April Fools: Google makes a lost sock app, Bad Ads removed and Google passed Apple

Google’s April Fools

Do your socks mysteriously disappear after you’ve done a load of washing? This is a serious problem for many Australians, who end up with boxes and boxes of mismatched socks.

Every year we have been resigned to add new orphans to the box… until today. We’re teaming up with retailers across Australia to launch a new range of Searchable Socks — to organise the world’s undergarments and make them universally find-able.

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Google/Alphabet passes Apple as most valuable company
Shares of Alphabet opened nearly 3 percent higher Tuesday, pushing the technology giant’s market capitalization past Apple to become the world’s most valuable public company.

Alphabet has a market capital of $547.1 billion, higher than Apple’s $529.3 billion as of 9:45 a.m. ET.

Google removes millions of ‘Bad Ads’ in 2015

About 1,000 Google employees monitored and removed these ads last year. They blocked over 7,000 phishing websites, suspended over 10,000 websites attempting to sell counterfeit products, and another 10,000 sites offering “unwanted software” that did nothing but affect system performance and alter user’s homepages.

More than 12.5 million ads promoting unapproved pharmaceuticals were also blocked, in addition to the even greater 17 million “trick to click” ads designed to look like system warnings. Overall, Google blocked 50% more ads than it did in 2014.

There’s no telling how many bad ads still made it through, however the company isn’t slowing down anytime soon. Speaking to the The Wall Street Journal, Tom Siegel, Google’s VP of Trust & Security, said there’s still more they have to do, since “The absolute number of bad ads is going up, as is the total number of ads we show.”

Bots have also become a bigger issue, meaning Google has to find an effective way to deal with those. Largely because bots pose a financial threat to advertisers, who pay Google for each ad click.

Questions and Answers

Q: Google has removed the side bar Ads, help, what do I do!

A: Don’t panic! Focus on writing better Ads, better website text that matches your Ads and increase your bid limit.

Just for Fun

Here’s Who Runs The Show: Paul Wagstaff

A website developer and a business owner since 2004. Cultivate Digital is a boutique web design studio located in Melbourne, Australia and is now a top 5 rated web design agency in Google.

Paul has a lifelong passion for building things online and applies a high quality ethic to every project he takes on.

He is also an incredibly dedicated business partner who loves helping small businesses get online in record time with a minimum of fuss. He works with his clients personally and the reviews prove how much his clients appreciate his down to earth, honest and transparent approach.

When Paul isn’t working, you may find him exploring the moon through his 12 inch Telescope, reading a good book, or listening to Dr Karl and other science podcasts.