Ads as a Source of Information

from Google Operating System by Ionut Alex Chitu

At the most recent Google earnings call, Sergey Brin said some interesting things regarding the ads from search results pages. Google tries to reduce the number of ads that are displayed and the number of queries that show ads as it improves the targeting and the ads are more effective.
在最近一次的财务电话报告上Sergey Brin提到一些关于搜索结果页面上出现的广告的有趣的东西。Google在改进针对性提高广告有效性的同时打算减少搜索结果页面上出现的广告和出现广告的搜索关键词。

We try to reduce our coverage at the same time as improving the monetization. But clearly that's not the ideal strategy indefinitely, because we don't want to end up with no ads. And in fact from a quality point of view, we now find our ads are a significant addition quality-wise to our page. They are just a very important source of information. (...) We're all the time running experiments. We run some people without any ads at all, and we know that our ads add value so we know that we're happy about having them.
我们打算在增加收入的前提下减少广告的覆盖面。但是这远不是最好的策略，我们也不想最后一个广告都不放。事实上从质量的角度来看我们放置的广告是对搜索结果页面的一个很好的补充。它们也是一个很重要的信息来源。（...）我们一直在做各种相关的试验的，有些人不会看到任何广告，我们了解到广告本身原来也是有价值的，我们意识到我们也很希望有一些广告。

Jonathan Rosenberg quoted Larry Page, who "often says that we'd be best off if we just showed one ad, the perfect ad". Showing ads that are relevant to the context makes the sponsored links section an alternative to the list of search results, but I wouldn't call some paid links "a very important source of information". Most ads try to convince people to buy a product or a service and to achieve this they may use manipulation or misleading messages.
Jonathan Rosenberg 引用Larry Page的话说如果只显示一条广告，我们最好显示那条最完美的广告。根据内容的相关性显示广告可以使赞助链接变成搜索结果列表的替代，但是我不认为有些付费广告是非常重要的信息来源。大部分广告的目的是说服人们去买一款产品或一项服务，为了达到这个目的他们常常在介绍上做手脚或者是提供误导的信息。

Last year, one of Google's ad blogs tried to convince healthcare companies to promote their messages using Google ads:
去年Google ad的一篇博客试图说服医疗公司通过Google ads宣传他们的信息。

Moore's film [Sicko] portrays the industry as money and marketing driven, and fails to show healthcare's interest in patient well-being and care. Sound familiar? Of course. The healthcare industry is no stranger to negative press. A drug may be a blockbuster one day and tolled as a public health concern the next. (...) Many of our clients face these issues; companies come to us hoping we can help them better manage their reputations through Get the Facts or issue management campaigns. (...) We can place text ads, video ads, and rich media ads in paid search results or in relevant websites within our ever-expanding content network. Whatever the problem, Google can act as a platform for educating the public and promoting your message.
摩尔在纪录片《精神病人》中把整个行业说成为金钱和市场所驱动，完全丧失了医疗机构应有的对病人健康的照顾和关心。听起来很耳熟？当然，医疗机构和负面报道并不陌生。一款药物今天可以引起轰动效应，明天可能就被警告说会危及大众健康。（...）我们的不少客户都面临同样的问题，有公司找我们希望我们可以通过了解事实和做管理宣传活动来帮助他们树立一个更好的企业形象。（...）我们可以在付费搜索结果里或者是在相关的网站上投放文字广告，视频广告，和多媒体广告，这些相关网站来自我们的不断扩张的内容提供商网络。无论什么问题，Google都可以成为一个教育大众传播你的信息的平台。

Advertisers have an agenda and they're rarely objective. They provide facts that are difficult to verify and they rarely support their claims.
广告商一个日程，他们很少会客观。他们会提供一些很难证实事实，，他们也很少会拿出证据来支持他们的声明。


AdWords has a big list of guidelines that includes supporting competitive claims, third party verification of the claims and an accurate representation of a product, but not all the ads respect these guidelines.
AdWords 有一个很长的使用准则清单，上面包括符合竞争声明，对声明的第三方认证和产品的准确展示，但不是所有的广告都会遵守这些准则。


In an interview from 2004, Sergey Brin said that Google's ads "aren't distracting; they're helpful. (...) We know that when people are looking for commercial things, they use the ads. They know they're ads and they know they're just commercial, yet they use them."
在2004年的一次采访中，Sergey Brin说Google的广告不会分散人们的注意力，并且很有帮助。（...）我们了解到有时人们在寻找商品，他们会看广告。他们也知道这是广告，也知道这些是商业性的，他们还是会去看。
Did you use Google's ads as a source of information? You could check your ad history to see if the ads that attracted your attention supported their claims and offered useful information.
你是把Google广告当作信息来源来用的吗？你可以看一下你的浏览历史中的广告记录，看看吸引了你的注意力的广告是不是符合他们的声明是不是提供的有用的信息。