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AOL Allegedly Censors 'Email Tax' Opponents
Mediacitizen writes "AOL was accused yesterday of censoring email to AOL customers that included a link to a site opposing AOL's proposed 'email tax.' Over 300 people reported that they had tried sending AOL subscribers messages that contained a link to www.DearAOL.com, but received a bounceback message informing them that their email 'failed permanently.' After the DearAOL.com Coalition -- 600 organizations convened by Free Press, MoveOn and EFF -- notified the press of this blocking, AOL quickly cleared the opposition URL from their filters, alleging a 'software glitch.'"
"software glitch"? Right. That's the most pathetic attempt at damage control I've seen in quite a while. I do agree that something has to be done about unwanted e-mails that keep flooding my inbox (my main e-mail address gets about 300 such e-mails a day) but AOL is driving down a road that will further alienate them from their users. By pulling stunts like this, they clearly demonstrate their motives as benefiting themselves and not the customers.
This does not bode well for the acceptance of e-mail tax. As if the general public wasn't against it in the first place.
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From the article: "Left to their own devices, AOL will always put its own self interest ahead of the public interest."
Well, yeah, no kidding. Since when did the "public interest" pay AOL for anything? Unless there is a law which says AOL cannot filter its "own" servers, too bad. It is AOL's right to do anything like this it wants to.
Is this the best thing to do? Obviously not, however don't be shocked when it does happen. Unless you control your own email completely (from the ISP right down to the server) you are relying on someone else. And that someone else ultimately has their interests in mind before yours.
Now, do some companies care about your interest? Sure, but they are not going to place your interest above theirs, otherwise they will be out of business. Supressing propangda which might cost you money; I don't think any business wouldn't consider that; and most, if not all, would try it.
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No law says they cant filter out what ever they want too, as long as they publsh the list to their subscribers ( and that may not be required, but good practice ) We aernt talking a goverment here. there is no 'censorship' clause..
---- Booth was a patriot ----
If you consider the AOL's CEO's brain as "software" :P
This is funny because all these large corporate entities are proving (by shooting their own feet) that the Google 'do no evil' mantra is worth more than any advertising campaign....
I can see the future where such 'news articles' cause havoc at the next shareholder's meetings... sadly, that day has not yet arrived, but as the world of commerce gets flatter, it will...
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The glitch, of course, being that they got caught.
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If they use heuristics and other methods for spam filtering that don't always work 100% reliably (I've had legit e-mail end up in the spam bin), it legitimately could have been because their spam filter just decided it was spam, and started dumping it. I'm not defending AOL, I think they suck, but just offering an alternate line of thought. Many ISPs use a human-based filter, the company I work for runs into it all the time, people sign up for our mailing list, and rather than cancel when they're done with it, they just click the "report as spam" button, and then all of our company is on their shit-list, even to those users who want to get our e-mails. Especially if somebody was mass-mailing AOL users that e-mail, it seems likely.
-JesseNothing says "unprofessional job" like wrinkles in your duct tape.
AOL has their customers lost in a blizzard. Most of their customers don't know what the "internet" is. They just use the AOL GUI for all their browsing and email. Like my sister in-law who pays $21.95/month for dial up service. She's just used to AOL. She likes the nice little portal uses to dial up.
/. crowd. Look at their commercials. They want the suburban soccer mom who thinks the internet is a big bad place, and only AOL can protect them and their kids.
I've tried to get her to move off. USfamily.net is $8.25/month. I would think saaving a single mom with a 16 year old $13/month would be a good thing.
AOL isn't marketing to the
Oh, and she doesn't want to take any chance at loosing her AOL ID. She has given it out to all of her chat buddies.
Say hello to civil and criminal liability.
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, it doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
AOL exists on name recognition and the ignorance of the customers that choose to use them as an ISP. Nothing new here. As such, this becomes the modus operandi for everything it does... "let's block these mails, but show them as bounced messages... our users are too dumb to know the difference anyway, right?" Still, nothing new here.
But AOL itself is stupid, thinking that EVERYONE is so blissfully unaware of it's business practices. Even moreso, that anyone would be OK with it.
I don't know which is worse... that AOL thinks it can get away with an e-mail tax, that it can censor e-mails opposing it, or that it thought it was perfectly OK to do either (or both).
Hey, AOL... there are still parts of your feet still down there... keep shooting.
The problem with socialism is that they always run out of other people's money. - Margaret Thatcher
You get caller ID
Telemarketing company pays extra to block caller ID on all outbound calls
You pay extra for an unlisted number
Telemarketing company pays extre for list of unlsted numbers
You pay for call block
Telemarketing company pays to bypass call block
I don't see any problem with AOL filtering out emails that they consider hurtful. They use the "AOL Constitution" known as TOS (Terms of Service). An AOL subscriber must abide by this TOS contract if s/he wants to continue being a subscriber of AOL's service.
I do not like AOL, and that is why I am not an AOL subscriber.
You join as a subscriber, you play by their rules. Once you join, you make a connection to their network and, that's just it, you are on THEIR NETWORK. It is their land and their 'domain.' They make the laws - their rules. I think you get the point.
I will probably get flamed for this.
A large section of the population are idiots. These people can't figure out how to work a thermostat let alone the internet.
My boss is amoung them. I enjoy working for her, but we have been trying to wean her off AOL ever since work got a DSL line. That's right the company has a DSL line and spends whatever a month just for her AOL. She is the only one who wants it. She get's confused whenever we try to hide it on her. Heck she gets confused whenever we make minor changes.
As I said i do enjoy working for her(the side benefits aren't bad for the job) but she can't figure out how to download a file, or where to find it once it was downloaded. Those Concepts are above her head, and will always be that way.
so for her AOL is good. It's safe, and everything is in one place for her to use.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
Now is the time to cancel your AOL subscription!
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It was you or someone like you with whom I had the following conversation with a few years ago. It is a painful memory burned deep within my psyche.
AOL Rep: Thank you for waiting on hold for 53 minutes listening to the same 20 second recording over and over, how may I help you?
ME: I'd like to cancel AOL.
AOL Rep: Okay, no problem*. (*This is a trick)
ME: Great.
AOL Rep: I need to get your screen name.
ME: It's AOLSucks29785. I called myself that because AOLSucks1 through AOLSucks29784 were already taken.
AOL Rep: Do you live at 5022 Pheasant Circle, the white house with the blue shutters and a green Toyota parked in the front? Was you last telephone bill for $36.17? Did you have sex two nights ago for 28 minutes and could stand to put a little bit more fiber in your diet?
ME: [nervously] Uhhh... yeah.
AOL Rep: Okay, I've got you pulled up in our system. For verification purposes, what's your mother's maiden name?
ME: Henderson.
AOL Rep: I'm sorry, that's not correct.
ME: Um, yeah it is.
AOL Rep: Not according to our records. Has it changed recently?
ME: No, it's my mother's goddamn maiden name. It's been the same, like, forever.
AOL Rep: Well that's not what our computer says.
ME: I don't care about that, her maiden name is Henderson!
AOL Rep: Maybe when we first asked you, you told us her middle name instead of her maiden name.
ME: Well, her middle name is Sue.
AOL Rep: Nope, that's not it either. Try it one more time. What's your mother's maiden name?
ME: HENDERSON!
AOL Rep: Well why didn't you say that in the first place? Why did you tell me her maiden name was Williams?
ME: I DIDN'T!!
AOL Rep: Sir, I need you to calm down and speak to me respectfully or I will end this conversation.
ME: Look, I just need to cancel my AOL account. And please, don't waste your time or mine trying to read me that stupid script to get me to stay? Okay? I went through it before. The one where you ask me what I use the Internet for, and I tell you, and then you tell me all the ways that AOL supposedly makes it easier... don't do that. I just want to cancel.
AOL Rep: That's not a problem at all.
ME: Good.
AOL Rep: I would hate if someone used a script on me too.
ME: Well, exactly.
AOL Rep: So may I ask what sorts of things you use the Internet for?
ME: Dammit, you're using the script on me.
AOL Rep: No, sir, I wasn't. I was just making friendly conversation.
ME: I didn't call for friendly conversation, I called to get you to cancel a $30.00 per month bill for dial-up Internet when I can get super-fast high speed Internet for $19.99 per month.
AOL Rep: I bet that makes it really easy to watch movies and music videos online!
ME: I suppose, but --
AOL Rep: Did you know that AOL has a movie and music video service for high-speed internet that --
ME: Are you out of your mind?
AOL Rep: For just a low monthly fee, you can keep AOL and use it with your high-speed Internet!
ME: Why on God's Green Earth would I do that?
AOL Rep: AOL is so easy to use!
ME: I don't need Playskool Internet on my computer. I am capable of using a normal web browser.
AOL Rep: But it's --
ME: Just cancel my damn subscription.
Of course, two months later, what shows up on my credit card? AOL, charging me for their super-cool high-speed internet product that I specifically told them I didn't want. And in closing, I hate you forever.
Oh good god no. That is the cancellations department (or as they call it the "Saves" department). They tried to make me take saves rollover calls once, I immediately and politely cancelled every account that the customer wanted cancelled. Lowest call time and highest customer satisfaction I think that queue ever saw. They never asked me to do it again...