I mean, if all you do for a living is email spam then I wouldn't call that hacking, but seeing as this is a programming based startup and the marketing attempt

I mean, if all you do for a living is email spam then I wouldn't call that hacking, but seeing as this is a programming based startup and the marketing attempt required programming skill, I'm imagining this was put together by the same guy/guys that are on other days making new product features. If slapping together a marketing scheme that quickly lets you reach a lot of people without you needing to spend a lot of time optimising or upkeeping it isn't hacking then I just straight up don't understand how the day setting up a new feature and a day setting up the new spam bot are different conceptually. I don't think being an unsophisticated asshole and a hacker are mutually exclusive. Plenty of hacking is unsophisticated and most people are assholes, hacker or otherwise.