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Keywords: Google, Adsense, web design, HTML, NVu Title: Make Easy Money With Google: Using the AdSense Advertising Program Author: Eric Giguere Publisher: Peachpit Press ISBN: 0321321146 Media: Book Level: Inttroductory Verdict: Recommended for non-technical readers wanting to design web sites for use with Google AdSense

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The idea of dialogue as a means of instruction has a long and distinguished history, going back at least to the philosophers of ancient Greece. And now, centuries later, author Eric Giguere treads in the footsteps of Socrates and Plato to instruct his readers in the fine art and philosophy of creating web sites that pay for themselves using Google's AdSense program. Put like that it might sound crass, but in reality the approach works very well at the non-technical readers that the book is aimed at.

Rather than diving into technical tutorial, the book is structured around a very simple scenario. The author/narrator is engaged in a conversation with three non-technical friends who are interested in creating web sites and who want to make some money using Google AdSense. Each of the three friends has different levels of experience and slightly different requirements, thus allowing the author to engage in a range of realistic conversations.

The book begins with the absolute basics, and so long as the reader knows what a web site is and how to look at it using a browser then they are equipped enough to go forward. The essentials of terminology and concepts, from understanding what a server is to understanding that a web page is just text containing special codes (HTML tags), is explained in very simple and easy to understand language. For the technically minded this stuff is second nature, but for vast numbers of people this the process of downloading and viewing a web page might as well be magic.

Giguere is careful not to over-state his case. He is at pains to explain that he's not promising that the reader will make a lot of money, just that he'll explain how to make a page that can sport Google ads. And this he does very well.

On the technical side the book even includes a quick tutorial on web page creation using the open-source Nvu HTML authoring application. The mechanics of uploading the page to a server using FTP is included as well. He even goes into the details of how to find and apply for a good domain name, how to get hosting and so on. Finally, of course, he walks the reader through the process of applying for AdSense and shows how to add Google's code to your web pages.

Given the context, it would be easy to produce a book that is about doing everything possible to make money, but to his credit Giguere avoids this temptation. The book is very clear that web sites should be about good content first, and that money, if there is any, should follow naturally from that.

For anyone not versed in the technology but interested in creating a web site this is a great place to start. For the more technical reader looking to recommend a title to a friend or relative then this is one that's worth recommending.