Improving communications with Publishers is definitely moving way up their priority list, but it isn't as easy as it might sometimes seem. At the recent Publisher Panel Live event it was a major theme across the whole two days.

John Brown is the guy brought in to make that happen. Nice guy, seems incredibly capable, but it's still a big job. They not only have the issue of "protecting the signals" to deal with, but also just the sheer scale at which they operate in terms of Googlers to publisher (Google isn't a massive firm in terms of staff numbers). There is a lot updates already happening to help pages across the publisher products, which I see as more evidence of the desire to improve communications. Changes to the reporting of invalid traffic are another example of the same. Change does seem to be slowly happening.

I collaborated with John on a related piece of content that I'm hoping will make it through approval and hit the adsense blog soon.

The post almost makes it sound as though publishers are as important as users and advertisers.

I have some sympathy with Google. The world of online advertising is populated by scammers and scumbags who would happily rob us all, if they could. The more Google tells publishers, the more doors are open for criminal and duplicitous activity. So while I'd always like to know more and to have clearer guidelines about various issues, I understand that some secrecy and security is needed.

The post almost makes it sound as though publishers are as important as users and advertisers.

Publishers are only of peripheral importance to Google. We're as important to them as roads are to oil companies. It's a fairly clear relationship. I always chuckle when I hear publishers complain and demand 'x' and 'y' from Google because, like, they're important to Google's bottom line.

A vexing problem no doubt. My recent discussions with AdSense left me no wiser as to identifying invalid traffic. To my mind the daily reports are now quite meaningless, because they may/may not include invalid traffic/clicks.

To be very fair, the AdSense contact was most generous in support and quick follow up. Splendid support.

Un-splendid support for us.

Despite being a ten year publisher with an unbroken history of monthly checks a while ago the contact-us link (offering email support) vanished and after posting in the adsense help forum I was basically told that their system doesn't have a bug in that area, and adsense employees cannot help with ascertaining the reason, or if ascertaining it, cannot correct it, so don't expect it to return. And this advice came not from a google employee but from a member with a back channel to google employees.

So In my books the adsense support is woeful and they have so successfully sealed themselves off from their customers (us) that if something is actually wrong with the supposed contact channels, there is no channel to open a dialog about it. If that makes sense. Which you know it does, because it is google and that's how google works now.

@nyc863 - Read this to see if you qualify:

Email support

We offer email support in several languages for our website publishers earning more than US$25 (or local equivalent) per week on a consistent basis. Note that publishers earning any YouTube revenue on their AdSense accounts are not eligible for email support via AdSense, and should visit the YouTube Help Center.

Eligible publishers will find a contact form by clicking the “Contact us” button on any page of our Help Center. Your email will be answered by one of our support specialists within two business days (sometimes longer during holidays).

My emphasis added.

@nyc863 - it is rather helpfull link [support.google.com...]

p.s 6-7 years ago it was really tricky to find feedback form in Adsense Help.

Thanks - for a long period this month the "Welcome to the AdSense Help center" did not offer the menu that you see when you are logged in, to our account when we were logged in.
Now it does (online support: unavailable, email support; wait time 1-2 days).

When it did not, nobody in the unofficial forums could explain why or explain how to find out why it was missing.

Now it is back, however I am very sure my questions will be met with a bland referral to a FAQ that does not help, and a conversation will not be allowed.

Q1 - why is adsense serving larger ads than the defined enclosing div, when they are responsive?

Q2 - what is the qualification to become a premium publisher, (because premium publishers are all doing things with ads that are forbidden for regular publishers, such as sticky divs).

I am very sure my questions will be met with a bland referral to a FAQ that does not help, and a conversation will not be allowed

Not entirely in my personal experience. Certainly certain answers are quite cryptic for obvious reasons, however I found the person dealing with me to be most attentive to what I had said, referred certain aspects to traffic engineers...

Of course things are no different - on any given day presented with what I regard as average traffic, average clicks, average eCPM there is no way I can personally identify invalid clicks.

One aspect we discussed at length was to protect yourself?

Make very sure your AdSense Ads are prominently labelled above it as "Advertisement", so there is no possibility the site visitor can confuse it with your content.

That way you can always demonstrate to AdSense that you are not encouraging accidental clicks - don't rely upon what the Ad itself may say. Be safe rather than sorry.

I did that site wide by SSI, and noticed no difference in clicks at all.

Q2 - what is the qualification to become a premium publisher, (because premium publishers are all doing things with ads that are forbidden for regular publishers, such as sticky divs).

As far as I know more than 20 million impression per month

thanks

Is that 20 million ad-pages as identified in adsense daily impressions, or 20 million ad impressions ?
nevermind - thats pages. However it is apparently not sufficient in and of itself. The other qualifications are secret.