It’s getting to be that time of year during which people grow much nicer and more family-oriented.  Or much more rude and antisocial.  Whatever.  Either way, Google’s making a special effort to ensure that it isn’t put out of mind over the next couple of months.

First up is the search giant’s offer to help out around Thanksgiving.  A post on the Official Google Docs Blog claimed, "A Google Site is a great way to let everyone know what to bring, provide directions, organize flight arrival times and even plan some post-Thanksgiving events, like football marathons or a little exercise to burn off those pumpkin pie calories."

This seems like OCD overkill, perhaps (plus there’s the issue of whether older family members know how to deal with the Web), but is harmless enough.

Then there’s the development that might do a measurable bit of good.  Over on the Inside AdWords blog, new holiday ad templates were announced.  They look nice, and could attract extra eyes and clicks, earning people some money just when they probably need it most.

Google’s almost sure to make more announcements as Thanksgiving and Christmas draw closer, too, so stay tuned.

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Google has introduced a set of new ad templates for its Display Ad Builder tool. The templates, which Google refers to as "elegant" reside in the "general" category.

"These templates have ready-made buttons and backgrounds that give each ad a cohesive look and feel," says Dan Friedman of Google’s Inside AdWords Crew. "More specifically, the backgrounds use subtle gradients and the new buttons have unique shapes, icons and color treatments. The goal of these ads is to make it as easy as possible to create high-quality ads in a matter of seconds without having to use complex graphics software."

With some of the new templates, advertisers need only upload their product image and write some text, and the template pretty much takes care of itself. For the design-impaired, it’s a good way to easily create a decent looking ad.

In addition, most of them seem to cater to "clickiness," meaning they make it easy for a call to action to inspire a click.

To use the templates, just click Display Ad Builder on the Create an Ad page in AdWords. Google Display Ads features over 90 different templates. Google offers a display ads tutorial here.

At the moment, there are exactly 725 alternatives available in the Google Docs Template Gallery, and that’s a rather large number.  But if you check back at this time next week, there are liable to be a whole lot more, because Google’s now letting everyone submit templates.

In an email to WebProNews, a Googler explained, "[W]e are opening up the template gallery so that anyone using Google Docs can create and submit a template for inclusion in this public catalog.  If you submit a template to the gallery, other Google Docs users will be able to view a preview, create a copy for their own use, and rate your template to help others find the most useful templates."

This crowdsourcing effort represents a clever move.  After all, it’ll cost Google very little, and people like participating in communities and showing off their creations.  Also, this is a way in which desktop-bound software will find it difficult to compete.

Google doesn’t even have to worry about the Template Gallery filling up with junk, since sorting options like "Hottest," "Most Users," and "Highest Rating" should keep individuals from wasting their time.

So consider showing your creative side – or at least see what other people have to contribute – on Google Docs.

Google is warning users about an increase of spammers promoting Google scams.

"We’re seeing disturbing cases in which websites, emails and advertisements claim that you can make large amounts of money from home with very little effort using Google products and services," the company said on the official Google Blog.

"They’re designed to look like they were written by a regular person, just like you, who stumbled across an amazing opportunity to make their monetary dreams come true. What they don’t tell you clearly is that Google is not affiliated with these sites and that they may add extra charges to your credit card or misuse your personal information."

Google has offered users a number of ways to report such scams.

 If you’ve been ripped off, or suspect others are, report the site and file a complaint with the appropriate agency.

If you come across many sites with duplicate content or common templates intended to direct users to the same product or scheme, please let us know with a spam report

If you’ve been contacted to place suspicious links on your site for money, let us know with the paid link report form

 If your site’s forums or comment sections have been spammed with fake offers of fabulous financial gain, you may need to take steps to fight comment spam. Spammers will take advantage of any user-generated content sections of your site, and will even generate thousands of fake user profiles to try to slip under the radar.

If you receive suspicious messages that claim to be from Google, these may be phishing attempts. Please report them to phishing@google.com