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Is the google plus ad a community promotion advertisement or something else?

I clicked it but nothing shows if I don't log into google - what is this?

https://accounts.google.com/ServiceLogin?service=webupdates&passive=1209600&continue=https://m.google.com/app/contacts/mp/144/continue/?unauth%3D1%26login%3D1&followup=https://m.google.com/app/contacts/mp/144/continue/?unauth%3D1%26login%3D1&btmpl=mobile&ltmpl=mobilex

enter image description here

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I ended up at https://plus.google.com/101120115153580954446/posts when I clicked the ad (same destination and largely identical content whether I am logged into a Google account or not).

The above-linked page seems to be a Google+ account for “Stack Exchange” to post various things: “interesting” questions from various SE sites (similar the SE Twitter account), but also podcast episode notifications, and some other SE-related news. It seems very similar to the SE page on Facebook.

Joel Spolsky recently tweeted that “You can also follow Stack Exchange on Google+” with a link to a Google+ search for “Stack Exchange” (this was right after he tweeted about the symmetry of SE on Facebook and Facebook on SE: facebook.com/stackexchange, facebook.stackoverflow.com).

The ad itself seems to be just one of the SE-promoting ads that SE injects into its sites (questions from other SE sites, site proposals from Area 51, “Join us on Facebook”, “Join us on G+”, et cetera).

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  • The link you have above resolves to this for me - you sure you're not logged in to google? accounts.google.com/…
    – bmike Mod
    Commented Dec 1, 2011 at 5:49
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    @bmike: I originally just did a simple “logout” in my normal browser (Safari). Since you asked, I tried my first URL in two browsers (Chrome, Firefox) that I usually do not use (and with which I have never logged into a Google account). I got the same result as a plain logout: the G+ page for Stack Exchange with no user-specific content. Further, under a brand new OS-user-account (freshly created for this test) two browsers (Safari and Firefox) also gave the same result.
    – Chris Johnsen
    Commented Dec 1, 2011 at 7:13
  • Awesome - and head scratchingly odd. Thanks for the above and beyond testing.
    – bmike Mod
    Commented Dec 1, 2011 at 7:15
  • The m.google.com and mobilex bits of your URL might indicate that Google is trying to serve you some kind of mobile adaptation. The page rendered when I visit your URL (a login page) certainly looks like it might be “small screen optimized” (minimal styling and content, with everything in a narrow column).
    – Chris Johnsen
    Commented Dec 1, 2011 at 7:23
  • Reproduced: If I “sign out” of Google, have Safari set its User-Agent to an iPhone variant, and then load my first URL, I end up at a URL very much like yours (852 instead of 144). When I am signed in to Google (with the UA set to be like an iPhone), I do get a mobilified G+ Stack Exchange page. I guess G+ is not quite mobile-ready (or they just do not want to render otherwise public pages for visitors that are not signed into Google).
    – Chris Johnsen
    Commented Dec 1, 2011 at 7:32

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