By now many readers must be familiar with the Adsense by Google Program. I’ve been with the program for over 3 years. During those 3 years, I have only received 2 checks from them.

I enjoyed the ease with which it is possible to set up Adsense and actually use it. I particularly benefitted because it allowed me to pay for my hosting costs with a little left over. My websites aren’t particularly highly trafficked, but the traffic I do get tends to be highly focused, so I achieve decent click through rates on advertisements. But it took me a long time to build up the traffic, so it was nearly 13 months before I qualified for a minimum payment! The second payment came in less than a year. Currently things are getting better still, as I learn how to tweak the placement, generate traffic, and build content. In fact, I just qualified for another payment! Cool. Don’t know when the check will get here, but it should be within 2 months.

I’m quite concerned over bloggers losing their Adsense Accounts to click fraud. In fact over the last week, I’ve seen two bloggers (Kumiko’s Make Money Online Blog and LegalAndrew’s Blog) lose their Adsense accounts, and neither of the blogs seems particularly the kind of fraudulent website that seems to persist. For more information on regaining your account, Stason.org has a great article, called How to Bring Google Adsense Down.

And so I wonder, as they must, why Google seems to take action against these websites, but leaves the splog around. In fact, quite a few of the sploggers delight in joining forums and blogs like this to leave their trash. Naturally, they don’t last long enough to do much here. But still, how is it that Google seems to take these actions when thousands of splogs openly flout the rules? Or is that just an impression, since those who are splogs don’t openly complain? Does Google now need more legal oversight, or are Adsense lawsuits just around the corner, too? At the moment, I’m weighing my options on Adsense on whether I should include them on this blog or not. I’m still undecided.

Comments, stories or tips?