11–20 of 175 posts
Archived link: https://web.archive.org/web/20251230214339/https://vptdigita...
there's something seriously wrong with this archived link. It's not staying still for one moment. It's constantly twitching and the text scrolls to weird positions. It's unreadable because of this. Is it the archive at fault or is the original webpage this way?
I thought this was going to be about honey adulteration, which is a major problem.
Obviously Internet affiliate marketing schemes are built on mutual exploitation of asymmetric data collection. This cannot possibly surprise anyone.
With that said, this is a good article with excellent data collection and evidence presentation. It's great to have documentation of obviously corrupt practices, even if they are unsurprising.
Archived link: https://web.archive.org/web/20251230214339/https://vptdigita...
there's something seriously wrong with this archived link. It's not staying still for one moment. It's constantly twitching and the text scrolls to weird positions. It's unreadable because of this. Is it the archive at fault or is the original webpage this way?
Works for me here, and in 90% of the cases where someone complains of annoying page behaviour (cookie banners, revenue optimizations, subscription solicitations, "click here to ...", paywalls, ads, et alii ad nauseam).
Seriously, just disable JavaScript on unknown/untrusted/undeserving sites. It makes the web tolerable.
- The Honey browser extension inserted their own affiliate link at checkout, depriving others of affiliate revenue.
- Honey collected discount codes entered by users while shopping online, then shook down website owners to have the discount codes removed.
- Honey should have "stood down" if an affiliate link was detected, but their algorithm would decide to skip the stand down based on if the user could be the an affiliate representative testing for compliance.
Allegedly.
"Who gets a kickback on this toothbrush" is a much MUCH less important question than "do you pollute the air we are all breathing".
Likening any of this to Volkswagen emissions compliance scandal does a huge disservice by treating "Affiliate Marketing" as far too important. "Who gets a kickback on this toothbrush" is a much MUCH less important question than "do you pollute the air we are all breathing".
It's not about the severity of the impact, its the fact that they were breaking the rules and explicitly coding to actively avoid being caught by testers.
TLDR; - The Honey browser extension inserted their own affiliate link at checkout, depriving others of affiliate revenue. - Honey collected discount codes entered by users while shopping online, then shook down website owners to have the discount codes removed. - Honey should have "stood down" if an affiliate link was detected, but their algorithm would decide to skip the stand down based on if the user could be the…