Slashdot Mirror
Google Stops Ads For "Cougar" Sites
teh31337one writes "Google is refusing to advertise CougarLife, a dating site for mature women looking for younger men. However, they continue to accept sites for mature men seeking young women. According to the New York Times, CougarLife.com had been paying Google $100,000 a month since October. The Mountain View company has now cancelled the contract, saying that the dating site is 'nonfamily safe.'"
What happened to "Do No Evil"?
Its become "Do No Evil (*)"
(*) Except on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays, Sundays, after 4pm, if it makes us lots of money or if we just cant be bothered with our fake holier than thou image.
Please drill down into TFA and tell me if this is a slashvertisment for CougarLife, an unrelated violation of googles TOS, or really google being evil so I can be outraged accordingly.
Cougar life? Psh, that's so last year. Tell me about some sabretooth action!
If the site still exists, and am looking for an older woman to have some fun at night, I'm sure that Googling "Cougar dating" should give me satisfaction, instead of having an ad displayed from time to time making me think that I like to be a toy boy...
No, wait, she sticks to her own age group. My bad.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
I've seen a lot of spam for these kinds of site, so there may be a valid reason for closely examining them, but if this is an editorial decision, it's repulsive.
Well, cougar do pose a greater risk to family safety than most daddies.
Once again, another story that has NO impact on the readers of /. Neither "hot older women" nor "cute young men" can be found here. Thanks for reminding us you jerk!
If would be a different story however, if google had banned a site for women seeking basement dwelling fat people.
For their new Cougar Life, the first cereal to stay completely dry in milk.
Did I miss the announcement? Heck, this isn't even a pr0n site.
Never heard of them before.... until now.
Hope is the currency of fools
why do we always need to self-censor? Who said the web needs to be "family safe"? Why are companies voluntarily following 1950's morality codes that the FCC imposes on broadcasters?
and what's offensive about women looking for some love'n?
It seems like in this country love is the biggest taboo of all
The problem is that the two are not often compatible. The site for older men trolling for younger women likely intentionally does some obfuscation to hide what they are after. The cougar site, however, is relatively unambiguous by name. In the same light we seldom see political advertising that pushes facts, most political ads (the ones on slashdot being excellent examples) instead push rumors, half-truths, and outright lies.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
because of the pervasive censorship, and announces a strong anti-censorship stance, even in engaging in a hopeful (although a little hamstrung) effort to show themselves as friends of transparency:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/apr/20/google-google-street-view
but on the other hand it engages in a strange, fossil pre-'The Graduate' sort of hysterical moral panic that doesn't even exist (as a compelling widely believed opinion) in western countries anymore:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Graduate
even if you are so cynical as to say google has no real allegiance to transparency and truly fights censorship, that it's just a pr campaign, the contrast here is so galling as to nullify even the pr campaign on a surface level
therefore, this has to be a case of google losing some coherence in internal corporate guidelines. there's going to be some meetings, some people are going to get a stern email, and this decision will be reversed by higher ups
as to say this decision is hypocritical of google is putting it mildly
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
no intarwebs for teh cougars. They must do LOLCATS.
Considering I had never heard of them before, I'd say that by cancelling the contract Google has done the service the biggest favor yet! I imagine most people out there hadn't heard of it, either.
You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it dissolve.
Google has simply labelled "cougar" to be an adult term, and adult ads are not allowed on its network. Yet other ads with the same or even stronger adult theme are allowed. The same company has a site for older men seeking younger women, and that one is allowed.
So it seems Google is being very sexist about it. Probably not a high level decision, just someone who let his/her own personal views put a word on the banned word list. I don't think Google really wants to ban all the adult themed ads, it is a lot of money they would be throwing away. 100k in advertising for one site only. Even Google is going to feel it if its puritans stance is now going to force it to block all the sites aimed at men as well.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
It's probably just me, but the phrase "nonfamily safe" doesn't seem to parse all that well. Personally, I read that as "safe for non-families". So, if I wanted to go to that site with some friends, so long as I am not related to them, it would be acceptable. However, once my wife enters the room, it becomes non-safe.
On second thought, that's probably an accurate interpretation.
Take it to the limit, everybody to the limit, come on, everybody fhqwhgads.
You know if other parts of the world it's called MountainLionLife.com, Puma.com, or even PantherLife.com
I judt got a nre Kinesis keybiartf so please excusr ant egregiou typos.
A coupling of an older man with a younger woman has a greater chance of bearing children than that of an older woman and a younger man.
It seems to me that the Cougar scenario contains more safety from creating a Family than the other
This is just a tactical move in Google's spat with Apple. They're banning the term "Cougar" before Apple can use it as the name of its next OS X release.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
Actually searching for Cougar still brings up ads for Cougarlife.
It also brought up a Google ad for "cougarfling". I wonder if Cougarlife has done something to annoy Google, or if Google is legitimately trying to be family safe -- if so, they should be refusing to display any ad of this sort.
If I may play devil's advocate for a second:
In most cases, an older woman seeking out a younger man is looking for a hook-up (women aren't morons, they know that men 10-20 their junior won't marry them). I don't have enough interest in this subject to do in-depth research, but I'm willing to bet a significant portion of CougarLife's clients are married women with children looking for something on the side - which is indeed "nonfamily safe".
In contrast, an older man dating a younger woman is much more likely to end up in a relationship or marriage, and while an older man actively looking for a younger woman is clearly looking to hook up as well, he is also much more likely to be looking for something more substantial, which means he's in a position to do so - meaning, not married and not in a situation where the outcome of the services provided by [his dating site of choice] will be a threat to his family.
Turning down CougarLife's ads might be wrong based on other factors, but the "nonfamily safe" rational itself seems pretty sound to me.
Who said the web needs to be "family safe"?
The Web is just following the Golden Rule: Those with the Gold, make the Rules.
And Moms and Dads with small children have more money to spend on ads and media than teens and 20-something hipsters.
Statistically improbable!
which is totally what she said
So if I start a non-profit caring for big cats (there really is one near me) I can't advertise for donations on Google? What is the Microsoft ad contract like?
Think Deeply.
a site with older woman, desperate for young guys. I am getting laid tonight !
outcry from "feminist" groups over the use of the word "cougar?" The misguided misandrists nearly succeeded in having that term banned from DemocraticUnderground. I don't think these same groups ever raised an eyebrow over "sugar daddy."
They leave China because they can't stand the idea of censorship - and now are censoring themselves (and by extension, my searches and ads I see)...sounds like a load of bullshit to me. Family Friendly? The Internet is not the play place at McDonalds - its (or was) the Wild West and thats the way it should stay...
Individuals must choose, decide their "essential" nature rather than having it given from some transcendent source.
Will someone please think of the swingers?
In the online advertising world you generally try and avoid Google. Not only is it really expensive but they change their rules at every turn, blacklist some of their good clients without notice and offer vague to no reasons as to why they have done so. We think "CougarLife will just have to advertise somewhere else, no biggie." But what we must realize is that they surely have spent lots of money researching what forms advertising work on Google's system. It's quite an expensive process to research and to optimize a campaign so that you are not just bleeding money. And now Google simply says "not our problem". I realize it's their systems and they can boot who they wish. But disposing of their clients as they please is catching up to them.
This is called a bracketing paradox, and it's commonplace in natural languages. The classic textbook example is nuclear physicist, which doesn't mean "a physicist who's nuclear," but rather "an expert on nuclear physics."
Are you adequate?
And Moms and Dads with small children have more money to spend on ads and media than teens and 20-something hipsters.
No they don't. Where would you get an idea like that?
Literalism isn't a form of humor, it's you being irritating.
And what to say of Lycid Lynx? Icanhascheezburger.com?
My god, women looking for sex are EVERYWHERE!
Thank god for slashdot, the one safe sanctuary free of sex! No change of running into a horny woman lusting after my body here.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
The key issue here isn't what's going on in the collective heads of the bureaucracy of the Google AdWords team. I'm sure they're all very fine people who love their mothers and volunteer for the poor, etc. The issue is that the effects of this policy are sexist.
It's much the same story as for racism. I don't know what people really think about members of minority groups, and I honestly don't particularly care. But I do care about their actions and words. It honestly doesn't make any sense to say to a person or organization "you are racist/sexist". But it's totally sensible to say "this behavior is racist/sexist". It's about the effects.
I think the Sugar Daddy site is WORSE than Cougar Life. The former is explicitly about young girls hooking up with old guys in exchange for money. It's barely camouflaged prostitution. Cougar Life, at least, isn't explicitly about money changing hands.
They block cougars because it isn't "family safe" but right now I'm seeing an ad at this very page for a dating site that shows a nude woman! (ok, it's some Eve from some picture from Renaissance, but my point stands)
So if I go to a Porn site, won't I get advertiseing to other porn sites? Aren't those non-family friendly?
Pot meet Kettle...
Life takes interesting turns, but the most interest is when you're off the beaten path.
And Moms and Dads with small children have more money to spend on ads and media than teens and 20-something hipsters.
And adults without children draining their revenue have even more money to spend on leisures.
Just my 2.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
means it's safe for the non-family. Discrimination is bad; murdering English is evil.
How remarkably Applesoftian of them!!!
What I find really amusing is that this will potentially impact WSU and all schools with sports teams called 'Cougars'. It's kind of like when AOL banned the word 'breast' and people in chat rooms had to talk about 'hooter cancer'!
Moralism is fucking stupid and society needs to get over it. Google is just contributing to the problem and acting like hypocrites to do it. China thinks they censor for 'morality' too, but that wasn't ok for Google, Google only wants to censor for morality on its own terms.
I support the Slashcott and will not be reading or commenting from 2/10/14 to 2/17/14. Beta is steaming pile of dog shit
Say doesthe Lincoln-Mercury arm of the Ford Motor company still make cars by that name?
All that stuff about non censorship in china, and they block a dating site...
the MILF syndicate got to Google.
I've seen this again and again. Too many young women are just bad at life. They might be attractive, fit, and successful at their jobs, but outside of that there is isolation and void and fear. And much like their cars and their computers, they want to dump their unhappiness on Mr. Man for him to fix it. I don't mind reinstalling Windows every now and then, but I am not a spiritual healer and if my loving doesn't take away the pain, I don't know what will.
The Mountain View company has now cancelled the contract, saying that the dating site is 'nonfamily safe.'
What's wrong with a site being safe for nonfamilies?
Please keep old vagina off the internet. K thanks.
Cougar Life has run adverts on the radio here in Chicago.
Their tag line is "Wouldn't you like to **** a cougar too?"
As such, it's pretty obvious that they're not going to pass the "No Adult Content" caveat in place with Google.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
"Google is refusing to advertise CougarLife, a dating site for mature women looking for younger men. However, they continue to accept sites for mature men seeking young women.
Men age like wine, women like milk.
If its the site I'm thinking of its really no surprise, I heard a commercial on the radio and found myself wondering if it was a site for dating or prostitution.
I really wish I could find the audio to that commercial, I'm no prude, but it certainty wasn't an image I would choose for my company. It just kept going on and on about how this was THE site for cougars to fuck young men. (and they didn't sugar coat it with hookup, meet, etc, the purpose of using the site was to find older women who want to fuck)
When I google cougar life, I get sponsored ads for CougarFling.com. The mind boggles.
BS.
There are only a few (two or three, tops) mountain lion attacks on children in the US, per year.
The number of children physically (beatings), sexually, and emotionally attacked by their fathers is orders of magnitude higher than that.
Which one is for non-human cougars stalking Kim Bauer? [grin]
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Neither are stretch marks!
Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
Given that ABC, one of the most family-friendly networks on US TV, has a show called "Cougar Town," can it really be said that this term is somehow offensive or even "adult?" That seems like a stretch to me. Any 12 year old who watches "Lost" or "Dancing With the Stars" has seen ads for "Cougar Town."
I'm fluent in English, but didn't know this particular eum... "common metaphor".
To me a cougar was a letter c that attacked my Dwarves from time to time in Dwarf Fortress... I knew it was an animal, but I didn't bother to look it up.
When I play Dwarf Fortress again I'm going to study cougars a bit more closely. They sound really vicious.
I can't even say I had "gay old time" anymore without people looking at me funny!
You may be looked at funny for calling a reporter or other writer a "hack" too.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Goat, GTO, is missing.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
compatible. The site for older men trolling for younger women likely intentionally does some obfuscation to hide what they are after.
I don't think sugar daddy is obfuscated, neither in description nor in domain.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
I suspect it really is just that simple... "CougarLife.com" is considered explicit; Google would probably treat a site called "SugarDaddyHeaven.com" exactly the same.
But Sugar daddy is explicit and so is the first result, Sugardaddie.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Prostitution is no longer legal in Rhode Island, governor Donald Carcieri signed a law making "the buying and selling of sexual services a crime" in 2009. Prostitution was legal in many places until the same people who pushed for Prohibition also pushed to make prostitution illegal as well. Some US cities had their own red-light districts. But before they existed prostitution was legal anywhere. The idea of red-light districts in the US came about with the same goal as the .xxx domain, first require prostitutes to work only in specified places then make it illegal. Once grouped it's easy to control them.
Given the ever growing emphasis on the government staying out of "morality" issues, I'd wager that within the next few decades it'll be legal in at least a few more states.
Unless people and/or their representatives come to their senses I doubt prostitution will be made legal again. If anything laws against it will not be enforced.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
searching for cougar dating brings a sponsored link for www.DateACougar.com.
And many others. Years ago I googled "cougar dating" myself.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Statistically, fahrbot's situation is an exception to an overwhelming rule: there are many more older men in relationships (and certainly in marriages; check the stats) with younger women than there are older women in relationships with younger men.
Do you have those stats? CNN says in Older women and younger men: Can it Work? that a "2003 study by AARP revealed that 34 percent of all women over 40 in the survey were dating younger men, and 35 percent preferred it to dating older men." AARP has Cougars and Their Cubs as well as a number of other articles on cougars. Now those two articles were the first 2 results for statistics dating old young.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
This conversation has gotten too intelligent, compassionate, mature, and reasonable...
Ironically, some of the traits I also like in a woman. :-)
Those are some of the same traits that attract me.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Yeah I just did a google search for the term "cougar". The top sponsored link (ie advertisement) is for...cougarlife.com.
And the second sponsored link, on the right, is for dateacougar.
Nothing to see here - irony intended - move along little doggy.
Q: What do old broads put behind their ears to attact men?
.
A: Their ankles!
The article confuses Ad Revenue with Search Results. Google is refusing Ad Revenue from Non-Family websites. This is not restricted to cougar related businesses. If you search for "cougars looking for younger men", you'll see plenty of results for Cougar Websites. Google is just refusing to be an advertising source for them.
http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=cougars+looking+for+younger+men
Prostitution is no longer legal in Rhode Island, governor Donald Carcieri signed a law making "the buying and selling of sexual services a crime" in 2009.
Ah yes, one of the anti-sex trafficking groups (who are really anti-prostitution and often anti-sex in any way we don't like) convinced the government to outlaw it. After all, who wouldn't - think of the trafficked women!
AdSense vs. Google search. Not the same thing at all.
Google’s guidelines for image advertisements includes the following:
Ads are reviewed and categorised as 'FamilySafe', 'Non-FamilySafe' or 'Adult Sexual Content' depending on the content of the ad and website. Only 'FamilySafe' images (containing no adult content) will be approved.
Your images may not contain:
* Any material intended for persons over 18.
* Mature sexual themes, nudity and/or sexual activity.
* Crude or indecent language.
* Offensive or inappropriate content.
We reserve the right to exercise our editorial discretion concerning this image requirement.
Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
For all the slashdotters dreaming of cougar hookups, remembers, they are cougars. They are not desperate.
So I googled cougarlife.com and got this in the sponsored ad column on the right:
--
We are living in a world we do not understand.
It seems not all cougars are evil.
Yet.
who wouldn't - think of the trafficked women!
One thing that gets me is that some of those who oppose prostitution are supposedly pro women. What could be more anti-woman that denying them the right to decide what they will do with their own body? And that includes feminists. In order to get away with it they twist it around and say prostitution is a way "in which women are exploited by a patriarchal system". Then again they say the same about marriage.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
AdSense vs. Google search. Not the same thing at all.
Google's guidelines for image advertisements includes the following:
Ah but those guidelines are for AdWords not AdSense. What the differences are I don't know though.
How about this, searching for sugar daddy returns 7 results about dating and 9 ads for dating websites. On the first page of results there are only 2 results for food, Sugardaddys "Sumptuous Sweeties - It's not your everyday brownie" and Sugar Daddy "Candy you ate as a kid". Searching for cougar returns 4 ads for dating and 2 results for dating websites. Three more web results are definitions and wiki articles. Included news results include articles about what Google is doing, BYU's football team the Cougars, and actual cougar cats. The web search also includes images of cougars, that is cats.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Apple does not sell a tablet like the Modbook Pro, Apple sells MacBook Pros to Axiotron who then modifies them. There is a difference. Searching Apple's online store only even returns one result for modbook, a Western Digital external hard drive.
MacBook Touch
Now I know you're making things up, searching the store for "macbook touch" does not return one MacBook Touch, the only touches returned for the iPod Touch.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Ah but those guidelines are for AdWords not AdSense. What the differences are I don't know though.
AdSense is the service that webmasters register for to embed Google ads in their sites. AdWords is the service that webmasters register for to put ads for their websites on Google’s AdSense network.
Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
AdSense is the service that webmasters register for to embed Google ads in their sites. AdWords is the service that webmasters register for to put ads for their websites on Google's AdSense network.
Okay, thanks but what is it that puts ads on search results?
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
CougarLife still makes the cut, though; search "cougar dating" and it shows up as a sponsored result. So that clearly isn't the issue here;
But it is an issue, searching "cougar" returned 2 cougar dating websites but searching "sugar daddy" returned 7 sugar daddy dating websites.
it's just the AdSense network that they got booted from.
Maybe but Google searches shows a bias.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
What could be more anti-woman that denying them the right to decide what they will do with their own body?
Because, so the argument goes, they can't possibly actually want to take part in prostitution; men have forced them into it for their own benefit. What's more, if any woman claims otherwise, they're either doing it to curry favour with men or have been tricked into believing it by our male-dominated society. This isn't just limited to the issue of prostitution either; the exact same argument is used against women who are kinky.
Of course, there's more to it than this. For example, some groups use the idea that women are forced to become prostitutes due to economic pressures as a justification for banning it. This makes no sense unless you assume that the women in question are irrational and actually chose it over a better option that will become obvious to them once prostitution is illegal. Combine this with feminism's known class and race issues, and things start to look interesting...
Combine this with feminism's known class and race issues, and things start to look interesting...
I partially agreed with what you said, until I got here. Perhaps you mean feminism in the so called west but there are feminists all over the world. There are even African, Chinese, Muslim, and South American feminists.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?