polygon
February 5th, 2001, 01:04
Do you have limits to the kinds of ads you're willing to have running on your web site? How do you enforce those limits? Have you had users complain about the appropriateness of an ad on your site?
Obviously most non-----related sites are not interested in having --- ads. But there are other ads which might be a problem. Risque' ads for things other than actual porn. Ads for gambling (casinos). Ads for cigarettes (not that I have ever seen one online). Ads for scams, pyramid schemes, fake prizes, etc. (we have all seen these).
Obviously different ad networks have different standards and offer different options for webmasters to control (or not) the types of ads being displayed through their sites.
Given the audience that uses my site, I am highly sensitive to possibly objectionable ads. Perhaps because of my prodding them, ValueClick created a check-box so that you can choose to exclude gambling ads, rather than having to check the new campaigns and click the casinos off individually.
Scams are more difficult to exclude systematically. Fraud can take a multitude of forms. Obviously all those "you have won a free vacation" things could be classified as scams. Maybe less obviously, the same folks who do office supply frauds and aluminum/vinyl siding frauds in person have now moved online as well.
I regularly get complaints from users about ads on my site. These are fairly frustrating because the report is usually vague (even when I write back and press for details), and there's no way to figure out which ad (or even which network) caused the user to become offended. And of course, they take it for granted that I personally approved each and every ad.
Obviously most non-----related sites are not interested in having --- ads. But there are other ads which might be a problem. Risque' ads for things other than actual porn. Ads for gambling (casinos). Ads for cigarettes (not that I have ever seen one online). Ads for scams, pyramid schemes, fake prizes, etc. (we have all seen these).
Obviously different ad networks have different standards and offer different options for webmasters to control (or not) the types of ads being displayed through their sites.
Given the audience that uses my site, I am highly sensitive to possibly objectionable ads. Perhaps because of my prodding them, ValueClick created a check-box so that you can choose to exclude gambling ads, rather than having to check the new campaigns and click the casinos off individually.
Scams are more difficult to exclude systematically. Fraud can take a multitude of forms. Obviously all those "you have won a free vacation" things could be classified as scams. Maybe less obviously, the same folks who do office supply frauds and aluminum/vinyl siding frauds in person have now moved online as well.
I regularly get complaints from users about ads on my site. These are fairly frustrating because the report is usually vague (even when I write back and press for details), and there's no way to figure out which ad (or even which network) caused the user to become offended. And of course, they take it for granted that I personally approved each and every ad.