41–50 of 71 posts
A positive point, however, is that they are open about this on their website: http://help.duckduckgo.com/customer/portal/articles/216405-m...
The article is almost 1000 words, but the title of HN post is more than enough to describe what's going on.
This reminds me of the debate on Path's address book upload activity. I don't think it was malicious. It could be covered in a TOS update. But I rarely read the TOS for a site. When I do, it's a serious investment of time to understand what they're trying to say. I think we need to simplify TOS language and standardize on a set of images to represent privacy, affiliation, and payment terms for a service. I would actu…
It seems like almost no one here takes issue with this... Would it be cool if Google inserted affiliate codes in it's search results (those that apply)? Slippery slope perhaps? Is it really that different?
Even on Google, that doesn't affect the user at all. I wouldn't mind. However, it would definitely piss off the affiliate program...who should just boot Google from their program. Now that I think about it more, that's the real problem with this. The businesses are most likely getting sales anyway, and pinterest can't argue that they're doing anything special to generate the sale. Since pinterest can't censor links t…
You can't be serious. The sales would never have been generated in the first place if pinterest never existed. Your logic would seem to preclude any affiliate program in existence. If I have a blog reviewing my favorite books, and being a book lover I want to make it easy for people to enjoy books I recommend so I go ahead and place links to Amazon. Should Amazon say "well you we're going to link to us regardless, so you aren't eligible."
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But why does that matter? What does anyone gain from knowing that they are using affiliate links? What does anyone lose from not knowing?
I don't think there is an effective way to hide the use of affiliate links, so they may as well disclose it in their FAQ or TOS just to avoid complaints that they're not being genuine towards their users.
This reminds me of the debate on Path's address book upload activity. I don't think it was malicious. It could be covered in a TOS update. But I rarely read the TOS for a site. When I do, it's a serious investment of time to understand what they're trying to say. I think we need to simplify TOS language and standardize on a set of images to represent privacy, affiliation, and payment terms for a service. I would actu…
It's been tried http://khulaproject.com/ I don't think it's a particularly viable business, it might be a good feature of a larger business that was focused on helping customers navigate the complexities of modern life; but on it's own, the value in one instance is too small to motivate purchasing.
As for Path's storage of user contacts; while I find the practice sketchy, especially since I just signed up for Path and had no idea this was happening, but not unexpected especially considering facebook's status as a 'role-model' for privacy issues.
Side-note: Khula Project in its current form is deadpooled. I do plan to relaunch sometime in the future with a project more focused on information distribution.
I have absolutely no issues with this: 1. It's the most scalable way for them to generate revenue without shoving ads down your throat. 2. Skimlinks doesn't "modify" your links, they simply put it through a redirect to see if it affiliates. The link you've submitted to Pinterest will likely stay as is. 3. If users submit affiliate links already, then services like Viglink/Skimlinks don't overwrite your cookie (i.e. R…
It's awesome that skimlinks exists...years ago I worked for a company that relied on affiliate revenue and we had someone working full time to maintain relationships. I imagine they lose some of the pickier affiliate programs, but this is an awesome way to test out the revenue model. It also brings up another interesting point. If this revenue model works for pinterest, it means it could also work for pinterest users…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're totally off base on the first part. 1) Prohibited paid search placement: This only applies to bidding on placement on search engines. Pinterest has not bid on terms on their own site, so that section has no relevance even if Pinterest itself could be considered a search engine. 2) Redirecting links: This prohibits placing links that point to an intermediate page that then redirects to Amazon. Pinterest is link…
Any idea what the "redirecting links" clause means for URL shorteners and other redirect-based services?
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3501938
Well, now I know.
I remember reading Posterous is using skimlink's competitor Viglink http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1309403 The real question is WHY would companies let Posterous or Pinterest become affiliates at all? Where are the incremental sales? It makes sense for businesses to encourage USERS to become affiliates and promote their products, but allowing user-gen site to monetize their users' links does not encourage their…