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Google Contributor Isn’t Dead, it’s Just Pining for the Fjords

About a week ago Android Police reported that Google Contributor, the service where users can sell adverts to themselves, had shut down. According to a statement from Google, that is only about half true.

GC is no longer collecting and distributing funds, but the program is not dead. I was told this morning that the new Google Contributor platform is still under development:

Nothing has changed from what I initially told you — we’ll have a new version coming soon. In the interim, we’ve stopped supporting the old version. Sign ups to be an early tester when we launch here.

It would be better to say that GC has ceased operations in the month since it stopped accepting new users, but so long as a new program is under development it is arguably not dead.

There’s no word yet on what form the new GC will take, but the program had originally been pitched in late 2014 as a way for users to support the websites they like. In practice, however, Google Contributor was less about users rewarding websites than about Google selling more ads.

That benefited neither websites or users, so it is good that the idea died. Hopefully, its replacement will be more beneficial.

image by 401(K) 2013

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Comments


Don DeBon January 26, 2017 um 12:33 pm

It is possible it might come back, just as it is possible Google Play Partner Books program will reopen. Possible, but not likely.


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