4 ms·

> That's called shadowban in the case of OP. I’d call that fraud. If you pay for a service you get to use the service.

by throwawayacc2 5y ago

pas 5y ago
Does their ToS say they can terminate it without notice?
- _fat_santa 5y ago
  Terminating without notice is one thing. Shadowbanning and continuing to take your money is a completely different thing.
JohnHaugeland 5y ago
No, banning someone from a paid service is not fraud.
- jimnotgym 5y ago
  It is if you keep taking their money and pretend that they are not banned.
- throwawayacc2 5y ago
  Banning + refund for the remainder credit, sure. Scummy, but sure. Shadow banning, taking peoples money while they still think they get a service, not even banning at the end of the billing cycle, without giving notice, nah, that’s definitely fraud.
- stjohnswarts 5y ago
  It is if they silo you off without notifying you and make sure no one else can see you and keep taking your money. Now I don't know if tender is doing that provably, but that was the thesis.
- ska 5y ago
  Colloquially and technically "ban" and "shadowban" are different things; I have no idea what happened in OP case but "shadowban" means that you leave someone in a system but silently block all of their interactions. e.g. ban: you try to log into HN and it gives you a message: "You can't log in, you are banned" shadowban: you log in to HN with your account, you post comments and vote on stories but unknown to you nobody else on HN can see this. Eventually you start to wonder why you never get replies anymore. It's definitely an ethical issue if you are doing the latter without telling someone, and additionally charging them for the service you aren't providing. With a dating app it might be hard to tell for a while; how are you to know that you aren't getting any replies/engagement because of the way such sites work, or because the people you contacted never saw the likes/messages/whatever.

> That's called shadowban in the case of OP. I’d call that fraud. If you pay for a service you get to use the service.

pas 5y ago

Does their ToS say they can terminate it without notice?

_fat_santa 5y ago
Terminating without notice is one thing. Shadowbanning and continuing to take your money is a completely different thing.

JohnHaugeland 5y ago

No, banning someone from a paid service is not fraud.

jimnotgym 5y ago
It is if you keep taking their money and pretend that they are not banned.
throwawayacc2 5y ago
Banning + refund for the remainder credit, sure. Scummy, but sure. Shadow banning, taking peoples money while they still think they get a service, not even banning at the end of the billing cycle, without giving notice, nah, that’s definitely fraud.
stjohnswarts 5y ago
It is if they silo you off without notifying you and make sure no one else can see you and keep taking your money. Now I don't know if tender is doing that provably, but that was the thesis.
ska 5y ago
Colloquially and technically "ban" and "shadowban" are different things; I have no idea what happened in OP case but "shadowban" means that you leave someone in a system but silently block all of their interactions. e.g. ban: you try to log into HN and it gives you a message: "You can't log in, you are banned" shadowban: you log in to HN with your account, you post comments and vote on stories but unknown to you nobody else on HN can see this. Eventually you start to wonder why you never get replies anymore. It's definitely an ethical issue if you are doing the latter without telling someone, and additionally charging them for the service you aren't providing. With a dating app it might be hard to tell for a while; how are you to know that you aren't getting any replies/engagement because of the way such sites work, or because the people you contacted never saw the likes/messages/whatever.