Otaku, Cedric's blog

25 Comments

• #1 by Bob Lee on January 22, 2007 - 4:11 pm

  

  Ick. I can see targeting the keywords, but that title (“Eclipse Download”) is downright deceptive. They should have titled it “Real programmers use NetBeans” or something (also not true, but not overtly deceptive) instead of trying to trick Eclipse users.

• #2 by Bob Lee on January 22, 2007 - 4:12 pm

  

  Ick. I can see targeting the keywords, but that title (“Eclipse Download”) is downright deceptive. They should have titled it “Real programmers use NetBeans” (also not true, but not overtly deceptive) or something instead of trying to trick Eclipse users.

• #3 by Bob Lee on January 22, 2007 - 4:13 pm

  

  Ick. I can see targeting the keywords, but that title (“Eclipse Download”) is downright deceptive. They should have titled it “Real programmers use NetBeans” (also not true, but not overtly deceptive) or something instead of trying to trick Eclipse users.

• #4 by Ricky Clarkson on January 22, 2007 - 5:32 pm

  

  Bob, DRY.

• #5 by Thiago Arrais on January 22, 2007 - 6:58 pm

  

  I got no sponsored link when trying the same search terms. The top page for me is the usual eclipse downloads page.

• #6 by Thiago Arrais on January 22, 2007 - 7:00 pm

  

  Man, your comment system is leading to an error page. No wonder why Bob filed multiple comments.

• #7 by anjan bacchu on January 22, 2007 - 10:03 pm

  

  hi cedric,
  it’s been a while since comments result in a error page.

• #8 by Alex Blewitt on January 22, 2007 - 10:19 pm

  

  I suspect that it’s just highlighting/capitalising on the search terms, much like you get random searches on other systems like “Search eBay for RANDOM PHRASE TYPED IN”
  Whilst it doesn’t surprise me — Google AdWords are bought and sold and often competitors try to find terms that will give maximum revenue — it’s certainly amusing to see, none the less.
  And, since the AdWords are only shown up until a particular budget, it’s quite likely that others performing the same search wouldn’t see the same sponsored links. They’ve also been known to advertise on http://www.eclipsezone.com, too.
  A more interesting question is — does this work? If you’d already decided to download Eclipse, would this link make you do anything different? My guess is probably not.

• #9 by Alexis MP on January 23, 2007 - 12:57 am

  

  For what it’s worth, I have the same pic with BEA buying the “Creator” keyword. What’s Google doing about this?
  It seems like you never miss an opportunity to bash Sun.
  Oh, the Eclipse downloads are here: http://www.eclipse.org/downloads/ (where else?)

• #10 by Tom Future on January 23, 2007 - 6:03 am

  

  I don’t see anything wrong with this at all.
  I don’t know that I’ve ever clicked on a “Sponsored Link” in the search results, but isn’t this exactly what they’re for, to present an ad for something that’s closely related to the search terms, and in which it’s very likely the searcher is interested, but that is not likely to appear in the actual search results?

• #11 by Donald Smith on January 23, 2007 - 7:10 am

  

  This has actually be going on for a really long time (see my blog eclipse-ecosystem, Nov 2, 2006). I would post a link, but apparently Bl0gsp0t is “questionable content” here
  To be honest, I don’t see a problem with using eclipse keywords for posting an ad. There’s some good data in there if you know what you’re doing (and I’m sure they’re somewhat awestruck at how many people google for eclipse downloads
  The sleazy part is the blatent misrepresentation in the name of the link. But hey, when you’re desparately seeking attention, what else can you do?
  – Don

• #12 by Laurent Foret on January 23, 2007 - 8:05 am

  

  I agree with Alexis/Tom and others . There is no blame to sponsor its baby. It is a sponsored link, not a result ! Users/developers are not stupid . In french pages the same search is sponsored by “Adobe flex”.
  If I was a Jetbrains commercial I will add an initelliJIdea link.

• #13 by ludo on January 23, 2007 - 9:31 am

  

  Cedric:
  If you need a Sun GlassFish Java EE 5 Eclipse plugin, get the download from there:
  https://glassfishplugins.dev.java.net/download
  In any case, I guess this is how Google employees get paid, no?:-)
  Bad bad Google trying to hijack the search world with $$$:-) What do you expect?

• #14 by Bill on January 23, 2007 - 1:18 pm

  

  I love Google and am usually in agreement with you Cedric but I have to go with ludo on this one.
  Google is allowing companies to “Buy” results (that to most people look almost exactly like the #1 Google search results) and place an arbitrary link name & destination in that result.
  How can anyone but Google be to blame if the result is that companies use what Google is offering to try to mislead people?
  That’s the point, isn’t it? If I were to buy a link at the top of the search results, it would be to mislead people from what they expected to be Google’s #1 search result to my company. If I wasn’t trying to mislead people, I’d buy space on the sidebar.
  Also, I’d guess it wasn’t SUN doing this. I bet some NetBeans advocates came up with the idea, but I could be wrong.

• #15 by Anonymous on January 23, 2007 - 2:06 pm

  

  What is the point for Sun to buy these [email protected]
  They are throwing money because eack click on this sponsored link gonna cost us a lot…with 0.0000001% conversion.
  I do not believe ‘fooled’ users will switch to Netbeans…if the purpose of their search was to find the link to download Eclipse!

• #16 by Ed Burnette on January 23, 2007 - 2:50 pm

  

  If the Foundation wanted to, I believe they could make a case to Google to take down the Netbeans campaign. In fact I mentioned this to them once. But so far they (the foundation) haven’t shown any interest in bothering.

• #17 by Frank Bolander on January 24, 2007 - 1:20 pm

  

  Hmm, just googled eclipse download and got an Adobe Flex 2 link titled:
  “Download Eclipse”
  Flex 2 works w/all your programming
  languages. Download a free trial.
  http://www.Adobe.com
  Doesn’t seem to be limited to Sun.

• #18 by Jem on January 24, 2007 - 4:55 pm

  

  It’s good that Sun is taking this tactic. NetBeans is much better than Eclipse.

• #19 by Aziz on January 24, 2007 - 11:53 pm

  

  Wow list is growing, why Microsoft is waiting for

• #20 by Donald on January 25, 2007 - 5:33 pm

  

  Frank – Flex 2 is a full fledged Eclipse environment. That’s fair game IMO.
  – Don

• #21 by Frank Bolander on January 26, 2007 - 7:56 am

  

  Don,
  Why not a “Download Flex 2″ link instead of “Download Eclipse”? The issue is about coopting trademarks.
  Here’s another: Googled Download Websphere:
  Websphere Download
  http://www.bea.com BEA Workshop

• #22 by Frank Bolander on January 26, 2007 - 7:56 am

  

  Don,
  Why not a “Download Flex 2″ link instead of “Download Eclipse”? The issue is about coopting trademarks.
  Here’s another: Googled Download Websphere:
  Websphere Download
  http://www.bea.com BEA Workshop

• #23 by Donald Smith on January 26, 2007 - 9:47 am

  

  Frank, I see what you mean, but Flex 2 is an Eclipse based IDE. When you download Flex 2, you are downloading Eclipse with Adobe’s extensions for Flex development. I personally don’t see any comparison between this and Sun’s blatent lie.
  – Don

• #24 by Savita on February 2, 2007 - 9:25 pm

  

  Actually its wrong or may be there is random search.
  Anyways Eclipse is open source.

• #25 by Mr. Pooter on April 24, 2007 - 2:12 pm

  

  The only question one can ask about Netbeans is “Why?…”

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