Lane's Gifts and Collectibles, et al. v. Google, et al.

I'm pissed off! I'll try to keep this from degenerating into a RANT, but it's hard when things get to you so much! Here's the items I want to share with you:

- Click fraud is a huge problem. It's larger than any company can currently deal with. I suspect that Google is one of the best at this, but from my own experience, they cannot easily detect click fraud that looks like regular traffic. Duh! The only way they can begin to really fighting this is be gathering information that is only available on the client end, in the web server logs. But sometime even when this is supplied they don't seem to pick it up. I went through most of one day and it was CLEAR what was going on to me, but not to them.

- Someone finally got sick of this and sued Google. Maybe they got hit harder than others, I don't know. They filed a suit which somehow resulted in a settlement where all advertisers can get some money back.

- The problem is that the settlement is $90 Million, but the lawyers are taking $30 million. That sucks. Even more so that even without the lawyer's fees the money advertisers will get is really small. It's like that damn Microsoft settlement last year. What a joke!!!

- Google has continually stated that they have advanced fraud detection methods and stop it or issue refunds. Since they are now providing this settlement, this seems like it was not true. I mean, if they were doing all they could, then why settle? They have the bucks to fight any bogus lawsuit, so to me, with what I have seen, it was not turn and they know it, but don't know what to do, or are unwilling to do anything.

- Now we have to put up with getting a very, very small amount of what is due to us as advertisers, and so lawyers that we never signed up with are getting a HUGE chunk that should mostly be ours.

What Do I Want?
What I would really like is to be able to opt-out of this settlement, and I think that is what I am going to do. Then I would like Google to take a look at my account and make a fair estimate if they can, at what my losses are and give me a choice of a CASH refund or advertising credit. Screw the lawyers. I'd rather get nothing that have them get ANYTHING. I'm so sick of this crap that makes everyone feel so powerless.

Yeah, it's turned into a rant... sorry!

But if anyone feels the way I do and wants to get together on this please contact me.

(hris

http://adwords.blogspot.com/2006/05/lanes-gifts-v-google-settlement.html