Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

MailChimp deleted my account with no warning

blog.rongarret.info

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

261–267 of 267 posts

Re: MailChimp deleted my account with no warning

#261

Post by hippich »

ravenstine wrote: post #92
hippich wrote: post #13

To people mentioning public shaming. I had a mailing list with them removed with all contacts lost and account banned without even notifying me. Customer support indeed responded, but with something like your account was banned because you are involved into cryptocurrencies (i had hashcash.io - no selling or buying of crypto is even close) and we completely wiped all your data. Only after a hint about possible public…

How difficult was it to set up an SMTP server? I know that merely installing and configuring the software isn't that hard, but the common opinion of late seems to be that setting up things like MX records(I really don't even know how those work) is too onerous. If it's not that difficult, then there really should be fewer people/orgs relying on services like MailChimp.

I am using sovereign - https://github.com/sovereign/sovereign

It is dated it seems, but still does a job.

There are indeed issues with delivery, but you just work through these as they arise. Also, there is no monetization involved, so I do not care that much about delivery rate. But if your profits are directly tied to delivery rate - hoting own SMTP server might not work as well.

Re: MailChimp deleted my account with no warning

#262

Post by hippich »

josefresco wrote: post #91
mkhalil wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Way to patronize someone trying to be self-sufficient. Just because you read blog posts titled "DON'T HOST YOUR OWN MAIL", doesn't mean you shouldn't. People are scared of hosting their own mail servers because they a) are told they shouldn't b) don't understand SMTP. I am all for decentralizing this hyper-centralized internet.

Sorry, I'm old enough to have come from the era of "DIY" mass emailing which transitioned (rightfully so) to using providers like Constant Contact/MailChimp. I've seen first hand the drawbacks of emailing thousands of people via your own SMTP server. Blacklists, legal threats, deliverability issues, proper unsubscribe, formatting etc. And this was early 00's when much of the legal framework around email marketing was…

It indeed depends on personal circumstances. In my case my case sending mail through own SMTP server is not a problem.

Even if that would be a problem in future, you'd rather use one of SMTP PaaS (there are quite a few of them out there) instead of using fully integrated solution like Mail Chimp. I.e. you can use Mautic and connect it to Sendgrid or something like that. This way you have full ownership of mailing lists and newsletters content.

Re: MailChimp deleted my account with no warning

#263

Post by notatcomputer68 »

rkeene2 wrote: post #178
SkyPuncher wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So they lied in the first response (all data is wiped and unrecoverable) Not defending Mailchimp, but keep in mind the perspective and context. To a customer support agent using some backend interface, it very well could be "completely wiped". To an escalation team, they may be able to pull it from backups in an "unofficial" manner.

The antecedent of "they" in the previous sentence is the company, not an individual. The individual creating the email, as a person, probably was not lying BUT since they were acting as an agent of the company, in an official capacity all of their actions were that of the company as a whole. This shields them from individual liability as well as makes the company liable for their actions (as long as they are acting a…

That way of looking at it - that the company is lying but the individual is not - is fascinating to me.

Re: MailChimp deleted my account with no warning

#264

Post by ahje »

tgsovlerkhgsel wrote: post #236
ahje wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a couple of lessons to be learned from this: * Make sure to have a plan B for all service providers that you use for critical services. * Make sure you have a secondary copy of critical data, and that you store it responsibly in case a provider does something. That still doesn't excuse not informing the account holder, but given the short time that has passed, it is possible that task has ended up in someon…

If it ended up in someone's backlog, then MailChimp still screwed up because the "suspend account" button should automatically send a notification (even if it only said that more information will follow). I'd also add one item to your list: Proper monitoring (which is extremely difficult and time-consuming to set up). A plan B is useful if you know that you need to enact it. Here, the third party provider had silentl…

Good point! Monitoring is also one of those critical things one should always have.

Re: MailChimp deleted my account with no warning

#265

Post by lolc »

dkonofalski wrote: post #249
lolc wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Saying you know when you don't is a lie. Instructing people to say they know when they don't is instructing them to lie on your behalf. The answer should be: "I can't know." Followed by one of: (1) Let me connect you to someone who can know (2) Let me tell you how much it costs to find out (or 3) Also we don't care. That would be honest. Not saying it's easy.

>Saying you know when you don't is a lie. Instructing people to say they know when they don't is instructing them to lie on your behalf. Because, in that case, the intent of the statement is to deceive. If the intent of the statement is simply to not set an expectation that can't be guaranteed rather than to intentionally deceive, then it's not a lie, in my opinion. I work in audio editing and recovery/enhancement an…

I agree with what you say. I think the trouble starts when the economical burden of recovery is not on the customer, but on the company.

If I tell somebody that something's unrevocerable because I know they wouldn't want to pay the recovery, I'm not lying. But saying nothing can be done when I'm just afraid of the cost of righting my mistake: that is lying.

Re: MailChimp deleted my account with no warning

#267

Post by darthpaul4651 »

Coming from being a former MailChimp tech support agent (regular tech support, not compliance support), I can say that while I was in tech support, all account data is accessible on the company’s backend and for closed accounts, their data is available for 3 months after the close date. Open accounts aren’t pushed to dormant status until 2 years after no send and no login activity. Pretty happy that I’m no longer there; MailChimp was fine but they don’t pay their support agents enough for the kinds of stress and bad management they have to go through.
Post reply on HN