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These people spammed everyone who starred their GitHub repo last year, so be aware. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30900237 https://news.ycombinator.com/i

These people spammed everyone who starred their GitHub repo last year, so be aware. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30900237 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30900237 I found the project interesting, but those tactics immediately turned me off.

Semaphor 4y ago
FWIW, I find the founder's apologies in the issue thread [0] believable. Not as in "they were right", but more "they thought this was useful, realized they were completely off base, and it will not happen again". [0]: https://github.com/OpenBB-finance/OpenBBTerminal/issues/1625 https://github.com/OpenBB-finance/OpenBBTerminal/issues/1625
- filmgirlcw 4y ago
  I'll be honest, I was angry enough about the email that I unsubscribed and blocked their emails. It’s a one and done situation for me. I personally have zero interest in any project that thinks it’s a good idea to scrape the emails of people that star their repo, subscribe them to a MailChimp mailing list, and send them marketing emails, as if this is Product Hunt (who also wouldn’t allow this without opt-in) and not a code sharing platform. It’s great they apologized, but for me, it was a one strike, you’re out scenario. And it underscores what I see as a significant misunderstanding of why something should be open source. It shouldn’t be seen as a marketing funnel. And if the only reason something is offered as OSS is as a marketing funnel, gather your data somewhere other than GitHub. Disclosure: I work at GitHub but had only just joined as an employee when this happened. Had I been there longer than like two days, I would have probably flagged the account and let the abuse team make a decision on it.
  - wslh 4y ago
    Nowadays we are accustomed of this kind of campaigns from everywhere. From the pure marketing perspective it is common.
  - Semaphor 4y ago
    Absolutely understandable. I simply wanted to highlight their response as it, imo, was not the normal "oopsie" one.
- eminent101 4y ago
  > FWIW, I find the founder's apologies in the issue thread [0] believable. The comment thread here looks fishy enough that I am disinclined to give the benefit of doubt here.
- xcombelle 4y ago
  they probably had a warning of mailchimp that putting someone on a mailing list without their consent is a forbidden use of mailchimp. source: I worked with an organization which put a lot of people in their mailchimp mailing list
  - sexy_year 4y ago
    We did. But that was after I received a SPAM email saying "Welcome to our newsletter" in my personal GitHub account when I wasn't part of that audience. You can see my interaction with someone from our team here: https://github.com/OpenBB-finance/OpenBBTerminal/issues/1625#issuecomment-1086958892 https://github.com/OpenBB-finance/OpenBBTerminal/issues/1625... - When we realize what had just happened. We immediately deleted that audience (which was our plan all along anyway), but then it was too late, we were trending on HackerNews and Mailchimp pinged us after. After that it was mostly damage control, as there's nothing we could have done to make things better.
conorcleary 4y ago
It's not spam if it's targeted - that's marketing.
- bboygravity 4y ago
  Is this sarcasm? Can't tell...
  - conorcleary 4y ago
    No it's a ying-yang truth. You'll have arguments pro and con.
    - bboygravity 4y ago
      Unsolicited email (spam) is spam. There's really no 2 ways about it. Targetted or not doesn't change that fact.
- filmgirlcw 4y ago
  No one signed up to their newsletter. They scraped the emails of everyone who starred the repo and imported it into MailChimp and subscribed us all to a newsletter. That’s spam.
  - willdr 4y ago
    This is your brain on Finance, unfortunately.
  - conorcleary 4y ago
    Just like you receive marketing copy in your mailbox.
    - jeroenhd 4y ago
      Merriam-Webster defines spam as: "unsolicited usually commercial messages (such as emails, text messages, or Internet postings) sent to a large number of recipients or posted in a large number of places". The emails were unsollicited and sent to a large number of recipients. It's fits the dictionary definition of spam, despite not containing a direct advertisement. Cambridge merely defines spam as: "unwanted email, usually advertisements", which this also fits perfectly, as nobody who stars a Github repo sees that as confirmation of wanting join a mailing list. Furthermore, if this were marketing (it's an invitation into the community more than anything else) this email may actually violate the CAN-SPAM act. IANAL but I don't think it applies here as the email doesn't even offer anything, it's just begging for feedback.
yazzku 4y ago
Thanks for the heads-up. Guess they don't put that on the front page.

Semaphor 4y ago

FWIW, I find the founder's apologies in the issue thread [0] believable. Not as in "they were right", but more "they thought this was useful, realized they were completely off base, and it will not happen again". [0]: https://github.com/OpenBB-finance/OpenBBTerminal/issues/1625 https://github.com/OpenBB-finance/OpenBBTerminal/issues/1625

filmgirlcw 4y ago
I'll be honest, I was angry enough about the email that I unsubscribed and blocked their emails. It’s a one and done situation for me. I personally have zero interest in any project that thinks it’s a good idea to scrape the emails of people that star their repo, subscribe them to a MailChimp mailing list, and send them marketing emails, as if this is Product Hunt (who also wouldn’t allow this without opt-in) and not a code sharing platform. It’s great they apologized, but for me, it was a one strike, you’re out scenario. And it underscores what I see as a significant misunderstanding of why something should be open source. It shouldn’t be seen as a marketing funnel. And if the only reason something is offered as OSS is as a marketing funnel, gather your data somewhere other than GitHub. Disclosure: I work at GitHub but had only just joined as an employee when this happened. Had I been there longer than like two days, I would have probably flagged the account and let the abuse team make a decision on it.
- wslh 4y ago
  Nowadays we are accustomed of this kind of campaigns from everywhere. From the pure marketing perspective it is common.
- Semaphor 4y ago
  Absolutely understandable. I simply wanted to highlight their response as it, imo, was not the normal "oopsie" one.
eminent101 4y ago
> FWIW, I find the founder's apologies in the issue thread [0] believable. The comment thread here looks fishy enough that I am disinclined to give the benefit of doubt here.
xcombelle 4y ago
they probably had a warning of mailchimp that putting someone on a mailing list without their consent is a forbidden use of mailchimp. source: I worked with an organization which put a lot of people in their mailchimp mailing list
- sexy_year 4y ago
  We did. But that was after I received a SPAM email saying "Welcome to our newsletter" in my personal GitHub account when I wasn't part of that audience. You can see my interaction with someone from our team here: https://github.com/OpenBB-finance/OpenBBTerminal/issues/1625#issuecomment-1086958892 https://github.com/OpenBB-finance/OpenBBTerminal/issues/1625... - When we realize what had just happened. We immediately deleted that audience (which was our plan all along anyway), but then it was too late, we were trending on HackerNews and Mailchimp pinged us after. After that it was mostly damage control, as there's nothing we could have done to make things better.

conorcleary 4y ago

It's not spam if it's targeted - that's marketing.

bboygravity 4y ago
Is this sarcasm? Can't tell...
- conorcleary 4y ago
  No it's a ying-yang truth. You'll have arguments pro and con.
  - bboygravity 4y ago
    Unsolicited email (spam) is spam. There's really no 2 ways about it. Targetted or not doesn't change that fact.
filmgirlcw 4y ago
No one signed up to their newsletter. They scraped the emails of everyone who starred the repo and imported it into MailChimp and subscribed us all to a newsletter. That’s spam.
- willdr 4y ago
  This is your brain on Finance, unfortunately.
- conorcleary 4y ago
  Just like you receive marketing copy in your mailbox.
  - jeroenhd 4y ago
    Merriam-Webster defines spam as: "unsolicited usually commercial messages (such as emails, text messages, or Internet postings) sent to a large number of recipients or posted in a large number of places". The emails were unsollicited and sent to a large number of recipients. It's fits the dictionary definition of spam, despite not containing a direct advertisement. Cambridge merely defines spam as: "unwanted email, usually advertisements", which this also fits perfectly, as nobody who stars a Github repo sees that as confirmation of wanting join a mailing list. Furthermore, if this were marketing (it's an invitation into the community more than anything else) this email may actually violate the CAN-SPAM act. IANAL but I don't think it applies here as the email doesn't even offer anything, it's just begging for feedback.

yazzku 4y ago

Thanks for the heads-up. Guess they don't put that on the front page.