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Tell HN: YC companies scrape GitHub activity, send spam emails to users

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Re: Tell HN: YC companies scrape GitHub activity, send spam emails to users

#151

Post by Goronmon »

WhatsName wrote: post #29

Doesn't YC have some code of conduct or legal/ethical guidelines? I would assume a legal and compliance department would have some major headache if documented cases of misconduct jeopardize later due diligence. I would not fund or aquire a company on the radar of national regulatory bodies for something as stupid as this.

Doesn't YC have some code of conduct or legal/ethical guidelines?

Regardless of any claims of having this, I would say this behavior aligns with what I have seen over the last couple decades. I'm more surprised that other people would expect anything different?

Re: Tell HN: YC companies scrape GitHub activity, send spam emails to users

#153

Post by agmater »

unfunco wrote: post #136
unfunco wrote: post #93

I also had unsolicited spam from Vincent Jiang of Aden, another YC company. Hi Daniel, I just came across your profile on social media and wondered if you'd be interested in joining our Discord community for AI agent development. Currently, we see that agents break, loop, get lost, hallucinate, and cost a fortune, and therefore built a space where developers can share challenges and insights.

…and more from Backdrop. Hi Daniel, I found your GitHub profile while searching for anthropic projects, and got your email from your profile. I'm part of an online program for builders called Backdrop Build, and I think that program would be a great fit given what you are building. We have a track for builders in AI like you, it's fully online/remote and costs nothing to participate. It also works if you have a day j…

Hey it's Joey checking in again. We noticed you mentioned our company, let me know if you have any questions about our (free!) program. I'll go ahead and email you some more info, just in case.

Re: Tell HN: YC companies scrape GitHub activity, send spam emails to users

#154

Post by malmeloo »

Oh I'm getting so tired of this. Lately there appears to have been an uptick in this kind of marketing spam too, there's so many companies trying to advertise their AI products this way. At least it's a good indicator of which companies I should avoid at all costs, and it provides me with an email address I can use to direct my angry emotions towards.

They're getting more aggressive at it too. Just yesterday I received an email from Alignerr (not YC affiliated I think) saying that my sign-up was complete and cheerfully welcoming me to their platform. I had never even heard of them. An automated "job opportunity!" email didn't arrive until 3 hours later, but by then I had already directed some angry words towards their support email.

Other, even less respectable projects are also regularly enrolling my GitHub projects into their platforms, and I have to actively reach out to them to remove it.

I'm so tired of this man. Can someone go and take away these organizations' ability to send emails?

Re: Tell HN: YC companies scrape GitHub activity, send spam emails to users

#155

Post by progbits »

dewey wrote: post #140
progbits wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't like this way of putting it, it's good the github API makes this easy as that makes it an useful. Should not try to imply this should be restricted just because of some bad actors. It's just going to annoy legit users and the bad ones will scrape anyway.

I'm just stating a fact, not implying anything. It's the good old saying with the sharp knife, it can be used for good and bad.

Ok sorry I guess I read too much into it.

Re: Tell HN: YC companies scrape GitHub activity, send spam emails to users

#156

Post by max__dev »

elwebmaster wrote: post #148

Just got a SPAM email from a Github scraper while reading this thread: From: james@techglobal.website Quick note – your GitHub profile Hi X, I came across your profile on GitHub. Given you're based in the US, I thought it might be relevant to reach out. Profile: I run a technical team (full-stack, cloud, DevOps) that delivers for clients. We're looking to work with an engineer based in the US on client-facing coordin…

Checked my spam after seeing this thread and found the same sender/email. Subject and signature are slightly changed.

From: james@techglobal.website Brief note – Following up on your GitHub work

Hi ,

I came across your profile on GitHub. Given you're based in the US, I thought it might be relevant to reach out.

Profile:

I run a technical team (full-stack, cloud, DevOps) that delivers for clients. We're looking to work with an engineer based in the US on client-facing coordination—discovery, requirements, alignment—while we handle delivery. If that might be relevant, I'd be glad to set up a short call.

Best, James

Re: Tell HN: YC companies scrape GitHub activity, send spam emails to users

#158

Post by nerdsniper »

ryandrake wrote: post #145
AznHisoka wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same here, having YC attached to your name is not the flex you think it is, its even the opposite for me

Their brand has been associated with hacking-around and gaining advantage via rule breaking for a while. Didn't their founder application at one point ask "Tell us about a time where you hacked some system for your advantage?" At this point, I think everyone knows they're signing up for dark patterns and questionable practices when they get involved.

It still does.

> Please tell us about a time you most successfully hacked some (non-computer) system to your advantage:

I suspect it can be an excellent barometer of someone's:

- alignment in terms of pro-social vs. anti-social

- decision making under desperation

- "social filter": threading the line between 'interesting'/'compelling' vs. 'off-putting'/'concerning'

which are important signals for evaluating potential future C-suite executives.

Re: Tell HN: YC companies scrape GitHub activity, send spam emails to users

#159

Post by dent9 »

martinwoodward wrote: post #31

Martin from GitHub here. This type of behaviour is explicitly against the GitHub terms of service, when we catch the accounts doing this we can (and do) take action against those accounts including banning the accounts. It's a game of whack-a-mole for sure, and it's not just start-ups that take part in this sketchy behaviour to be honest. I've been plenty of examples in my time across the board. The fundamental natur…

Amazon did this to me. Their recruiters started hounding me at an email address that I only ever used to sign git commits on some repos used on GitHub. When I asked them how they got my email address they said "it was in [our] database"

Re: Tell HN: YC companies scrape GitHub activity, send spam emails to users

#160

Post by miki123211 »

martinwoodward wrote: post #31

Martin from GitHub here. This type of behaviour is explicitly against the GitHub terms of service, when we catch the accounts doing this we can (and do) take action against those accounts including banning the accounts. It's a game of whack-a-mole for sure, and it's not just start-ups that take part in this sketchy behaviour to be honest. I've been plenty of examples in my time across the board. The fundamental natur…

I've raised this as ticket ID 4114793, just in case.
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