Robert J. Sawyer

Hugo and Nebula Award-Winning Science Fiction Writer

Google AdSense

by Rob - September 4th, 2006.
Filed under: Uncategorized.

Well, as those who read my blog directly at sfwriter.com/blog.htm have doubtless noticed, I’ve been trying an experiment in having Google AdSense ads on my blog.

But I’m not sure I’m happy with the results: the ads seem to mostly be either from vanity publishers or authors of self-published books, or from fee-charging agents, and those aren’t things I’d recommend to people. Most web users are savvy enough, I’m sure, to know that the mere presence of AdSense ads on a site doesn’t constitute an endorsement of the goods or services offered by the advertisers by the owner of the site, but, still, I’m not sure I’m comfortable with them being here. Thoughts, anyone? (And, no, they’re not generating much revenue.)

There’s also an interesting twist to Google’s license agreement: to avoid getting paid for clicks you yourself generate, you, as the site owner of a page displaying AdSense ads, have to agree to NOT click on them yourself — so I’m not allowed to follow the ads to find out precisely what they’re for; I’m having to guess about the actual products beings sold, in most cases. (Although the Science Fiction Book Club is one of the advertisers whose AdSense ad pops up in rotation here, and I fully support them, and am glad to have books published by them.)

Hmmm ….

Leave a Reply