Over the last months or longer I've noticed a trend. When I search for something like "milling copper", "cnc feed rate for bronze" or whatever, lots of web pages are shown that are related to the search but are of little help. They seem to have been put together from chunks of information all over the internet and generally offer paper thin advice and information. Often, the information contradicts itself one paragraph to the next. Quite often they are in numbered list format. They all seem to have a "feel" to them that rings false. Have you noticed those? I guess they are robot generated, basically to support ads but they really tick me off when I'm looking for real answers. I wish there was a way to filter them out because they really dilute the information you get in search results. And, I think there is no one to complain to. (Except you lucky folks.)
You are right, they are auto generated, based on your search. Used to be algorithms, now by AI, which is making them harder and harder to spot. The trouble is, they are not illegal, and they are NOT generated by your search engine or the parent companies. They generate in response to the search, in time to come up in the search. It used to be easy to spot (and less frequent) when the same kind of gibberish was put up by hand from "bloggers" just copying paragraphs of things related to their subject, just to get the ads served for as long as it took you to figure it out.
Do the same with those as you do with any other "junk" page. Once you spot it, close it. No more ads served, no more paychecks. At least not from you. Don't keep reading just to see how bad it is. That's really how they win.
Those ads on "those" sites are as profitable as they are because they're targeted. All the times you've concented to a EULA that says they an share information with "affiliates"... lots of data mining, lots of AI putting data together from all over the internet about each and every one of us... The ads are effective enough to be persuasive. And thereby valuable just to SERVE you the ad. Even if you don't click, it's still so effective at putting a bug in your ear, that it's worth money just to have put it in front of you. And of course NEVER click on those ads. Or if they've really set the hook, if you must follow up, do it through a search engine. Or copy the link and paste it without the tracking information.
It's here, it's always been here, it's crap, it's profitable, and it's not going away. It's the price we ALL pay for free use of the infrastructure that makes the internet happen.
