Monday January 09, 2006

Adsense: The Electronic AE

One day, at a paper where I used to work, the head of sales wandered — starry-eyed — into my office. He was flipping through one of those glossy real estate circulars in which agents pay to place page after page of full-color ads. He was marvelling at this holy grail, this magazine with no editorial content at all. “It’s all ads,” he said, flushed as though he’d seen the face of God.

Publishers and account executives aren’t bad people, they’ve just had their worst instincts reinforced by the commission structure. They’re like pit bulls made mean by hunger and abuse. Anyone who doesn’t believe me should try playing around with Google’s Adsense.

I started serving Adsense pages last week, first of all to see what kind of money a blog like this might make (answer: not much), but also because I wanted to see how it works and, you know, what it’s like. Bloggers will know what I mean. Half the fun of blogging is on the stats page, where you can see firsthand how online waves crest and fall. Well, let me tell you: Adsense is like having a tiny AE implanted into your brain. You can practically smell the cologne.

I am not a gambler, but I’ve stood at a roulette table long enough to feel the temptation created by that particular economic transaction. Adsense has its own tug, and once you’ve felt it, it’s easier to understand most of the blogosphere. I mean, why shouldn’t I rename this blog the Hanasiana Digital Camera Hut? That would attract shoppers and some sweet contextual ads. And then I could replace the content, or most of it, with ads—as many ads as possible (or as the TOS allows)—and then I could increase my traffic and (more importantly) the number of ads by posting 57 items a day, and wouldn’t it be neat if I raved about a product and an ad for the very same product appeared in the sidebar? But I don’t know what ads are going to appear, so I guess I’d better rave about all the products I write about, just in case. And the next thing I know, I’m running a glossy real estate circular that’s “all ads,” like the head of sales said. It’s no wonder that 90 percent of all media is compromised junk.

It looks like I’m going to have to build a Chinese wall inside my brain—or at least find a way to keep that jerk out of my office.

Posted by jim at 05:59 PM ||