads (That’s not an affiliate link, because that’s not why I wrote this. But if you want to help me out, with no cost to you of course, then this is my affiliate link. Thanks!)
I really love The Linux Action show. It’s always the first podcast I listen to after every time I fill up my mp3/ogg player (Yes I subscribe to the Ogg version!). So best of luck, I hope everything works out!
May 7th, 2010 - 12:21 am
It does bother me that Google provides no way to get in contact with them. And what’s worse is that it’s intentional. It would be okay if they were just a bunch of nerds who didn’t care, but if you ran into one of them on the street, or a mailing list, they gave you the info you needed, but if you do happen to bump into one of them, and ask for information, they won’t tell you.
May 7th, 2010 - 12:28 am
Just like with their Webmaster Tools, they will give you a disturbing view of how BAD your website sitemap is–but no indication of what the actual errors are. You have to GUESS. I’m guess people even try to pay Google for feedback on how to make their sitemap better…but why bother? If someone behind answers.py even responds to your forum post, they’re likely just to respond: “go read more answers.py, laT3z!”
What does this actually give them? This gives them an OZ like authority over their users. It creates an “expert system” (much like what Microsoft created)…emergent economies of SEO consultants well up and justify Google’s oblique behavior by charging people to “help them with it.”
Obviously you need a *cough* AdSense Consultant *cough*…
May 7th, 2010 - 12:31 am
This is why I still use Yahoo search engine, and used webcrawler before that even after it went out of style. I avoid Google because I can see through their BS just with the rainbow letters alone.
Lets make it look kid friendly with rainbow letters instead of professional why dont we? On top of that, the name, its like starting a search engine named One Hundred or One Million. Get a real name!
Unimportant opinions on my part, but the comment alone shows my support! If they are too large to notice that they are stepping on small legit sites, I say bring them all down, fast and hard! Scrap google, they cant be trusted!
May 7th, 2010 - 12:53 am
@SpyderVenom – because Microsoft (where Yahoo search goes) is a less evil company??
This is an issue with Google not having the resources to give their adsense partners personal responses/dialog. This is probably because they are dealing with thousands of these issues each day. My “guess” is that someone complained about the content used in STOKED. I doubt you will ever hear anything for certain. If the JB guys get a personal reply back, I think it is probably more than is reasonably expected from a program like adsense.
My advice is to just use a different ad agency for that page (or all of them) if you want more personal service. But, please don’t act like the whole corporation is evil because it doesn’t have the resources to take a personal interest in each adsense account. Use their products/services where they fit your needs, and don’t where they don’t.
May 7th, 2010 - 1:00 am
Also, to prove I am not a Troll, I just swung a donation your way via paypal. Hopefully enough people donate to tie you over until you get this resolved or something new is set up.
Love the shows!
Jack
May 7th, 2010 - 2:28 am
@Jack, let me preface this by saying, I believe you’re not a troll, and I would also join you in donating, if I didn’t already spend my current allowance designated for that sort of thing on the humble indie bundle.
Anyway, you said: “This is an issue with Google not having the resources to give their adsense partners personal responses/dialog.” It’s more of a philosophical issue, not a manpower issue. Google, unlike other companies such as Apple, believe very strongly in algorithms, and even if they had the man power to individually talk to every adsense participant on the planet, I don’t think they would. Rather, they would spend their time creating an algorithm doing it. The Computer Scientist in me says, Woot, go Google. Than again, it is times like this that I begin to wonder about my gut feelings.
May 7th, 2010 - 2:42 am
Oh, and @Lunduke…I just read the title of your post, that’s a wee bit outlandish. And it gives readers (or at least me), the initial impression that your just a cranky, snarky, blogger. (Well, okay, maybe you are, but one that is awesome to listen to.
), But I think the link title that appears on digg: Google Causes Extensive Harm to Indy Producers, is much better, or also maybe something along the lines of Google’s (intentional) lack of any communication being a bad thing.
May 7th, 2010 - 3:19 am
@leif – You are probably correct that this “algorithmic” approach is intentional. That does seem like Google’s style. Even so, the title of the blog, statements about Google being Evil, and the overall Google trashing in various comments isn’t helpful or accurate I think. The company has too many dimensions (many extremely beneficial to the Linux/OSS community) to completely trash over an incorrect adsense block.
If C+B want to stay with adsense, they could propably just rename the page URL in question and continue on until their adsense account gets blocked (at which point there is a well-defined appeal process); or they can move on to a different company that is less robotic (algorithmic) now.
I just hope Chris doesn’t stop with his Android app of the week reports.
May 7th, 2010 - 3:40 am
Google Adsense sucks! Hope you guys can find another, better way of income to get going
May 7th, 2010 - 12:02 pm
If I were you I would send them a letter with complain to thier address. State that you expect an answer from them within whatever period you think is reasonable. If you do not receive the answer send the second letter where mention that you will complain in the anti-trust or advertising commission if they do not reply.
May 7th, 2010 - 12:03 pm
@#6… They did the exact same thing to me! As soon as I hit the 100 dollar threshold I got an email from them saying I was in violation when I was not!
May 7th, 2010 - 12:29 pm
This is your wake up call.
They are big. You are small.
They dont give a shit about your money or your person.
You are so unimportant for them that they will close your account because some automatic script tells them so.
And they dont give a shit about what you think. There is no way to contact anybody.
You are a product for them just like your data ang Google is selling your data to other big players. Directly like search queries or indirectly by showing you ads based on your data.
You are not a client. They don’t care about your demands. They are interested in making money like every business.
Don’t be evil is just a good PR campaign nothing more. People inside are the same people that work for other companies.
Are you using Google Docs or other Google services? Think about it because somebody or “something” in Google can decide that you are abusing their service (Google logo on a CCTV camera?) and shut your account. They have no obligation towards you.
This is a toxic relationship.
You can’t harm Google in any way but they can harm you.
So don’t start in the first place – don’t give them your data.
The only way to win is not to play.
May 7th, 2010 - 12:40 pm
We’ve been banned from AdSense too, was quite surprising until we found that loads of other sites have been banned too, just because some impersonal algort decided it didn’t like us.
Frankly, Google is Stalinism for the Internet. They decide truth, history, winners and losers.
May 7th, 2010 - 3:19 pm
I once had a Google Adsense account, too. I actually turned it off myself before ever being paid out, because I was afraid it was bound to banned by Google. I had a small mostly personal site – and figured most of the clicks probably came from only a few people, even if I personally did nothing wrong. I don’t blame Google for this. It’s just that my site wasn’t meant for their program (as many small or personal sites are not). I suspect in the case many of the comments (not JB which clearly is a larger site) that this is the case for their sites as well.
Anyway, Google being picky about maintaining its adsense relationships (and doing the process algorithmically) should not be used as a way to condemn everything the company does. Some of the comments on here are completely absurd.
May 7th, 2010 - 5:21 pm
FreedroidRPG, Battle for Wesnoth, Thousand Parsec, BZFlag, and multiple other beneficiaries of the Google Summer of Code disagree with the idea that Google hates video games, especially open-source video games.
I’m sorry that they took away some of your Adsense revenue, but that’s no reason for grandstanding or acting as a drama queen.
May 7th, 2010 - 6:04 pm
This is probably not intentional evil, but the result of the right hand not knowing what the left is doing. It is a problem endemic to large bureaucracies.
In all likelihood, this is ultimately the result of an ignorant programmer making false assumptions. Certainly, it has been shown that a similar phenomenon was in large part responsible for the Wall Street meltdown of recent times.
Programming is hardly the only arena in which this phenomenon is found. For proof, look no further than the MBA who says, “I don’t need to know the business; I can manage it on just the numbers.” As the statement suggests, these popinjays willfully embrace their ignorance, as they feel to actually learn something would waste their precious time.
But this is not a defense of Google, rather, it is an indictment of the larger system which has institutionalized such abuses. As Dame Edith Sitwell put it, “I am patient with stupidity but not with those who are proud of it.”
May 7th, 2010 - 7:34 pm
1. I don’t see any AdSense on ign.com
2. Ten bucks says the iTunes link is your problem (linking to copyrighted material)
May 7th, 2010 - 11:52 pm
It’s the Star Trek Online stuff.
A whole show based on and containing content from copyrighted material owned by Paramount and whatever game company it is.
That’s the problem.
May 8th, 2010 - 12:17 am
So Google turned off your adsense so they must hate Linux and Video games? It’s the automated policies that protect them. You didn’t even reference how long the response was to your petition. There’s nothing wrong with Google. Even as WordPress user you would have to accept that they are the best at what they do.
May 8th, 2010 - 8:22 pm
Funny, I asked some family that works at Google about this.. He replied “Ours is not to reason why.”
Everybody jump ship, Eric Schmidt is taking over the world!
May 9th, 2010 - 12:04 am
Yea it is probably the Star Trek stuff.
Your use of the Star Trek logo is probably what concerned them.
This is all rather ironic since that game got poor reviews and you are probably providing their best source of free advertising.
It says a lot about a game when people are willing to do a show on it. If I didn’t hate MMOs and Star Trek then I would give it a try.
But anyways that sucks though but I have heard so many complaints about adsense that it really doesn’t surprise me.
May 9th, 2010 - 3:13 pm
What Google could do, is to include an ID of the notice, giving the alleged perp a direct method of referencing and reaching a person who can then review the issue.
In fact they could send out the notice and give us a week to respond or automatically stop adsense.
Further it should send two messages just in case one was lost in Trash or whatever.
Google does have a gigantic amount of pages to deal with, and using robots is a good way. But it has the responsibility not only to copyright holders but clients as well to have a fair and easy method of managing their service.
May 9th, 2010 - 7:38 pm
Sorry to hear about your issues with AdSense. I’m at a point with my own site where I need to make a decision on an ad package. From what I’ve heard you are not in a unique position. The most common seem to be like in your case, where even the smallest sliver of copyrighted material, even a mention and link to something copyrighted gives them an excuse to pull the plug on you. That, and like someone else mentioned above, reaching the $100 minimum before profit.
Lame!
May 10th, 2010 - 4:21 am
This may be counter productive, but are there grounds to take google to small claims court? I have no idea how much ad revenue you are being denied. But are there legal avenues to pursue that are cost effective?
Sounds like your really in between a rock and a hard place.
May 10th, 2010 - 7:06 pm
Started moving away from Google a long time ago, the only thing remaining is my use of Google Hosted Services, but I have yet to find a good replacement that supports IDN.
May 19th, 2010 - 9:43 am
Viro is another robot application that looks for copyrighted terms or trademarks. They took down ebay posts that I would put up once in a while because it had trademarked terms. Did it list them? nope. Did they wait till the last few hrs of the auction… yes… ridiculous. Called ebay (which is a task all on its own) was able to convince them it was used properly (since it was the companies product) only to have it taken down again… I can’t stand these kind of practices.
Point to my post is you can’t win.
August 16th, 2010 - 9:13 pm
Google is in the position they are in (God Like) because people are lazy and continue to use them. More people who are angry need to start using other services besides Google. Bing, Yahoo – I use Yauba.com (great search engine). DO NOT USE GOOGLE OR GOOGLE RELATED services (gmail, Youtube,) are all controlled by them. If you don’t like being treated like shi* by Google, then start using another search engine. If enough people do this – the net as we know it will be better off. DUMP GOOGLE!