I found it interesting that an email to the privacy address (which also routes the mail to "legal" and "support") bounced with a message that the mail account was "temporarily suspended".
Paul Marino
· 2 years ago
Count me in as one of the affected/pissed off. Way too trusting of these sites, they offer up a chance to submit your email info in order to sift through their own database for common contacts. Instead, they're leeching your contact list.
Well, there goes the neighborhood. However the silver lining is that we'll all be much more hesitant to embrace anything all these lines again (good for us, bad for start-ups).
Thanks for the update, Robert.
pos3idon
· 2 years ago
Thats just awefull, sue 'em!
Seth E
· 2 years ago
of course, Quechup is wrong, evil, represents the worst offences of old-media marketing, etc. Still...why didn't I get asked?
Tim
· 2 years ago
I am still staggered that people will give their email login details to some random 3rd party website they just heard of.
Guess it's just me.
Robert Scoble
· 2 years ago
Tim: Yeah, that is interesting bit of psychology, isn't it? Easily abused.
Seth E
· 2 years ago
I think a number of good honest examples have made many of us trust anyone who humbly declares themselves a "start-up". We assume that others have have the same respect for web2's communal nature that we do. Seven years ago, Tim, it would've been un-heard of.
Paul Marino
· 2 years ago
I believe we've been lured by the altruistic intentions of sites that are on the up-and-up. Sites like Twitter, FB, Pownce convey a sense of trust that let my guard down - particularly when the invite came from a trusted friend/associate. Seizing that opportunity, this site (I won't even say their name any longer so I don't contribute to their search cache), they chose to take advantage of this climate of trust.
But as one of the recently burned, that's gone away real fast.
Bill Koslosky
· 2 years ago
I got the invite last weekend but didn't bite.
It's simple enough to do a quick Web search to check the cred of this site. And, why would you want to create another inbox to manage?
vruz
· 2 years ago
Strange enough, Robert, this helps to validate the strength of the so-called "social graph" you have talked about before.
When you get recommendations via (unencrypted, unsigned) outlook-email, you can't safely attest for the veracity of the information you receive.
But perhaps recommendations coming from people validated in your social graph as "recommenders" would work better ?
Begs for some interesting thoughts.
Richard Callaby
· 2 years ago
Robert,
Thanks for the heads up on this one. This not only saves me the embarrassment of not spamming my friends but also how to create more trust if and when I should create a social networking site. Guess the phrase "Do No Evil" does not apply to every startup on the Internet although it should.
Thanks!
Lora
· 2 years ago
Robert, I agree with you. I accidentally followed an email from a friend of mine (yours too actually) and Quechup sent emails to everyone in my hotmail address book (including you). I posted an apology this morning: http://www.whatisnew.com/2007/09/08/spammed-by-...
The upside is that I've received emails from friends who I haven't heard from in a while.
Though, this certainly doesn't win my trust of social networking sites beyond those that have already earned my trust.
Chris Wilson
· 2 years ago
I got a slew of invites last week, and thought it must be something people were loving, since they were all signing up at once. I even signed up, but there is no way to enter email addresses by hand, or to upload vcards or tab delimited files, and the service didn't work with .Mac.
To top it off, there was no way to 'befriend' the people who previously had invited me. So, befuddled and annoyed, I walked away. I even twittered my annoyance as I left.
Looks like I was actually 'spared' quite a bit of embarrassment and shame. Thanks for the post!
Dossy Shiobara
· 2 years ago
quechup = malware email worm.
When will the popular email anti-virus products block Quechup invite emails to keep it from spreading? :-)
rudolfganz
· 2 years ago
Like ketchup, it takes the original taste.
Lilyhill
· 2 years ago
An interesting twist. I signed up, but when it came to the part of adding "friends", it gave a choice of email apps. So I chose the email app that didn't have anything in the address book. Problem is, it happened to use the same pw as the address I used in part 1 of the sign-up. Went thru the step, and Quechup told me there were no people added (which would have been true.) So I thought I was fine. But they apparently must have tried using the same pw with the address I used in step 1 - and also accessed the address book for that email - the used a different app! Fortunately, there was not a lot there. But definitely a sneaky move. And perhaps not exactly legal?
Ian Betteridge
· 2 years ago
You probably got an invite from me - sorry!
Like many others, I actually deleted my Quechup account when I found out what it was doing. And like many others, I then found that - AFTER I'd deleted my account - it sent out a load of spam to everyone in my address book. Let me say that again - Quechup sent out spam purporting to be from me, after I'd deleted my account with them.
Horrible.
Sherri Cornelius
· 2 years ago
Me too!! And I'm normally a very careful internet person. I'm not sure what caused me to put aside my instinct on this one, but I also blogged about it:
Ringo did the same thing one year ago with my yahoo account.
Jake McKee
· 2 years ago
It really goes to show the value of "trust" in the Word of Mouth process. I first signed up from the earliest of early spam mails I heard/saw/received. It came from a friend of mine within the social media industry that I have 100% faith in. Getting an invite from him always (or at least used to) equate to an instant registration on that particular site.
Sadly, Quechup has committed what amounts to cyber-terrorism... making me rethink the things I once thought were safe and will likely never be able to believe are safe again. Boo on them.
Robert, I know you are one of Facebook's biggest fans, but I think things like Quechup, coupled with Facebook opening up to third party developers is the harbinger of things to come. Already we get unwanted app spam from unwitting friends on facebook- and then we surrender our personal info to the developers of these apps. Something bad is bound to come of this...
neverness
· 2 years ago
After Plaxo once pulled this one on me, no site is getting access to my personal address book. I got one, entered it, but once it looked like a dating site (not social network @ all) I killed it.
As the addresses in my address book of most people are their private addresses (or work) i refrain from giving access to this information. If necessary I'll let them know via other means that a site seems to be interesting.
A blog about this button probably would be more effective :)
Jack Yan
· 2 years ago
I signed up before I read your alert, Robert, but fortunately, I make it a policy (on every site) to never feed in address books. This was the site that would not allow me to enter my city in New Zealand! It insisted I needed to insert a ‘region’ and there is no corresponding one for any of the major cities here—guess it’s only for Kiwis who live in smaller towns and in the country!
David Mackey
· 2 years ago
I haven't received any invites yet, but have been seeing these stories all over the blogosphere.
I first found out it was a spam engine through Twitter, quite a few of my friends chronicled the process and dismay of the whole thing. Then I got a few invites, I checked it out and thought it didn't look Web 2.0 enough so I didn't even try it. I'm glad I didn't. Thank goodness for Twitter and my friends. Glad to see a post from you on it.
Lou Paglia
· 2 years ago
Wow, I knew your blog was popular but I had no idea that you had 100 million readers that read your negative review of MSN Spaces then went and signed up anyway! I'm impressed :)
Thanks for the heads-up, unfortunately it only takes one of your friends that has your email address to not heed warnings and sign-up for you to get spammed. Hopefully, won't be getting too many.
GO GIANTS!
Martin Cleaver
· 2 years ago
Hi Robert,
I sent an email to their lawyers (Ron Stauber) this morning, and have left them a voicemail to ensure that they get it.
We met on Friday night at o2con by the way, but we didn't introduce. I was on the sofa talking with James (who's surname and business card escape me). James works with Austhink.
Cheers, M.
Billy secondnameretained
· 2 years ago
Never had a problem with them in the 18 months I have been a member
Vic Berggreb
· 2 years ago
So, about that lawsuit Robert, let us know when that gets into gear, I'd support too.
Logo designer
· 1 year ago
I had a bunch of invite e-mails this autumn from people whom I could never suspect to invite me to such network. So, now the mystery is solved. I wonder did they thought about consequences and community reaction to this dirty trick?
Patrick Byers
· 1 year ago
Another great post, Robert.
I've been promoting social networking with clients, friends and colleagues. I agree, sites like this are adding to 'social networking fatigue.'
In fact, friends that I've connected with through legit sits like Plaxo, Facebook and LinkedIn simply aren't responding when I have sent them Spock and a few other requests.
What's more, the tech laggards in my address book won't even respond to simple Plaxo address update requests.
Learning about (or worse, an experience with) sites like Quechup could scare them away from social networking altogether.
All Comments
Well, there goes the neighborhood. However the silver lining is that we'll all be much more hesitant to embrace anything all these lines again (good for us, bad for start-ups).
Thanks for the update, Robert.
Guess it's just me.
But as one of the recently burned, that's gone away real fast.
It's simple enough to do a quick Web search to check the cred of this site. And, why would you want to create another inbox to manage?
When you get recommendations via (unencrypted, unsigned) outlook-email, you can't safely attest for the veracity of the information you receive.
But perhaps recommendations coming from people validated in your social graph as "recommenders" would work better ?
Begs for some interesting thoughts.
Thanks for the heads up on this one. This not only saves me the embarrassment of not spamming my friends but also how to create more trust if and when I should create a social networking site. Guess the phrase "Do No Evil" does not apply to every startup on the Internet although it should.
Thanks!
The upside is that I've received emails from friends who I haven't heard from in a while.
Though, this certainly doesn't win my trust of social networking sites beyond those that have already earned my trust.
To top it off, there was no way to 'befriend' the people who previously had invited me. So, befuddled and annoyed, I walked away. I even twittered my annoyance as I left.
Looks like I was actually 'spared' quite a bit of embarrassment and shame.
Thanks for the post!
When will the popular email anti-virus products block Quechup invite emails to keep it from spreading? :-)
Like many others, I actually deleted my Quechup account when I found out what it was doing. And like many others, I then found that - AFTER I'd deleted my account - it sent out a load of spam to everyone in my address book. Let me say that again - Quechup sent out spam purporting to be from me, after I'd deleted my account with them.
Horrible.
http://sherricornelius.com/2007/09/05/quechup-s...
Nice blog you have here. :)
Sadly, Quechup has committed what amounts to cyber-terrorism... making me rethink the things I once thought were safe and will likely never be able to believe are safe again. Boo on them.
Robert, I know you are one of Facebook's biggest fans, but I think things like Quechup, coupled with Facebook opening up to third party developers is the harbinger of things to come. Already we get unwanted app spam from unwitting friends on facebook- and then we surrender our personal info to the developers of these apps. Something bad is bound to come of this...
As the addresses in my address book of most people are their private addresses (or work) i refrain from giving access to this information. If necessary I'll let them know via other means that a site seems to be interesting.
A blog about this button probably would be more effective :)
Thanks for the heads-up, unfortunately it only takes one of your friends that has your email address to not heed warnings and sign-up for you to get spammed. Hopefully, won't be getting too many.
GO GIANTS!
I sent an email to their lawyers (Ron Stauber) this morning, and have left them a voicemail to ensure that they get it.
See http://martin.cleaver.org/blog/2007/09/10/cease...
We met on Friday night at o2con by the way, but we didn't introduce. I was on the sofa talking with James (who's surname and business card escape me). James works with Austhink.
Cheers, M.
So, now the mystery is solved.
I wonder did they thought about consequences and community reaction to this dirty trick?
I've been promoting social networking with clients, friends and colleagues. I agree, sites like this are adding to 'social networking fatigue.'
In fact, friends that I've connected with through legit sits like Plaxo, Facebook and LinkedIn simply aren't responding when I have sent them Spock and a few other requests.
What's more, the tech laggards in my address book won't even respond to simple Plaxo address update requests.
Learning about (or worse, an experience with) sites like Quechup could scare them away from social networking altogether.
And that would truly suck.
Patrick Byers
The Responsible Marketing Blog
http://responsiblemarketing.com