---
title: "Google ad madness"
date: 2006-01-19T07:08:35-05:00
url: https://blog.lmorchard.com/2006/01/19/google-ad-madness/
author: Les Orchard
tags: [asides]
---

# Google ad madness

Wow.  Can you identify the actual content on [this blog entry][p]?  I count plenty of ads, but it took me a minutes to see the short bit of original content there.  No slight intended to the particular author there, since it's something I'm seeing more and more.  But, man.  Last time I had Google ads on my site, I thought the rules were just one ad block per page.  Yeesh.

[p]: http://www.feedblog.org/2006/01/yahoo_music_for.html

<div id="comments" class="comments archived-comments">
            <h3>Archived Comments</h3>
            
        <ul class="comments">
            
        <li class="comment" id="comment-221083516">
            <div class="meta">
                <div class="author">
                    <a class="avatar image" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.joegrossberg.com"><img src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=f288a8afe5302a16a366d5e9d34f2fec&amp;size=32&amp;default=http://mediacdn.disqus.com/1320279820/images/noavatar32.png"/></a>
                    <a class="avatar name" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.joegrossberg.com">Joe Grossberg</a>
                </div>
                <a href="#comment-221083516" class="permalink"><time datetime="2006-01-19T15:59:11">2006-01-19T15:59:11</time></a>
            </div>
            <div class="content"><p>Looks just fine, because I use Adblock to keep Google ads out of my Firefox (it can block js scripts by URL).</p></div>
            
        </li>
    
        <li class="comment" id="comment-221083517">
            <div class="meta">
                <div class="author">
                    <a class="avatar image" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.soylentred.net/"><img src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=633c41346f349b55b8e86445fa28ca21&amp;size=32&amp;default=http://mediacdn.disqus.com/1320279820/images/noavatar32.png"/></a>
                    <a class="avatar name" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.soylentred.net/">Rory Parle</a>
                </div>
                <a href="#comment-221083517" class="permalink"><time datetime="2006-01-19T16:21:01">2006-01-19T16:21:01</time></a>
            </div>
            <div class="content"><p>That's just terrible.  Who would read that? I'd want to have a very compelling reason to stick around on a site like that. That density of ads is just plain <em>rude</em>. I've noticed a similar overload on <a href="http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/rumblingedge/" rel="nofollow">the Rumbling Edge</a>, the Thunderbird bugs blog. On my setup the content of any page on that blog is pushed under the fold by the ads.</p></div>
            
        </li>
    
        <li class="comment" id="comment-221083520">
            <div class="meta">
                <div class="author">
                    <a class="avatar image" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://plasmasturm.org/"><img src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=e17949267bbfe21a0fadf1bbf00592b4&amp;size=32&amp;default=http://mediacdn.disqus.com/1320279820/images/noavatar32.png"/></a>
                    <a class="avatar name" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://plasmasturm.org/">Aristotle Pagaltzis</a>
                </div>
                <a href="#comment-221083520" class="permalink"><time datetime="2006-01-19T18:17:30">2006-01-19T18:17:30</time></a>
            </div>
            <div class="content"><p>Looks fine to me as well:</p>

<pre><code>$ grep -i google /etc/hosts
0.0.0.0         pagead2.googlesyndication.com
</code></pre></div>
            
        </li>
    
        <li class="comment" id="comment-221083521">
            <div class="meta">
                <div class="author">
                    <a class="avatar image" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.decafbad.com"><img src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=2377f34a68801b861c3e54e1301f0dce&amp;size=32&amp;default=http://mediacdn.disqus.com/1320279820/images/noavatar32.png"/></a>
                    <a class="avatar name" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.decafbad.com">l.m.orchard</a>
                </div>
                <a href="#comment-221083521" class="permalink"><time datetime="2006-01-19T19:12:41">2006-01-19T19:12:41</time></a>
            </div>
            <div class="content"><p>Heh, okay okay, <em>physician heal thyself</em> and all that...  I finally installed Adblock on Firefox <em>and</em> tweaked my hosts file just in case I happen to switch back to Safari.</p></div>
            
        </li>
    
        <li class="comment" id="comment-221083522">
            <div class="meta">
                <div class="author">
                    <a class="avatar image" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://anton.lr2.com/"><img src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=8397967fc904063a46ec37ccdf251db2&amp;size=32&amp;default=http://mediacdn.disqus.com/1320279820/images/noavatar32.png"/></a>
                    <a class="avatar name" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://anton.lr2.com/">Anton</a>
                </div>
                <a href="#comment-221083522" class="permalink"><time datetime="2006-01-22T03:42:59">2006-01-22T03:42:59</time></a>
            </div>
            <div class="content"><p>Google's TOS allows no more than one of each type of ad on a page.  I'm not sure if they limit the total number, but they might ought to.</p></div>
            
        </li>
    
        <li class="comment" id="comment-221083523">
            <div class="meta">
                <div class="author">
                    <a class="avatar image" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://feedblog.org"><img src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=c2cb359ff3ec0e0eb4426089e179ce3f&amp;size=32&amp;default=http://mediacdn.disqus.com/1320279820/images/noavatar32.png"/></a>
                    <a class="avatar name" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://feedblog.org">Kevin Burton</a>
                </div>
                <a href="#comment-221083523" class="permalink"><time datetime="2006-01-23T07:57:29">2006-01-23T07:57:29</time></a>
            </div>
            <div class="content"><p>Yeah.. it's just been ad creep.  I need to update the templates...</p>

<p>I didn't realize how bad it had gotten :)</p>

<p>Thanks for the feedback!</p>

<p>Kevin</p></div>
            
        </li>
    
        <li class="comment" id="comment-221083525">
            <div class="meta">
                <div class="author">
                    <a class="avatar image" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.decafbad.com"><img src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=2377f34a68801b861c3e54e1301f0dce&amp;size=32&amp;default=http://mediacdn.disqus.com/1320279820/images/noavatar32.png"/></a>
                    <a class="avatar name" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.decafbad.com">l.m.orchard</a>
                </div>
                <a href="#comment-221083525" class="permalink"><time datetime="2006-01-23T11:47:32">2006-01-23T11:47:32</time></a>
            </div>
            <div class="content"><p>Kevin: Yeah, no offense man... after looking at a few more posts on your site, I realize it doesn't look as bad for longer posts.  I think with that template, for a shorter one-off thought, it hit me in the face with "ADS ADS ADS"  :)</p></div>
            
        </li>
    
        <li class="comment" id="comment-221083527">
            <div class="meta">
                <div class="author">
                    <a class="avatar image" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.welt-blick.de"><img src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=db893dfa6f3ab394bbbe463ac7e8220e&amp;size=32&amp;default=http://mediacdn.disqus.com/1320279820/images/noavatar32.png"/></a>
                    <a class="avatar name" rel="nofollow" 
                       href="http://www.welt-blick.de">Alex</a>
                </div>
                <a href="#comment-221083527" class="permalink"><time datetime="2006-04-17T22:35:40">2006-04-17T22:35:40</time></a>
            </div>
            <div class="content"><p>Allowed are 3 normal ads and 2 link ads - so you can put 5 ads on every page.</p>

<p>But of course it looks really terrible if you do so...</p></div>
            
        </li>
    
        </ul>
    
        </div>