Graphics Coming to Google Ads

Firmafest writes "New York Times reports that "Users of Google's search engine will soon see something they are not used to on the notoriously spare site: advertising with logos and graphics. And the advertisers will not be limited to America Online, whose talks with Google prompted the change in policy, according to two executives close to the companies' negotiations." The Financial Times has more on the partnership" CT: Sorry folks. My email is broken this morning and i'm not getting error reports.

Comments

Finally a chance to user my adblocker on Google!

[elrous0]

I knew they would give me a special gift for Christmas!

-Eric

code

[uberjoe]

What ever happened to 'Don't be Evil' ?

Re:code

[TripMaster Monkey]

It should be ammended to:

Don't be evil...until you can afford to be.

Re:code

[Anonymous Coward]

Then further amended to "Don't. Be Evil."

Re:code

[AKAImBatman]

The real question is: What makes this new? Google has had image ads for its adsense program for at least 6 months. Probably longer.

The good news is that the ads generally quite good, and try not to annoy you. As an adsense partner, you can also chose whether you have the ads on or off.

Re:code

[slavemowgli]

Don't you think it's a bit of an overreaction to automatically call a switch from text ads to graphical ads "evil"? Especially when they haven't actually made the switch yet and nobody really knows whether they will at all or (if they decide to go through with it) what exactly those graphical ads will look like...

Really, it's like Godwin, only with the nazis. Don't cry bloody murder every time something happens that you don't 100% approve of (and that goes for the grandparent just as much as you).

Re:code

[lengau]

As long as they stick to Jpegs and PNGs, I'm not complaining. But as soon as they allow animated GIFs, I'm blocking them.

Re:code

[dotwhynot]

Google agreed to special placements/treatments of AOL in their Search that Microsoft during the negotiations refused as unethical. That's interesting.

Re:code

[bigpat]

Don't cry bloody murder every time something happens that you don't 100% approve of (and that goes for the grandparent just as much as you).

If you wait until someone goes "too far" before complaining, then they have already gone too far.

AdBlock

[glomph]

https://addons.mozilla.org/extensions/moreinfo.php ?id=10&application=firefox

Re:AdBlock

[SCHecklerX]

And a very simple set of rules that will match almost any ad (remove the space that slashdot adds to some of these):

[Adblock]
us.a1.yimg.com
/.*ads?[./]/
/.*banner s?[./]/
/.*sponsors?[./]/
adserv
advert
fastcl ick.net

Re:AdBlock

[cloudmaster]

It blocks anything that ends with ad, ads, ad., ads. Are you telling me that no valid words end with the combination ad or ads?

[danny@midnight devel]$ egrep -c 'ads?$' /usr/share/dict/words
147

Some of those words include "uploads", "threads", "download", etc. Yeah, I'm sure there's probably nothing I'd ever likely want to see in a directory called "threads" or "downloads". I mean, gingerbread and keypad, probably not, but the Mardis Gras sites would suck without beads and redheads!

Also, "advert" matches "inadvertant", and Yahoo! puts some of their navigational graphics on *.a1.yimg.com as I found when I blocked that site (though I still block it).

There's a good reason that those banner blocking proxys, etc, use hostnames and more specific rules, and why in general you want regexps to be as specific as possible. It's not because people like excessive busywork.

As a service to those who would say "fine, what would *you* do," here's the relevant part of my squid.conf, which blocks a big chunk of the annoying ads on sites I regularly visit (including a big chunk of the google ads that I got pissed off at a while back):

# junk ads
acl junk dstdomain .tradedoubler.com
acl junk dstdomain .doubleclick.net
acl junk dstdomain .fastclick.net
acl junk dstdomain .advertising.com
acl junk dstdomain .atdmt.com
acl junk dstdomain .a1.yimg.com
acl junk dstdomain .mediaplex.com
acl junk dstdomain .valueclick.com
acl junk dstdomain .cj.com
acl junk dstdomain .pointroll.com
acl junk dstdomain .m7z.net
acl junk dstdomain ads.wunderground.com
acl junk dstdomain banners.wunderground.com
acl junk dstdomain .falkag.net
acl junk dstdomain .ru4.com
acl junk dstdomain .eyewonder.com
acl junk dstdomain .casalemedia.com
acl junk dstdomain .pennyweb.com
acl junk dstdomain .2o7.net
acl junk dstdomain ads.autotrader.com
acl junk_url_paths urlpath_regex ^/ads/.*
acl junk_urls url_regex http://./\.priceline\.com/banners/.*
acl junk_urls url_regex http://./\.googlesyndication\.com/pagead/.*\.js
a cl junk_urls url_regex https?://a.*\.akamai\.net/.*!(shopnbc\.com.*)
 
# block requests to junk domains
http_access deny junk
http_access deny junk_urls
http_access deny junk_url_paths
 
# replace the junk ads with an image from my web server
deny_info http://www.myinternalsite.com/images/icons/thumbs_ down.gif junk
deny_info http://www.myinternalsite.com/images/icons/thumbs_ down.gif junk_urls
deny_info http://www.myinternalsite.com/images/icons/thumbs_ down.gif junk_url_paths

Using the thumbsdown icon I can see that it's working - I like that a little better than my previous use of a 1x1 clear .gif. The list is getting big enough that I should probably just put that stuff in an external file (at least the rules) which I include, rather than putting it in squid.conf directly, but I haven't felt the compulsion to do so yet. Also note the akami.net rule has an exclude for shopnbc.com - it was blocking product images on something the wife wanted to look at. It may block other useful imagery, but so far I haven't noticed - but I may not notice, either. Though, one could argue philisophically about whether or not something I didn't notice was important to begin with, I suppose...

Google vs. Yahoo, the gap slims

[mister_llah]

Not too much of a surprise, but considering the lack of 'tacky' advertising was what seemed to have led a lot of people to Google (as opposed to staying with Yahoo) ... I have to wonder if it is really the best move.

Financially, it's a good move. They get a lot of traffic, it's good money.

Socially, perhaps not such a wise choice. ... but we'll all take it in stride, since we have no other choice, I guess...

Who's hosting the logos?

[hal2814]

I do hope that whatever Google does about displaying logos, images, etc, they do not sacrifice the decent speed the search engine has right now. I'd hate for Google to turn into another site that has good information but that stupid image from doubleclick has to load before you can see any of it.

google?

[provid]

whats google?

Re:google?

[schon]

I know you're being funny, but... true story:

About a year ago, I was contracted to install a Linux server for a client. The client used a vertical accounting app which ran only on SCO Unix and Linux. The client wanted to ditch SCO, and I was happy to help.

The vendor for this app insisted that the server be publically accessible so that their tech people could perform updates (my suggestion that we restrict via IP address was shot down, as apparently their tech support worked from their homes, and didn't have static IP addresses) via *TELNET*.

I recommended that they remove telnet, and use SSH (after all, would you want your accounting data to be available to everyone on the internet?) The client agreed, and we informed the vendor that they'd need to use SSH/Putty/whatever to access the server.

I got a call from one of their "tech" people, who asked why she couldn't log in. I told her that for (what I thought were obvious) security reasons, she'd need to use SSH.

She started bitching about "I don't know what that is! Nobody told me how to use that!", etc. After she calmed down a bit, I explained to her what SSH was, and how there were free SSH clients, such as Putty. She asked where she could go to download Putty, and I told her "Just go to Google, and enter 'putty SSH'", and click "I'm feeling lucky".

Her response floored me.

"What's Google?"

I can't believe that someone who has root access on god knows how many Unix and Linux boxes, and whose job it is to support these boxes, had absolutely no idea who Google was.

Re:google?

[uberdave]

What is worse, is that this someone "who has root access on god knows how many Unix and Linux boxes, and whose job it is to support these boxes", had absolutely no idea what SSH was.

It was bound to happen

[pryonic]

But I think Google will alienate a large percentage of its user base. People started to use Google because it was clean. Even with the introduction of text ads, the site managed to remain clear. Normal banner ads will just make the site look cheap and cluttered.

Maybe time to find a new search engine. Anyone any suggestions?

Re:It was bound to happen

[NeoSkandranon]

The site will only look cheap and cluttered as long as it takes me to AdBlock all the banners.

Up until now I've refrained from using any kind of blocking mechanism on google's ads because they are always restrained and discreet, and I suspect I'm not the only one who's formed their banner-blocking behavior in this way.

No flash, please!

[bedroll]

At least it appears that the graphics they'll be using will be limited in scope. Hopefully this isn't a precursor to flash ads and animated gifs. The day they start using pop-over flash ads is the first day of Google's demise.

Re:No flash, please!

[bedroll]

You hit the nail on the head.

The problem with the pervasiveness of advertising today is that eventually you become numb to it and just wade through it trying to get to wherever you were going (the next exit, the next page, the next tv show...). So then they have to ramp up the volume on their message to try to break the monotony and make you pay attention (loud commercials, bulky magazine inserts, moving billboards...).

What Google has done is take us back to a time when advertising was little more than attempting to get the word out for something that may not be widely known. They put ads on pages in a classy way, then attempted to ensure those ads were context sensitive so that it may actually help people find things. Adding classy touches that are subtle but noticeable, like small graphics and preferred placement, make a difference without changing the purpose.

Of course, they also are a precursor to the inundation of advertisement that we get everywhere else. The good news is that the people at Google acknowledged this problem long ago and may be aware that their success is tied to it.

Staying the course....

[Shakes268]

Google, by going public now has to deal with the investors. They want to see cash flow increases every quarter. So, to continue revenue increases they will continuously be attempting to increase ad revenue.

Search on Windows - 10 results and 50 million ads. "Hi, have you thought about double pane windows for your home?"

Search on Linux - "Hi, have you thought about fuzzy penguin slippers for Christmas?"

Search on Cars - "Test drive the new Ford 150 today! Print this google ad and we'll give you a gallon of free gasoline"

Search on Slashdot - "Xerox - for when you want to make your own dupes"

Brilliant!

[Jerry Coffin]

Now that's brilliant business:
Google: widely respected and quite profitable.
AOL: being bought out, and gets exactly the respect it deserves.

[closed captioning for the humor impaired: sarcasm to follow]
Obviously Google should be taking AOL's advice about how to finally achieve some real success, right?
[end sarcasm]

Adblock to the rescue

[hotspotbloc]

Google has been playing with image banner ads for a while which is why "http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/imgad ?*" is in my Adblock kill file. Don't they realize that the only reason most people who can block ads haven't blocked them because the vast, vast majority of their ads are text only?

BTW, get Adblock here: http://adblock.mozdev.org/

You *do* have choices

[brunes69]

Teoma still has only text-based ads, and has some innovative features and accurate results.

MSN Search has only text ads. Sure, it is MS, but the new engine is actually pretty accurate and has useful features like encarta integration.

Yahoo! search also has no image-based ads. Funny how people are constantly bashing Yahoo!, and now Google is going to have image ads on it's search, where Yahoo! removed them a long time ago.

It's called a free market, we wil see how it plays out. If Google alienates their customers, they will migrate elsewhere.

Sad Day

[Buzz_Litebeer]

It was as if a Million Geeks cried out in terror and then were silenced.

Jumped the Shark

[barik]

Honestly, it looks to me that Google has jumped the shark. Google now reminds me of just about every other company during the DotCom bubble burst.

Don't get me wrong -- I'm glad Google is around. They're providing some much needed competition in the web area, but I fear that things are going to get much worse before they get better.

Google has a lot of great technologies, but all of their income comes from advertising. So if they want to expand, and maintain free services, their only option is basically to ramp up their advertising. Whether they can do that without annoying their users remains to be seen.

Re:Also... [AOL + Google]

[nospmiS remoH]

I couldn't agree more. A good rule of thumb is that AOL + ANYTHING = crap. I literally got a knot in my stomach when I read "...America Online, whose talks with Google prompted the change in policy..." AOL killed Winamp and Netscape, and now they are threatening Google. This is a sad day, if only it were April 1st there would be hope that this is all just a lie. It is like AOL is a parasite and only remains alive by sucking the life out of everything it touches.

Google: "Don't be evil."
AOL: "Don't appear to be evil."

Images = evil

[chord.wav]

Images is the path to the dark side!! Sooner than you think, Google will partner with Gator and you'll see Bonzi Buddy dancing in your desktop!!

Re:Finally a chance to user my adblocker on Google

[shreevatsa]

You mean you haven't heard of Flashblock? (Install it from here.)

It does exactly what you want—blocks all Flash with a box with a Play button on it, which you can click if you want to allow that Flash object to play.