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Posterous silently changes all external links to affiliate links

shamrin.posterous.com

81–90 of 187 posts

Re: Posterous silently changes all external links to affiliate links

#81
post #5

Huh, didn't livejournal try the same trick a month or two ago? http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100304/1741458425.shtml

According to that article LiveJournal was (is?) overwriting existing affiliate links with their own. According to their co-founder, Posterous is only affiliating links that aren't already affiliated (ref: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1309604 ).

Well, from what I remember in followup coverage, lj claimed that overwriting existing affiliate links was a bug, and they were also just trying to affiliate links that aren't already affiliated.

Re: Posterous silently changes all external links to affiliate links

#82
post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The answer to your first question is unequivocally yes (within the confines of the law, of course). Unfortunately for you, and fortunately for the rest of us, you don't get to dictate the terms under which people offer free services. I don't find Posterous's business practices shady at all—they found a way to offer a free service to people while at the same time making some money off it in a way that users don't even…

Even a free service has some "terms", as you said. Neglecting certain aspects of the service (hidden costs) in the terms is fraud in my opinion. Now in this case it probably isn't illegal, but I just don't understand your logic in general. How does offering anything for free justify anything? Picking up on your renting example: if aunty offers me to let me live there for free indefinitely, and I move my stuff there a…

Just being blunt, but if you got pissed off at your aunt like that, I would call you an ungrateful spoiled brat. Doesn’t matter how much you paid to move your stuff in. I don’t actually think you’re a spoiled brat, because it’s just an analogy and expecting something from Posterous as you do is at a much lower level of entitlement than expecting something from someone letting you live with them rent-free. I see your point of view regarding Posterous and I can respect it although I disagree.

IANAL, but I think the only reason that a website offers terms of service (beyond any minimum legal requirements they must live up to whether they like it or not) is to give the appearance that they’re nice guys that care about their users. That makes users feel good; it’s a PR decision. But the business doesn’t have any obligation to make its users feel all fuzzy inside about the service. It’s just that it’s usually in the best interests of the business to do so, to the most reasonable degree possible.

And it’s good that business don’t have this obligation, because users can be stingy and irrational. Like, for example, when they get unjustifiably angry when the business finds a completely harmless way to support the free service.

Re: Posterous silently changes all external links to affiliate links

#83

Hey guys, Posterous partnered with Viglink.com back in December as an experiment to see if we could generate revenue by adding an affiliate code to links that don't already have one. We chose to work with Viglink because their technology doesn't interfere with the user experience at all. 1. Links in Posterous posts are not edited in any way 2. Viglink javascript intercepts clicks and adds an affiliate code when possi…

I'm curious as to whether you considered if this would have any effect on PageRank for content you host?

This type of behavior - using javascript to present the user with links different than the googlebot found - seems like the type of thing they frown on.

Re: Posterous silently changes all external links to affiliate links

#85
post #47
post #34

I don't really see a problem with this as it does not strip off existing affiliate codes, it only adds them if they are not present. I mean, Firefox makes millions off of Google searches and nobody seems to complain about that.

I'm not saying I disagree, but I think there is a fundamental difference between monetizing functionality in a piece of software, and monetizing user-generated content.

Hosting and displaying user-generated content isn't a part of the Posterous software functionality?

Re: Posterous silently changes all external links to affiliate links

#86
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're using their service completely free, so I don't think you are really entitled to any say on the matter. If you were paying for it you might have some reasonable expectation that they leave your content intact, but you're not. It's like complaining about high taxes and then turning around and complaining that the government isn't sending everyone's children to college for free. You can't have it both ways. I th…

So whenever I use a free service, they are basically entitled to do whatever they want? What kind of logic is that? If they can't handle it, people shouldn't offer a free service. But don't run a service for "free" and then try to make money with shady business practices. In other words, you are not entitled to running a service for free.

"... So whenever I use a free service, they are basically entitled to do whatever they want? What kind of logic is that? ..."

Share cropper mentality.

As much as I agree to with your sentiment by not owning the server you post on this is what happens. Eben Moglin has delivered a great speech on the lack of "Freedom in the Cloud" ~ http://www.meetup.com/ny-tech/messages/boards/thread/8486342... The stand out quote:

"servers have gained freedom & you have not. welcome to the cloud!" - eben moglin ~ http://twitter.com/noneck/status/8700276388

Re: Posterous silently changes all external links to affiliate links

#87

Hey guys, Posterous partnered with Viglink.com back in December as an experiment to see if we could generate revenue by adding an affiliate code to links that don't already have one. We chose to work with Viglink because their technology doesn't interfere with the user experience at all. 1. Links in Posterous posts are not edited in any way 2. Viglink javascript intercepts clicks and adds an affiliate code when possi…

Overall, I think you handled this well, but...

> Our goal is to be 100% transparent with everything we do at Posterous, especially when it affects your blog and content.

I'm sure users will be forgiving, but your credibility may be blown (re: transparency) by not announcing something like this. Why is it so trendy to be 'transparent'? Why claim to adhere to principles that you clearly didn't follow?

(Sorry to nitpick! <3)

Re: Posterous silently changes all external links to affiliate links

#89

Hey guys, Posterous partnered with Viglink.com back in December as an experiment to see if we could generate revenue by adding an affiliate code to links that don't already have one. We chose to work with Viglink because their technology doesn't interfere with the user experience at all. 1. Links in Posterous posts are not edited in any way 2. Viglink javascript intercepts clicks and adds an affiliate code when possi…

Overall, I think you handled this well, but... > Our goal is to be 100% transparent with everything we do at Posterous, especially when it affects your blog and content. I'm sure users will be forgiving, but your credibility may be blown (re: transparency) by not announcing something like this. Why is it so trendy to be 'transparent'? Why claim to adhere to principles that you clearly didn't follow? (Sorry to nitpick…

Not quite sure why you were down-voted; you make a perfectly reasonable point.

Re: Posterous silently changes all external links to affiliate links

#90

Hey guys, Posterous partnered with Viglink.com back in December as an experiment to see if we could generate revenue by adding an affiliate code to links that don't already have one. We chose to work with Viglink because their technology doesn't interfere with the user experience at all. 1. Links in Posterous posts are not edited in any way 2. Viglink javascript intercepts clicks and adds an affiliate code when possi…

Re: 4) Links are changed if you copy them. I went to the linked article, right-clicked the "Google" link and clicked "Copy URL". I went to gedit and pasted this:

    http://api.viglink.com/api/click?key=8eb8c964d427e97a1567cec6532655f0&v=1&libId=1272676171565&loc=http%3A%2F%2Fshamrin.posterous.com%2Fposterous-silently-changes-all-external-links&out=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F&txt=Google&title=Posterous%20silently%20changes%20all%20external%20links%20on%20users'%20posts%20-%20Alexey%20Shamrin&format=go
This is in Chrome under linux. no extensions or adblockers running.

If there's a way for copied URLs to remain unchanged, I would have no problem with the viglink stuff.

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