bogus photo stores

[mal233]

Bob,

I have recently found your site and have enjoyed it. thank you. but your site talks about beledogus photo store sites. then on your home page you have some, advertising a Canon XSi for $379!!!

these are labeled 'ads by Google', nonetheless, you shouldn't allow them on your site!! A photo site that talks about avoiding scam sites, then allows them to show up on their site is lacking credibility.

sorry to sound so harsh because I know everyone needs revenue to run their site, but maybe you could do something about these ads. I feel certain you don't condone or approve of these.

Mark

[Bob Atkins]

I explained the situation here - http://www.bobatkins.com/photography/photo_gear_buyer_beware.html

Basically I don't get to pre-approve which ads Google serves to me, so I can't stop such ads from appearing at least once. If I see such an ad and I can identify the advertiser, I can put them on my blocking list (I can block up to 200 domains from advertising), but I can only do that if I see the ad. Since I can't possibly view every ad that shows up on every page on the site, if an ad just pops up once or twice, odds are I won't see it.

If someone reports a bogus ad (along with the domain that it directs you to). then I can (and do) add it to the blocking list. That's about all I can do, since without the advertising from Google I couldn't really afford to run this site and spend the time on it that I do. Luckily most of the Google ads are from reputabl;e dealers. It's unfortunate that the photo retail trade has an unusually large percentage of "rip-off" stores which sometimes get their ads posted here. The only upside is that it costs them everytime you click on their ads and if you've read the articles on this website you're not going to be fooled by their "bait and switch" schemes.

FYI I just added techondigital.com to my blocking list. They were advertising the XSi for $279 and they're clearly not a store I'd recommed anyone deal with. The block list usually takes a few hours before it gets read by Google and ads start being blocked. That's another one down, but I'm sure there will be more.

[mal233]

thank you. I know but some newer users don't. I read your other articles and they were very good and you didn't pull any punches. Kudos for you!!

happy new year
mark