Google sneaking images next to ads part II

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I found a forum post from Josh (SitePoint Forum Leader). It was a very GOOD post in my opinion. He took great measures to digg deeper on Googles postion regarding placing its OWN images next to ads. See original Forum post here:

Josh’s  email to Google said and I quote -

Regarding your blog post “clarifying” the image placement next to ads here: http://adsense.blogspot.com/2006/12/…nt-policy.html

While it was certainly clearer, it wasn’t clear.

Statements like this are very ambiguous and confusing to publishers:

“You can definitely place Google ads on pages containing images — just make sure that the ads and images are not arranged in a way that could easily mislead or confuse your visitors. For example, if you run a stock photography site with a catalog of thumbnail images, don’t line the ads up with the thumbnails in a way that could be misleading. Consider using a full border around your ads or changing your ad colors, for example.”

So wait, does that mean if you use ads with a full border or different background color you can have thumbnails? If you offset the thumbnails so they don’t line up exactly with the ads is that okay? Your examples certainly don’t answer those questions, either (one implies it’s a no-no to put images related to the products sold in the ads, the other implies that it is bad to make your ads look like content links–but what if your adsense blocks are the only things with thumbnails on your site, is it then permitted?)

Do you have any better answers? This policy clarification still seems to leave things VERY subjective and ambiguous.

Also, given the number of people who are doing this, and how effective it apparently is, why don’t you guys just offer thumbnail ads to ADVERTISERS. Then they pick the thumbnail on their ads and everyone is happy. I’m sure you’ve gotten that suggestion numerous times.

I mean, it looks like you guys already break your own rules: http://www.joe-whyte.com/2006/12/18/…xt-to-its-ads/

-Josh

I love his email. Way to go JOSH!! Here is what GOOGLE HAD TO SAY!!!

Hi Josh,

Thank you for your email.

I understand that you have questions about the example we’ve provided. We’re trying to convey that users who naturally have smaller images on their sites (for instance, the stock photography site we used as an example) should still feel free to place ads on their sites, as long as they don’t try to associate the images and ads in any way. The provided suggestions were general suggestions that referred to our example, and do not apply to other sites.

Regarding your second question - if a site does not have thumbnail sized images for some other reason, then there’s really no circumstances under which images should be added and placed near Google ads.

We appreciate your suggestion for allowing advertisers to offer thumbnail images. While this feature isn’t currently available, I’m happy to pass along your comments to our engineering and product teams. Please also feel free to submit any future suggestions through our online form at http://google.com/adsense_features_email .

Sincerely,

Stephanie
The Google AdSense Team

I suggest my readers check out this forum post as there are going to be a lot of opinions going on over at sitepoint ;-). IMO I think Google is taking the easy way out. Yes they do explain themselves and I GUESSSSS because its christmas they have a REASON to put these images next their ads but seriously how close are they pushing the line on this?????

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