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Dateline: 6 April 2000 Early Edition Read The Previous Edition A permanent link to this page can be found here
Editorial
AllAdvantage users have already made quite a nuisance of themselves
around the Net and several locals have had their bottoms kicked for
trying to drum up business in ways that violate their ISP's terms of
service -- but I expect we'll soon see a flood of this kind of thing.
Having been hit several times by spammers promoting the service a couple
of months ago I actually emailed AllAdvantage and suggested that if they
were serious about being anti-spam then they ought to place their warnings
in a great big bold font on a separate page of the sign-up form that
required them to type in "I AGREE NOT TO SPAM."
Suffice to say they neither implemented my suggestion or even bothered to
respond.
Of course it could be that they feel their existing warnings are adequate --
but, given the level of spam I still see from AllAdvantage users who are trying
to boost their own earnings by recruiting others, I'd have to argue that
they are wrong about that.
The reality may be that they don't really mind if their users spam -- in fact
it's got to be a real boost to their bottom line, for several reasons:
So do you see how it works?
If someone joins AllAdvantage, earns an amount of money by being paid to surf,
then spams, they get their account closed and they forfeit their earnings.
That's extra money for jam in AllAdvantage's coffers right?
What's more -- their "upstream" also loses out on their share of the earnings --
that's *more* money in AllAdvantage's pockets.
And, as we all know, those who will have responded to the offending spam and
signed up are going to be more inclined to go out and send spam themselves --
because after all, they were quite happy to receive it.
It's easy to see that this spammer-recruits-spammer scenario could create a
situation where AllAdvantage might be earning large amounts of money from
its advertiser -- but never need to pay out a dime to its spamming members
because it simply enforces its anti-spam policy sometime before the cheque
is written out.
So, based on a simple observation of the benefits that accrue to AllAdvantage
from its spam policy, and the propensity of its users to engage in this kind
of activity, I think that any promotion of the service here in NZ is going
to be bad news for legitimate, Netiquette-abiding users.
And before all the 100 percent non-spamming, highly satisfied AllAdvantage
members email me (including a URL with their referrer number), I'll say
that I'm sure AllAdvantage are doing a wonderful job and making Net use
more affordable for many people. Good on them. It's just a shame about
the spam eh?
Become A Career Websurfer
How long before some savvy person writes some software that allows them
to automate the process?
Get a dozen phone lines and a dozen PCs (or half a dozen with two modems a
piece), get a dozen free ISP accounts under various aliases, join up to
AllAdvantage with more pseudonyms and leave those machines running 24/7,
busily surfing the Net on your behalf while you eat, sleep, watch TV
and wait for the cheques to roll in.
AllAdvantage will only pay you for the fist 25 hours of surfing so your
software needs to log-out and login again with a different alias at regular
intervals but that's not a problem to a half-decent programmer.
Hell, you can even act as the referrer for some of those aliases and earn
additional money as an upstream!
By my calculations it wouldn't be too hard to nett at least a couple of hundred
dollars a week using this system and, given that you only need use old,
tired second-hand PCs which are a dime a dozen, you'd pay back your original
investment in a pretty quick space of time.
Now of course I'm not suggesting that anyone actually does this (it's tantamount to
a fraud) -- I'm simply
pointing out that if there are people who are smart enough to reverse-engineer
DVD software, crack large (supposedly secure) websites and effectively
work wizardry with this technology -- such a scheme is well within the
grasp of a fair percentage of young, savvy Net users.
i4free Says
Perhaps in yesterday's column I should have said that "the average Net user"
will have to use software provided by i4free if they want to be able to configure
their computer to use the service.
The profile of the average Net user has changed significantly in recent years
and most of them these days don't even know how to spell TCP/IP and simply look
blankly at you if you ask them to change the TCP/IP parameters or reconfigure
their modem dialer. For them, there is little option but to download the
software provided by i4free and run it.
I also wonder if my "if I had a million dollars" scenario struck a nerve since
Annette Presley sent me an email bitching that I wasn't being an objective
journalist and suggesting that I was being paid by IHUG.
Clearly Annette isn't a long-term Aardvark reader and needs to take note that
this column is the editor's opinion -- and that most of the time I don't even
carry paid advertising on the site, let alone lust after being on an ISP's payroll.
I've offered Annette a right of reply -- but haven't heard back from her yet.
You will be kept informed.
Free republication rights available
on request
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Aardvark Daily is a publication of, and is copyright to, Bruce Simpson, all rights reserved
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