We're Taking Google AdSense

Submitted by Dana on Wed, 2010-06-23 20:23

You may notice something you've never seen before at Hold the Toast: Outside advertising. We're now accepting ads through Google AdSense. The Webmaster, aka That Nice Boy I Married, will do his best to filter any ads that are antithetical to the message and mission of Hold The Toast -- we really don't need to be taking ads for, oh, sugared soda, or low fat snack cakes, you know?

Still, occasionally something may slip by. Not only do we apologize in advance, we ask you, our readers, to please let us know if an ad for something really egregiously high carb, trans-fat-laden, or just plain nutritionally evil shows up in your browser. Keep in mind that Google AdSense, like a somewhat more benign version of Big Brother, knows where you are, and may well run different ads for you than they do for people in another state or another country. We don't know if we'll see all the same ads you will; we're new at this. Again, we'll try to keep up, but we're, uh, a small outfit. (Just me and him, so far.)

Thanks for your help in keeping our advertising low carb safe!

Share this
»

google ads

Submitted by Maryanne on Fri, 2010-06-25 14:58.

So far there have been several for low FAT sandwiches. Sorry I didn't know about the details you needed.

Maryanne

Thanks!

Submitted by Eric on Fri, 2010-06-25 15:13.

Because the phrase "low fat" often appears in what Dana writes, the ad service sees that as a relevant term and displays ads targetted to it. Sometimes the ad will display a website name, such as "lowfatsandwich.com", and we are able to block that website name. They don't always display a website name, though, so for some of them we just have to watch here, and use other ways of screening them when we see them.

Just to add...

Submitted by Eric on Thu, 2010-06-24 10:21.

AdSense terms of service state that we cannot encourage visitors to click any ad links, and I would imagine that the same prohibition holds for encouraging visitors to NOT click any particular ad. So all I'm going to say is, simply, use your common sense. You all know why you're here. Meanwhile, we are certainly permitted to filter and target the ads that do appear here, so if you notice one that seems completely inimical to the low-carb philosophy (for example, an ad for "YummySugarGlitchies.com"), let us know (and note the exact domain name in the ad, if it appears). Such ads are considered "competitive," and we are well within rights to add them to our "competitive ad filter" in AdSense.

In the end, we would very much like for our ad display policy to be an enhancement to our visitors' experience here -- good for everyone, you, us, and even the advertisers!