Blog Insights: Google's text link ads generate controversy

What bloggers are saying about the latest in information technology



Google is rolling out a cost-per-action advertising program, and as one would expect, there is the usual hue and cry about advertising on the Internet. Rahul Pathak's Starting Up blog is disappointed that Google, which purports to "do no evil", is going to "screw the user for the ad dollar." The criticism rings hollow. There is, after all, no similar argument about the advertisements that appear in your daily paper, and no complaints about the huge amounts of flyers that appear in the Sunday edition. Of course, your daily newspaper publisher could decide to eliminate ads for the benefit and convenience of the reader, but then, your Daily Tribune would cost ten dollars a pop instead of fifty cents. Advertising, like it or not, is what allows media to exist. Allowing it to exist in new and different ways in online media venues is in no way "screwing the user."

Part of the controversy is about Google's decision to also launch text link ads, which show ads when you mouse over text that is underlined, as opposed to just showing ads in the little strip of text ads that appears under the words "Ads by Google". WebProNews suggests that "Google purists" would see the act of embedding ads within text is evil. Michael Arrington says Google is crossing a "hazy ethical line" by timing the release of its text link format with its beta release of the pay-per-action program, ostensibly to avoid controversy by burying it along with other news.

Scott Karp has little faith in readers of online content, claiming that Google's ubiquitous ads allow consumers to be confused, and that cost-per-action will create an environment where marketers attempt to manipulate consumers even further, not just to click on an ad, but to actually buy something. Just how dumb do you think we are, Scott? If I see something in an ad that I like, and I subsequently buy it, how have I been manipulated? The text link ads are clearly ads, and are labeled as such, so there is no deception or manipulation. Web users are generally portrayed as of above-average intellect, and this is probably a correct assessment. But at the same time, when the argument against advertising is rolled out, Web users are portrayed as simpletons who can be easily manipulated by online purveyors of goods and services. We can't be both, and I'm in favor of giving Web users the benefit of the doubt.

Admittedly, "do no evil" is nothing more than a cute catch phrase dreamed up by one of Google's ad guys, and it means nothing. Google is no more or less evil than any other huge tech company, and they are, like other companies, in business primarily to make money. This should come as no surprise. But the fact that Internet companies like Google are in business to make money is precisely what has driven the Internet's growth. Companies like Google have made a much greater contribution to the Internet as a whole than organizations like Wikipedia and the ill-conceived Wikia Search, and Google will undoubtedly outlast them.