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If the boys on Amphitheatre Parkway pride themselves on anything, it’s their algorithms. They are the magic that makes Google the best search engine to date, and they’re also the driving force behind the real money, advertising.

One of the big draws to Google’s AdSense program is the low entry costs. The dream is for anyone to be able to show their wares to the world for pennies a day. Well Bob Cringely has something to say about that. He’s lifted the curtain and exposed some fairly serious problems with the AdSense universe.

My friend Mario Fantoni is a victim of click fraud, which in this case is simply defined as his Google AdWords bill climbing from $250 one month to $4,000 the next with no change in the campaign or increase in sales. Mario contacted Google, which, after an “investigation,” decided that he was, indeed, a victim of click fraud.”

In a world of automated bill pay, can the little guy afford that kind of dent at the expense of Google’s ever-beta algorithms?