Searching for a solution – ripple search 2.0
So…now it is sorted we thought we would go into a bit more detail about our search saga.
ripple search originally ran into trouble as Google felt that directing the co-oop search revenue to charity provided an incentive for people to click on the adsense ads. We disagree of course, but unfortunately we haven’t had a lot of luck getting through to Larry and Sergey to change the official Google policy. Maybe we don’t shop at the same supermarkets……
In all seriousness the folks at Google Sydney have been really helpful. We’ve worked with them over the last two weeks to come up with a solution that fits their TOS but allows people to use ripple search to make a difference.
The solution that we have agreed to with Google generates revenue by a sponsored link underneath the search bar on the main page. We will also be rolling out a new toolbar that generates revenue through a sponsored link in the toolbar over the next week. At that point (sorry) we’ll have to ask everyone to re-install their toolbars to make ripple toolbar searches generate revenue.
The main drawback of our new system is that Google will not let us place a sponsored link on the results page. Therefore repeat searches from the results page do not generate revenue. However, once the toolbar is operational people will be able to make repeat searches from there. We hope that ripplers will find that just as convenient.
We’re all volunteers so things don’t always move as fast as they can but we think we’ve found a clever solution which will let people keep searching with Google and fighting poverty…at the same time. Awesome.
Feedback on the new system is very welcome. Love your work ripplers.
