How to Deal with Threads That Violate Google Adsense's Terms and Conditions

[System0]

Those of you who use Google Adsense on their forums will know that Google will occasionally send you an email saying that a specific thread is violating their terms and conditions. When you receive an email like that, you have up to 72 hours to remove it or risk your account being banned.

When the thread is vulgar or whatever, I normally just delete it; however many times there appears to be nothing wrong with the content. I am curious as to how other forum owners deal with this?

It's worth noting that I only show ads to guests. So what I am thinking about is creating a private forum for members and moving any threads that Google do not like to that forum room.

Alternatively, I believe I could set up a solution in which I can disable Google Ads for some threads. That will obviously require an add-on, so perhaps the other solution is better.

Kevin

 

[rdn]

I'm using default XenForo feature "Censoring".

 

[System0]

Sorry, can you clarify what that is? What does the censoring feature do? I don't think I've ever used it.

 

[rdn]

I filtered common banned keywords: /admin.php?options/list/censoringOptions

 

[CTXMedia]

ACP > Options > Censoring - you can use it to replace swear words etc.

[Edit: Ninja'd]

 

[rdn]

And also here for incoming new post/threads: /admin.php?options/list/spam (Spam Phrases)

 

[System0]

Oh ok. I didn't know if you were talking about something else.

Just to clarify my own position, none of the threads contain swear words. I run a martial arts forum and members were talking about sparring. Apparently, Google doesn't allow that (which to me, is bizarre).

 

[rdn]

Then filter/disable ads on that specific forum node.

 

[System0]

Thanks for the suggestion...but that will not help either. Those types of discussions can and will arise in any forum room. It needs to be done at a thread level. That is, I do not want to disable advertising in hundreds of threads because one thread was flagged.

 

[BirdOPrey5]

An add on would get messy... Even if it was only occasionally you could never safely remove any old threads once you blocked them to guests. A private forum where you move threads sounds like a much better long term solution. Members may even appreciate having a place to post outside the prying eyes of Google, if you allow them to start new threads there.

 

[0ptima]

Those of you who use Google Adsense on their forums will know that Google will occasionally send you an email saying that a specific thread is violating their terms and conditions.

This topic seems to be coming up more and more. Is google clamping down?

 

[System0]

An add on would get messy... Even if it was only occasionally you could never safely remove any old threads once you blocked them to guests. A private forum where you move threads sounds like a much better long term solution. Members may even appreciate having a place to post outside the prying eyes of Google, if you allow them to start new threads there.

I agree. For the time being, I decided to try media.net instead of adsense for a couple of weeks, but only on the forum that recently had a violation. Obviously, that is not a long term solution. Setting up a private room for problem threads does seem like the most practical solution.

This topic seems to be coming up more and more. Is google clamping down?

Yeah I have received more over the last year. To be fair, one was a thread that had lots of injuries and ko's from the UFC etc, but some of the others had nothing wrong with them.

 

[digitalpoint]

Not sure if you use prefixes for other things or not, but a relatively easy solution (rather than making a full-blown addon to do it) would be to have a special prefix that only mods/admins can use... If you set the thread to that prefix, then you could key on that when you are inserting your AdSense code... if the thread prefix is that, don't show AdSense...

 

[zooki]

Sometimes there are legitimate, normal questions on sexual health. These do trigger Google Adsense violations. google does not like anyone speaking about masturbation. It is a bit silly, but all I do is choose not to display ads on the page, using a IF statement.

 

[Spartan]

I agree. For the time being, I decided to try media.net instead of adsense for a couple of weeks, but only on the forum that recently had a violation. Obviously, that is not a long term solution. Setting up a private room for problem threads does seem like the most practical solution.



Yeah I have received more over the last year. To be fair, one was a thread that had lots of injuries and ko's from the UFC etc, but some of the others had nothing wrong with them.

How does media.net CPM compare to Adsense?

 

[Duck]

Sometimes there are legitimate, normal questions on sexual health. These do trigger Google Adsense violations. google does not like anyone speaking about masturbation. It is a bit silly, but all I do is choose not to display ads on the page, using a IF statement.

How do you do that?

In fact, how do you choose to not display Google ads in entire sections of the forum, such as the moderator section, private message conversations, etc.

I understand that if you can see Google ads on a page, then Google can see that page's content. We have ads showing up all over the place.

And what about when a moderator looks at a soft-deleted post containing a naughty photo? Can Google see that soft-deleted post when you click "view"?

 

[rdn]

How do you do that?

In fact, how do you choose to not display Google ads in entire sections of the forum, such as the moderator section, private message conversations, etc.

How can I hide content in a specific forum?
<xen:if is="!{$forum.node_id} == x">
This content will hide in forum x
</xen:if>
http://xenforo.com/community/resources/conditional-statements.1604/

 

[Duck]

Thank you.

Another question, ... what happens if you delete/edit the content that's sent to you by Google in that e-mail mentioned in the first post of this thread, ... but they go ahead & suspend the ad account anyway?

Is it like something with the US federal government where you have to fill out form W8785-A and mail it in and wait 6-8 weeks for a "review" or are they reasonable and quick about this?

If they do a review, can we just remove the ads from the entire forum except for a few key sections that we've had the time to go through & censor, just to get past the review & get the account reinstated, then add the ads back to sections one at a time after we've had time to go through them all?

Ours is a forum run by long-haul truck drivers, for long-haul truck drivers & none of us have the kind of time required to clean up the entire forum, ... one that's been operational since 2007.

 

[Duck]

And another thing, ... tonight I've replaced about 2 dozen photos with this:



But now I'm thinking that if the forum is "reviewed" by humans, it might not be such a good idea.

I attached it to one post, and then hot-linked for all the others. That way if I need to get rid of it from all those posts & just turn them into the "broken image" icons, all I have to do is delete the original attachment.

 

[Duck]

How can we remove the Google ads from private conversations?

We can't even enforce their stupid censorship rules in private conversations that we can't even see. I know there are add-ons to let us view them but we simply don't want to have to resort to that.





Here is a video by AdSense which explains, in great stuttering detail, their policies on what's unacceptable.

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For the life of me, I can't possibly understand how a photo of a person pouring a bottle of water on to their head is considered "sexual" in nature.

Who are these people? Did they recruit their censors from a convent?