Zango Under Fire From Adult Webmasters

An anonymous reader writes, "Over the past few days, adult webmasters have been accusing adware maker Zango of 'stealing sales' by means of the following method: Computer users with Zango's adware on board will pop open a window containing the affiliate merchant's site they happen to be on at the time, except with Zango's own affiliate code in the window. By doing this, Zango claims credit for the sale and the original, rule-following merchant, the one who referred the user there, loses out. Despite this practice having been around since at least 2004, it seems the adult webmasters are only just realizing this takes place — surprising, considering how deeply connected the worlds of adware and porn are. It seems pornographers pushing adware is acceptable only as long as they aren't the ones getting burnt. Part of me doesn't care, and part of me hopes they carry the financial clout to force Zango to change their current practices."

wow..

[michaelhood]

Good thing there's no bias in this summary.

Selling adult material of willing participants to adults who want it.. definitely the same as theft.

So you are saying...

[jpardey]

...that all pornographers are inherintly contriving assholes? That, just because they have a different sense of morality, they would all stoop to such a low level? Sure, if they purely interested in "increasing shareholder value," then I can understand that they would, but could there not be suppliers of pornography who care about public reccomendation/honour/honesty?

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Oh dear.

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't be stupid. They lose money on a legitimate referral because Zango is STEALING it. Who cares what type of business it is.

Re:The battle of Stalingrad all over again...

[Archon-X]

Your generalisation is akin to saying all car drivers are hit-and-runners.

Zango targets all merchants, not just adult sites

[bedelman]

Ben Edelman here. I wrote the piece cited [benedelman.org] in the original post.

These Zango practices target all affiliate merchants, not just adult web sites. Earlier this morning I happened to see Match.com (a mainstream dating site) facing commission theft by Zango and a Zango advertiser. I document this kind of problem on an ongoing basis, and it remains remarkably widespread, even 2+ years after I first wrote about it.

I'm not here to criticize the adult industry or to defend it. But Zango's practices should rise or fall on their own merits. In my view, this is a scam -- asking a merchant to pay a commission to Zango or a Zango advertiser, when the user had already, independently reached the merchant's site. Much as some folks may not like adult sites, they ought not be defrauded by spyware or spyware-using affiliates.

Re:The battle of Stalingrad all over again...

[owlnation]

A malware company vs a web industry that generally loads its pages with popups and uses deceptive linking/indexing techniques. Come on, do we HAVE to root for one of them to win?

Please take the time to read some of the posts from adult webmasters elsewhere in this thread, and take this opportunity to learn and grow as a person.

Some adult webmasters are unethical. They are, in my experience, (as an adult webmaster and occasional performer in the fetish industry) very much in the minority. Most people involved in the adult industry that I have met personally are honest and hard working individuals.

In fact, I quit my job working in a very large and well-known international corporation because the things asked of me were far less honest and ethical than anything I have been asked to do in the adult industry. So, before you cast any stones Dilbert...

Please understand that those of us working in the adult industry are under far far more scrutiny from the authorities than any other legal business. We need satisfied customers (take the pun anyway you like) as much as any other business. Thus, using adware, deceptive linking techniques, and (does anyone still?) gazillions of pop-ups, is not a good business strategy.

I know that some webmasters do this, but so also do many from other realms too. Even companies like BMW have used SEO companies to forge page ranking. And don't even get me started on the music industry...

Porn is, in my opinion, far more honest and ethical than most other industries. So, enjoy it knowing that you are supporting hard working small businesses everywhere.

Clueless

[foreverdisillusioned]

Did you even read the GP's post? The point you utterly failed to grap is that sweeping accusations like "The site owners (the porn sites) make it easier to attack them as they support spam.[snip]" are wrong. Believe it or not, most adult site owners out there don't "support spam"--there just happens to be a EXTREMELY prolific minority. And even if the majority did support spam, that doesn't excuse blanket accusations that demonize the entire porn industry.

Re:wow..

[Tim C]

Not all participants in the movies are entirely willing though.

So, because you believe that some of the participants are unwilling, you would gladly see the entire industry go down in flames?

By the same token, I believe that some programmers create malware - clearly the entire application development industry should be shut down.