On September 7th, 2010, Google Adsense sent the following EMail, addressed to the forums;
QUOTE | Hello,
While reviewing your account, we noticed that you are currently displaying Google ads in a manner that is not compliant with our policies. For instance, we found violations of AdSense policies on pages such as https://idforums.net/index.php?showtopic=11159&st=400. Please note that this URL is an example and that the same violations may exist on other pages of your website.
Publishers are not permitted to encourage users to click on Google ads or bring excessive attention to ad units. For example, your site may not use symbols such as graphics, arrows, or misleading images that direct attention to the ads. This also includes placing Google ads in floating box scripts.
Publishers may not implement Google ads in a manner that disguises the ads in any way. For instance, publishers may not try to associate images with ads by aligning them together. Such an implementation may confuse users who assume that the image is directly related to the advertiser's offerings.
Please make any necessary changes to your webpages in the next 72 hours. We also suggest that you take the time to review our program policies ( https://www.google.com/support/adsense/bin/answer.py?answer=48182&stc=aspe-1pp-en ) to ensure that all of your other pages are in compliance.
Once you update your site, we will automatically detect the changes and ad serving will not be affected. If you choose not to make the changes to your account within the next three days, your account will remain active but you will no longer be able to display ads on the site. Please note, however, that we may disable your account if further violations are found in the future.
Thank you for your cooperation.
Sincerely,
The Google AdSense Team |
What they meant is they did not like how the Google Ads were implemented with Initial D Chibi characters next to it, because it and I quote "confuses users who assume that the image is directly related to the advertiser's offerings." After thorough consideration on my part and going through this topic - https://idforums.net/index.php?showtopic=37252 in detail again. I decided it is in the forums' best interest to stop serving Google Ads. It was just not working with the amount of traffic we currently get. There is no plan to bring back any sort of online contextual advertisement in the foreseeable future.
Some background history about idforums.net's relationship with Google Ads, IDWF first started serving Google Ads in https://idforums.net/index.php?showtopic=20352. The Chibi characters was implemented around May 2007. Google Ads was last served on these forums on September 13th, 2010. From January 2006 'til September 2010, idforums.net alone served over 22 Million Google Ads. That is 13.5K ads served daily on average. However, the click-thru rate was less than stellar, at 0.16%, the ads got clicked on 16 times for every 10,000 times it was displayed. If you have any concern regarding the forums' financial stability or just want to voice your opinion, you may do so in this designated thread in Community Forums - https://idforums.net/index.php?showtopic=20353
Thank you very much for your continual support!
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