More Flixter-is-Evil Ranting
This is a follow-up to my “Flixter is Evil” post from a few days ago.
I’ve read more information about Flixter and why it is evil. Do NOT respond to invitations to join. Just don’t! You will regret it. Sara sent me a blog post from today from The Internet Patrol ("The Internet Patrol is maintained by the Institute for Spam and Internet Public Policy, and written by ISIPP President Anne P. Mitchell, Esq. ISIPP provides analysis, information, and consulting on industry issues, policies and processes regarding email and the Internet.). The name of the post is "Is Flixster a Big Fat Spammer? Are They Accessing Your AOL or Hotmail Address Book? The Answer to at Least One of These is Yes!", and here is the summary:
Recently I started getting invitations to join Flixster from complete strangers. Obviously, this was spam, but why were these complete strangers sending it to me? And why were they always from AOL and Hotmail? Now people are asking - is Flixstr accessing your AOL and Hotmail contacts list and spamming them in your name?
Another quote from the article:
Even though they make you feel as if you have complete control over the process by telling you “On the next page you will be able to select whom to invite”, they already have your contacts by that point.
I posted a comment, which more fully explains the specific negative outcomes I’ve experienced as a result of using Flixter:
I am having EXACTLY this problem. It has been a total nightmare. Yes, I gave the password, but I’ve done that before, just so I could have easy access ONCE, then select those in my address book I wanted to invite. I clicked "unselect all" and carefully went through and selected only those I wanted to invite (about 5 people). I noticed that although I’d clicked "unselect all", there were about 40 addresses at the end of the list still checked. I manually unchecked all of those then hit send. Well, I’m guessing that that was about page 1 of 3, because EVERY other name in my address book was invited: professional contacts, old boyfriends, etc. It even sent mail to my "post to blog" address so that my first and last name were posted on my blog (something I never do). I think that so many people got those emails from me that a few clicked Spam on me. Since then, I’ve had people at places I’m interviewing report that they were unable to receive emails from me. My best friend can’t receive emails from me either. Flixter is purely evil. I will never EVER use a password to gain access to my email address book again. This is a total violation of privacy, and I am not happy about it.
Flixter has apparently hit "10 Million Registered Users", but I can tell you one person who is no longer a member, and proud of it: ME! If you’re in doubt, read the comment thread in the link in this paragraph, or just trust me. You don’t want to join this site.
On a personal note, I need your help. If you are a friend or I have ever sent you an email, please check your spam folder, and if you see something from me, please mark me as NOT SPAM! I have deleted my account on Flixter, so you should receive no more of those from me. And if enough people don’t de-spam me, I’m going to continue to be blocked all over the place. Please help me save my email address!
Update: Please read the comment section of this post for a response from a co-owner of Flixter, as well as follow-ups to his response.
Comment by Joe (Flixster Co-Founder)
March 23, 2007 @ 6:18 am
Abby,
I saw your note on ISIPP - I’m really sorry you had such an awful experience with our site!!
Obviously we don’t ever want to send invitations you don’t intend - i’m not sure what could have gone wrong the way you describe above. (You clicked “uncheck all” but it somehow unchecked “many” but not “all”? Is that right?)
Anyway - i would offer to cancel your account and make sure no reminders go out to your invites but it sounds like you already did that. Drop me a note if you like - i’d like to hear more about what happened in your case - but if you don’t want to i understand.
Sincere apologies,
Joe