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Google and Paint.NET need to stop misleading users (2013)

jasonlefkowitz.net

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Re: Google and Paint.NET need to stop misleading users (2013)

#41

Post by jameshart »

The terrible experience of pulling down an installer for Paint.net was one of the final straws that pushed me to move over to using chocolatey for windows workstation setup.

   > choco install paint.net
Unfortunately, while that allows me to never see fake download-button ads when pulling down software for my machine, one place it's still a nightmare in is the world of getting minecraft mods installed on a kid's computer. Picking out the real download link from among all the fake ads is sometimes a real challenge.

Re: Google and Paint.NET need to stop misleading users (2013)

#42

Post by Nexxxeh »

jameshart wrote: post #41

The terrible experience of pulling down an installer for Paint.net was one of the final straws that pushed me to move over to using chocolatey for windows workstation setup. > choco install paint.net Unfortunately, while that allows me to never see fake download-button ads when pulling down software for my machine, one place it's still a nightmare in is the world of getting minecraft mods installed on a kid's compute…

Have you got uBlock Origin installed?

Re: Google and Paint.NET need to stop misleading users (2013)

#43

Post by pyrale »

zeta0134 wrote: post #8

I'm curious why these ads are even allowed to get through the network in the first place. Is there just NO content reviewing taking place? That's seems negligent on Google's part. There is no reason for an ad like that to exist on any webpage, period. It should have been blocked at the source. Where is the 3-strikes policy in the ad space? Google is so eager to punish its Youtube streamers for running questionably of…

> Google is so eager to punish its Youtube streamers for running questionably offensive content, and yet it continues to let advertising scum like this run rampant across its ecosystem.

Youtube streamers are not cients, they are content creators. Just like newspaper sites, the average email user, or, in this case, paint.net.

Google can afford to treat content creators poorly, but they won't slight real clients : people actually paying them money. No matter how scummy these are.

Re: Google and Paint.NET need to stop misleading users (2013)

#44

Post by theDoug »

deprave wrote: post #34

People must remember that Google is first and foremost an advertising company. 90% of its revenue comes directly from advertising. Anyone who thinks they will prioritize anything over ad revenue is either very naive or very stupid. Google's CEO declared it's "AI first" and they developed TensorFlow. If they wanted to, they could have easily prevented those ads from entering their network.

Please explain how, since it’s easy.

Re: Google and Paint.NET need to stop misleading users (2013)

#45

Post by mynewtb »

yuriks wrote: post #31

You can report these bad ads by clicking the small X in the corner. Please do that if you ever see any of those, and they'll be replaced by other kinds of ads (and hopefully over time they'll get enough reports to be removed.)

The better solution is installing a capable adblocker.

Re: Google and Paint.NET need to stop misleading users (2013)

#47

Post by mherdeg »

yuriks wrote: post #31

You can report these bad ads by clicking the small X in the corner. Please do that if you ever see any of those, and they'll be replaced by other kinds of ads (and hopefully over time they'll get enough reports to be removed.)

Hmm I tried this and I see 4 reasons: (1) Seen this ad multiple times (2) Already bought this (3) Not interested in this ad (4) Ad covered content

There doesn't seem to be an option for "this ad is a huge DOWNLOAD link directly above the actual download link on a page that offers to help me download software." I did try filling out the form at https://support.google.com/adsense/troubleshooter/1190500 with this info, though. There was no way to indicate with a screenshot in that form exactly what the bad ad was.

Re: Google and Paint.NET need to stop misleading users (2013)

#48

Post by webmaven »

theDoug wrote: post #44
deprave wrote: post #34

People must remember that Google is first and foremost an advertising company. 90% of its revenue comes directly from advertising. Anyone who thinks they will prioritize anything over ad revenue is either very naive or very stupid. Google's CEO declared it's "AI first" and they developed TensorFlow. If they wanted to, they could have easily prevented those ads from entering their network.

Please explain how, since it’s easy.

I'll take a crack at an explanation:

Google has machine learning technology that automatically reads street address numbers on houses, regardless of angle, color, size, focus, or typeface.

Using the same type of algorithm to answer "does this ad have anything that looks like a button in it?" is relatively simple by at least two orders of magnitude.

So rather than it being "easy" in some absolute sense, what's meant here is that it is easy compared to similar tasks that we already know Google does routinely and has largely automated.

Re: Google and Paint.NET need to stop misleading users (2013)

#49

Post by yuriks »

mherdeg wrote: post #47
yuriks wrote: post #31

You can report these bad ads by clicking the small X in the corner. Please do that if you ever see any of those, and they'll be replaced by other kinds of ads (and hopefully over time they'll get enough reports to be removed.)

Hmm I tried this and I see 4 reasons: (1) Seen this ad multiple times (2) Already bought this (3) Not interested in this ad (4) Ad covered content There doesn't seem to be an option for "this ad is a huge DOWNLOAD link directly above the actual download link on a page that offers to help me download software." I did try filling out the form at https://support.google.com/adsense/troubleshooter/1190500 with this info,…

Interesting, for me the options were

1) Not interested in this ad 2) Seen this ad multiple times 3) Ad is inappropriate 4) Ad covered content

I chose 3 for all of them, but I'd argue that 4 would also fit somewhat.

Re: Google and Paint.NET need to stop misleading users (2013)

#50

Post by yuriks »

mynewtb wrote: post #45
yuriks wrote: post #31

You can report these bad ads by clicking the small X in the corner. Please do that if you ever see any of those, and they'll be replaced by other kinds of ads (and hopefully over time they'll get enough reports to be removed.)

The better solution is installing a capable adblocker.

That works around the problem for you. It does not solve it.
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