Slashdot Mirror
Yahoo Knows Best, Resets Users' Marketing Prefs
Go to your Account Information screen (for each and every ID you have) and about mid screen you will see "Edit Your Marketing Preferences" link. Click on it and set them back to the way you want them, otherwise get ready for *LOTS* of advertising spam type emails from Yahoo's advertisers. Note also at the bottom, that you will be marked YES for 'By US Mail' and 'By Phone' as well."
In additional Yahoo News, smagruder writes: "Starting today, I noticed that Yahoo! stopped forwarding my mail and when I go to setup/change the POP Access/Forwarding settings, they display a page for me to give them money to get my mail forwarding back. The issue: In their recent widely distributed press release, Yahoo! said that this all would start on April 24, NOT March 28!"
Update: 03/29 20:24 GMT by J : Yes, of course Yahoo is a TrustE customer. For a small fee, TrustE certifies: "You can edit your Yahoo! Account Information, including your marketing preferences, at any time." Isn't that great? I can edit my marketing preferences that I had no reason to know existed! Thanks, TrustE!
Update: 04/07 11:54 GMT by J : Nine days later, Yahoo notified me that these preferences existed:
From: Yahoo! <yahoo_privacy@reply.yahoo.com>
To: [me]
Subject: Message from Yahoo! about changes to our Privacy Policy and your Marketing Preferences[...]
In order to keep you up to date about our many new products
and services and how they might be of use to you, we have
created a new Marketing Preferences pagehttp://subscribe.yahoo.com/showaccount
within the Account Information area. It is designed to make
it easier for you to manage the marketing communications
you receive from Yahoo! and ensure you get the latest
relevant information to meet your needs. We have reset your
marketing preferences and, unless you decide to change
these preferences, you may begin receiving marketing messages
from Yahoo! about ways to enhance your Yahoo! experience,
including special offers and new features. Your new marketing
preferences will not take effect until 60 days after the date
of this mailing so you have plenty of time to decide what you
want to receive and what you don't. To change your
preferences, go to the Marketing Preferences page.
Anyone care to comment on the US legality of signing people up to snail mail, telemarketing lists after they've explicitly opted out? Seems very dubious to me.
Just tested it.
Can we build a new internet and start over? This one is starting to smell funny...
I've been trying to get my parents online for a couple of years now. Not an easy task when I live thousands of miles away and can't provide much in the way of instruction. So far its been a nightmare. Machines pre-installed with the full trojan-horse marketing one expects from a windows machine. Their doors to the web, AOL, MSN... all of it making their experience feel like getting 500 new cable channels that are all just different versions of the Home Shopping Channel. Email with a GUI that looks like Mickey Mouse has hacked your pop mail account. Lots of shiny clunky flashy advertising for people that really don't buy shit anyway...
The desperation with which corporations and their advertising machines come after us makes me very uneasy about the stability and future of our economy. The pyramid scheme can't hold... I can't afford/don't need any more crap.
"The U.S. Constitution - not perfect, but its better than what we have now"
i always wonder if, when an article is submitted by an AC, the person works for the company that is behaving badly. if so, kudos to them for doing what's right.
go get it
If yahoo is offering all of it's features as a
free and publically accessable system, don't they have the right to do whatever they want with the default settings?
Sure they do, but why does that preclude just being decent about this kind of thing instead of just doing what they want and inconveniencing people? Why couldn't they have emailed all users and warned them and given them a link to turn off all the spam? Someone at Yahoo has committed the same breach of public trust that Amazon.com is guilty of which is precisely why I won't do business with Amazon.com ever--because they have given me no reason to trust them. Likewise, I wouldn't buy anything from Yahoo (should they ever try any sales ventures) as I don't trust them either. Bear in mind, this isn't the first time they've futzed around with their users in this manner.
So, yes, nobody is denying them their right to do as they please with their free services, but at the same time, they should recognize that the trust of the public and their own users (paying or otherwise) is a valuable resource and a good thing to have. These kinds of moves, done without notice, erode that kind of trust and sully the name-recognition/branding that they clearly take for granted. Most online companies would kill for the kind of branding that Yahoo has managed.
--Rick
--Rick "If it isn't broken, take it apart and find out why."
So, I just went pay the $19.99 to continue to use the POP services at Yahoo. It is worth it to me for that amount. I find out though that I *must* create a Yahoo Wallet to do so. To use the Wallet service I must give Yahoo my credit card info FOR THEM TO STORE. This is "for your convenience". Then I look at the Wallet TOS and see this: "Yahoo! will not be responsible for any purchases or errors made under your account or Yahoo! Wallet". So you're going to force me to let you store my number but will not take any responsibility for it. Forget that! Its one thing to make purchases online, another to let somebody store my cc #. I've used Yahoo mail and the POP service for a long time since it allows me to keep one email address regardless of ISP. It looks like that is coming to an end!
Yahoo has been providing forwarding for @rocketmail.com addresses ever since they bought them out. Does anyone know if they are planning to charge for this also?
To leave a user input for the email that all the "partner" announcements are to be sent. I left all my choices to yes and changed the email account to abuse@yahoo.com
HAHA, stick that in your spam hole and smoke it.
It's been a while since I created my Yahoo! account, but by the time you receive this screen with marketing preferences, you've already given them your contact information, a decision you've made solely on the information in their terms of service and privacy policy.
THEN they ask you what your preference is regarding using your contact information for marketing purposes. You've already given implicit consent for them to use it by signing up in the first place (according to their privacy policy).
Now, I still consider it very shady and unethical for them to turn around and say, "I know you said no, but we don't really care," but:
a. I don't *think* there's any legal issue here; and
b. This is all assuming that these 'marketing categories' existed when you signed up in the first place. Their privacy policy seems to imply that they can add 'marketing categories' to their site later and assume an 'opt-in' policy for everyone that doesn't explicitly re-visit and opt-out.
So while I'm just as annoyed at Yahoo! as everyone else is, and find that this practice (assuming it was even deliberate) to be very shady, it's definitely arguable as to whether or not legal retaliation is warranted or possible.
(In my opinion.)
When I logged in a minute ago to reset the marketing preferences, I found that not only had they signed me up for email spam, but they displayed my home address and phone number and had me signed up for snail mail spam and telemarketing.
So no, they're not collecting due compensation for free services, they're taking advantage of the my status as a paying customer. I'm going to find a new ISP, and I'm going to switch all my small business Web site clients as well, because they deserve better. To hell with Yahoo.
All well and good. But the default should be to opt out. If you really want the email you'd set it up. But as a default the system should be as un-intrusive as possible.
OK, I know. I'm living in a fantasy world. But that's how it should be. Since they chose to do it their way, I don't see how they have any defense to charges that they are abusing user trust and misusing user data.
The Mongrel Dogs Who Teach
Free service? Not POP/SMTP access or forwarding of Yahoo! Mail... I've been quietly abandoning my (previously useful) Yahoo accounts.
Off-topic, but does anyone know of any scripts which will automate the retrieval of webmail messages and queue them in your regular mail spool?
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
I thought I was ok too until I went here:
http://subscribe.yahoo.com/showaccount
See the posts above to find the link that already selects "no" for everything and all you have to do is click "ok".
HotMail did the same... even set "Share my registration information" to yes. This info includes county, region, state, ZIP, gender and a few other goodies.
... is to lie. Apparently I'm a female construction worker, and only 3 years old too - :-)
precocious, huh
The important thing is the age - if you're less than 13 they don't bombard you with any crap at all...
Simon.
Physicists get Hadrons!