Saturday, September 08, 2007
Antisocial
Rapleaf has posted something of a public apology (and it's quite nice to see them admitting straight out that they were wrong to message people searched in Upscoop), but they only backed off so far:
A few people also asked us to stop sending the been-searched emails on Rapleaf.com. We debated the merits of that request internally and came to the conclusion that this is a good feature (the vast majority of the feedback on this have been very positive). People should know if their information is available for others to see. But we’ll limit these emails to maximum of once a quarter.Now, I'm also getting bombarded with e-mails about Shelfari. This nonsense is getting old -- I don't need to wake up to see 15 messages about Shelfari, Quechup, yoName, or any of these services spread across my e-mail accounts. There's a big difference between this automatic notification business and the way a more professional service like LinkedIn handles things -- I think I'm sticking with them. (And, for those of y'all I know, feel free to add me as a contact over there.)
Labels: linkedin, rapleaf, shelfari, socialnetworking, upscoop
Tuesday, September 04, 2007
Walking the Line
While we're complaining about social software spam, here's another one:
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I got a strikingly similar message last week from yoName.com as well. To me, this completely crosses the line -- the fact that someone else has searched for my e-mail address doesn't give these sites permission to spam me in a thinly veiled attempt to drive traffic. Even though the idea behind these services is interesting, I won't be using them -- especially now that I know they will e-mail whoever I search for.
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Dear Rachel,
Someone researched your reputation on Rapleaf by searching "rachel@lisjobs.com".
To view (or update) your profile, check out:
http://www.rapleaf.com/pub/Rachel-Singer-Gordon
Even though your profile is incomplete, the person who searched you found some basic reputational information on you. At Rapleaf, you can find such information as age, location, history, social network links, and more on over 60 million people.
-Your friends at Rapleaf.com
www.rapleaf.com
I got a strikingly similar message last week from yoName.com as well. To me, this completely crosses the line -- the fact that someone else has searched for my e-mail address doesn't give these sites permission to spam me in a thinly veiled attempt to drive traffic. Even though the idea behind these services is interesting, I won't be using them -- especially now that I know they will e-mail whoever I search for.
Labels: rapleaf, socialnetworking, spam, yoname
