If you are reading this and have a Blogger blog that is marked as 'Adult', I would suggest you go check that the blog has not already been deleted. Google is doing this under its vague new anti-sex-ad policy purge. As one of those people who have an adult blog, I received an email along with hundreds of thousand other blog owner.
In the email, Google said that all Adult blogs hosted on the once-popular blogger network would be deleted if found to be displaying ads. This is very worrying because it does not clearly define what constitute an 'adult content'. Meaning that anything that they feel unsuitable could fall under 'adult' umbrella.
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Understandably, a lot of people have been very vocal in this latest content cleansing by Google. Ironically, this is also happening on the same day that it finally closes down the Google Reader.
Since Blogger merged with Blogspot a few years ago, the number of people starting up their own blogs went up. There are people whose hobbies range from cat grooming to pubic hair trimming. They are used the platform not only to spread their knowledge and reach out to other people, they also earned a bit of advertising revenue on the side.
What Google now consider as adult content is any blog that features personal diaries, erotic writers, romance book editors and reviewers, sex toy reviewers, art nude photographers, film-makers, artists such as painters and comic illustrators, text-only fiction writers, sex news and porn gossip writers, LGBT sex activism, sex education and information outlets, fetish fashion, feminist porn blogs, and much, much more.
It turns out that some of those blogs had 'adult' label placed on them by Google; and not the owners - which means that they had no control over how they would have classified it. Now, they all face the chops.
My advice is to backup all your blogs that have any sort of adult content on them. There are lots of information out there on how to backup and export your content as XML or JSON. That way you can easily set up a new shop in less to no time at all. The downside is that all the backlinks and subscribers you managed to gain over the years will be lost.
Anyway, it's a shame that it has come to this. A company with almighty powers doing what suites them with very regards for what their users think. In fact, their are people who have been using the service for the last 10 years. All their content, reviews, comments and only friends will be deleted - simply by using someone else's hosted platform.
If this latest move is to stamp out those that are making - they are in fact targeting the wrong people. Adult affiliate links do not pay at all that's why you are not likely to see them on mainstream websites. With freely available homemade content online, more people are less likely to be paying for it in the first place. If like me you like half dressed ladies - then you might have to look elsewhere to satisfy your exotic taste.
So, what is your next option if you?
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