Please stop hosting dodgy ads

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Hi Mods,

I saw an advert on here about working from home and making loads of money ... it looked very dodgy so I clicked on it to check, and discovered that it is indeed a scam.

The link takes you to a fake newspaper website that is designed to deceive people into thinking that a real newspaper is reporting the success story of this home worker.

I didn't look any further but I would not be surprised if the "job" being offered involves "working" behind a webcam with no clothes on. Or maybe it's a simple monetary scam where they get you to pay up front for some kind of training or introductory pack and then never call you again. Either way, it is highly inappropriate for this site.

It's no surprise scammers want to advertise on this site because after all, people with AS can be vulnerable and naive, which is exactly what they are looking for. It is a terrible shame if people come to this site looking for help and end up being conned by cynical scammers taking advantage of their problems.

If you have any control over what ads are displayed on this site, please remove ones of this kind.

If you have signed away control over who advertises here, then please reconsider this. I realise allowing general advertising might bring in some much-needed cash for the site, but surely the safety of vulnerable people in the AS community has to come first.

Respectfully,

A.

The mods have absolutely no control over what adverts are shown here. I'm not even sure Alex the site owner has much control either. I think the ads work on the basis of picking up various keywords included in the pages being viewed and Google automatically displays adverts that are "relevant".

Personally I don't seen any adverts on this site at all, my browser blocks them all, but that is my choice. The site does need advert revenue to help pay for its existence. It is not good though that some of those adverts are cynically targeting the members to con them out of money.

I'm sure that if you want to help pay towards the upkeep of the site that any donations would be welcome.

I see 3 adverts from smaller advertising companies and one Google advert.

In the ToS of Google Adsense they state that if you use Google Adsense you cannot use different adverts from other companies on the same page.
If I can make a suggestion I would suggests changing from other adverts to Google Adsense only, even if it lowers the revenue.
With Google Adsense you can control the adverts better and block the "bad ads" you don't want to show on your sites.

One thing to note is that the ads are data mined and unique to each viewer. The ad service uses your recent google searches to help decide what to show you. Right now I'm looking at an ad for an AS school (just posted in parenting), a car (just searched some car options, we're in the market for a new car), and last minute hotel deals (booked a hotel for vacation a few days ago). I learned long ago that if I've run some recent google searches for few favorite things, I get to spend the rest of my day viewing ads quite pleasing to me.

You should submit your complaint to the ad vendors. They're responsible for what ads they remotely fed through the network of sites. Many of these advertisers probably pay a lot to have their ads hosted, so I don't know how you would persuade the ad vendors to not host them.

I'm with the OP on this one.

as much as I hate the idea of "robbing" websites of their ad income, I've decided that I really cannot bear 99% of the online ads so I basically block all scripts automatically and only allow some of them (actually I've developed a preference for no-css browsing but I'm weird that way ;P) using NoScript for FireFox.

in my defense, I do donate/buy merch from websites that I really like if only they give me the opportunity to do so.

there are websites that are doing it right though - Wired comes to mind. also, Google AdSense seems fairly non-intrusive, I actually click on those from time to time on my work computer if they do catch my attention. there are also phbb plugs for affiliate programs of many websites, it can even generate quite an income.

I wish WP would find a better ad vendor or use less-intrusive forms of advertising. I would definitely unlock the ads in my browser and support the website in this way if they did.

I agree, there should be no advertising. I don't want to be Justin Bieber's ideal girl

Maybe try adding donating page with monthly meter showing donations and monthly cost to host this site, if the donations go upto 80-95% to the costs of this site get permanently rid of ads.
At the moment I'm "poor" (read: unemployed) so I myself cannot donate much.

So one morning I could wake up to an ad that advertises 60s music.

I agree, there are some ads on this website that are offensive or the "services" they offer are snake oil or charlatans in disguise. For instance yesterday I clicked through on one and it turned out to be this Chiropractor offering to cure autism using an oxygen treatment.

There are some readers on this website who might actually pay money for this 'cure'....because they are naive and literal minded, because they want a solution, any solution to their problems?

I understand that google adsense brings Alex money and all the time he spends on this website I am assuming, this is an unpaid, volunteer effort. And while some of us know how to block said ads and some of us can recognize a scam when we see one, there are probably plenty of viewers who cannot or do not.

Maybe somewhere on the home page, there should be posted for all to see, WrongPlanet's policy on advertising on the website. Maybe a let the buyer beware? Or a 'Alex has no control over what ads pop up here and the ads being here does not mean that he recommends them'???? Maybe under the Info and Media tab? What the heck all these ads are about on this website. Something like that?

At the very bottom of a forum page I was browsing, was an ad of some kind that featured a very large-busted woman. She looked very provocative and was young. This seemed to be a link to a porn website. Some of these ads can't be controlled very easily, which makes it difficult filtering them for the wide range of ages that visit this website. This really concerns me. Hopefully whoever manages the ad campaigns for this website will look into this.

Carla