LJ: Still Classy

[smarriveurr]

So, for those of you not aware... LJ found a new way to make money off of you. Specifically, they seem to have signed up with a third party to redirect links to about 150 major e-commerce sites, and add "affiliate IDs" to them. Basically, this means that they'll get revenue for links posted by users and followed by anyone (including paid "never see

Comments

Re: LJ: Still Classy

[smarriveurr]

Eh, as long the sites aren't on a certain list of 150, LJ won't make money on it - and I heard, among other things, that Amazon is pissed and might yank LJ's affiliate status over this.

Apparently, no one at LJ or Driving Revenue thought about the actual legality of tampering with referral codes.

[smarriveurr]

Yeah. The stats fix is apparently from 2005, long before they pulled this shit - no one at LJ explained how to get out of the program, as far as I can tell, someone just figured out that if you turned off this stat tracker they mentioned back in the day, this wouldn't be called.

[firynze]

WOW.

If my social network didn't exist almost exclusively on LJ...this would be one more thing pushing me to the brink of leaving.

[smarriveurr]

Pretty much the boat I'm in. A decent number of my friends are on DW, but I think LJ just has waaaaaay too much inertia to get EVERYONE to switch in the near future.

I should have invite codes, though, if you want one. :p

[firynze]

I think I have a DW. Not sure...

[smarriveurr]

Well, I do, same name. If you ever decide you want one, and don't have it, just let me know.

[smarriveurr]

And I feel even worse that people bought me mine. Damn the siren's call of that handy array of icons...