[sanswork]

It's been like 10 years since I worked in the space but I'm pretty sure showing adsense on search results like that has been against the tos for a very long time unless you get a specific search feed(which is basically impossible these days and even 15 years ago was limited to companies like ask.com)

[shermantanktop]

Sounds like a footgun waiting to go off? Unless Adsense is pretty explicit about this, beyond some language buried in a TOS.

[sanswork]

You have to agree to have read the policies when signing up and they've always been pretty clear about placement rules. Not placing ads on non-content pages is a pretty basic rule and would clearly apply to this since a search result is non-content.

https://support.google.com/adsense/answer/48182?hl=en#zippy=...

[Sevii]

Adsense is designed to have as many footguns as possible.

[fooker]

Footguns as a service

[breput]

Interesting. It seems like a ToS violation would have been worthy of a warning and revoking the offending earnings, but nope, it was no mercy or review.

[b00ty4breakfast]

or at least an explanation. That would of course require a customer service apparatus designed to service customers rather than one designed to force them to become tangled in the abyssal morass.

[sanswork]

OP in this case isn't the customer, they are a supplier who has agreed to terms then decided to go against that agreement in a way that allowed scammers and himself attempt to defraud Googles actual customers.

OP isn't the good guy in this story. Them breaking a very basic, clearly worded rule assisted in fraud. Of course they deserve to be banned from the network if they can't even follow that rule.

Also all the other people in this story complaining about their rates falling off a cliff can blame people like OP who place ads in places they shouldn't leading to low quality traffic. No one wants to buy network ads if they have quality anymore.

[b00ty4breakfast]

I don't get the impression that the OP was deliberately breaking the ToS. That doesn't mean they weren't violation but you usually inform someone when they are breaking the rules, even if you are taking punitive measures. It would be like arresting someone and never telling them what they are being arrested for. Not only is it scummy behavior to not tell them but it also doesn't effectively communicate to others that the thing won't be tolerated.

[sanswork]

If I hire someone to do a job for me and find out they are breaking rules to try and get additional money from me and my clients I don't owe them anything.

The scummy behaviour is agreeing to only put the ads on content pages then immediately putting them on search result pages to attempt to extract more money from advertisers.

I feel like you're not quite understanding the level of fraud in advertising. There is a reason all the networks are quick to fire publishers/affiliates because the ones that aren't go broke paying out for fraud.

[b00ty4breakfast]

If you don't think that people are entitled to know why their service is being terminated then I don't think we having anything else to discuss. enjoy your day

[sanswork]

The person would have agreed to the placement rules when they signed up then went and broke them leading to Google and advertisers being defrauded by a bot. Why would you expect mercy there?