Hello

I am writing this since there appears to be many questions over at another site about a newsletter that was sent out. A topic has sprung up about this, and it currently is over 7 pages. However, knowing the sense of humor some of the members of the other site have, I figure that asking here would be best. No, I am not turing this into a flame war, nor will I say anything negative about the site. I do realize that there have been many things said on the other board that are negative, but I want you to realize that I also read this board occasionally, but due to time constraints, I cannot read nor belong to as many boards as I once did.

Anyway, back to the question at hand. I realize that there may have been an accidental mailing of the newsletter to a list that was not supposed to be used. Although I had subscribed to the mailing, and never realized that it was a problem, many other people on the other board got the message, and had never requested it. At first, it appeared that they were angry at this site for receiving spam, but in reality, they are actually angry with the way that they percieved their email to have been collecetd. They are looking for an explaination as to why their emails had been harvested in the first place, if that is how they were collected. It is not so much that they received the message. After all, how many spam messages a day do we all get? I know in my case, it usually is between 15 and 30, so even if I had received the message as spam it wouldn't have bothered me. The reason for the hostility, or at least the reason I percieve them saying, is that the members over there feel that this site is not being honest as to how the addresses were collected (since several people claim that they got the message using an email that they only use for that other site and not for anything else) and the reason for collecting them in the first place.

Someone over there suggested that the person(s) responsible post their response over there. I can understand completely if he/she/they do not want to. That is why I am asking the questions over here. I do not want to turn this into a flame war or anything; I just want to try to get everything resolved.

No one owe's anyone an explination. It's a news letter, not a threat. Everyone talks of court, but come on, not many people can afford it, and for what?

In a round about way, TN's been getting some free advertisement. It may be bad...but I know if I heard a website sent out a bunch of news letters I'd want to go check out their website. And other websites talking about it, and downplaying it, would add to the fire. This should've never been made public, but handled behind the scenes. In other words, people should've handled this situation like mature-businessmen, not like thoughtless enthusiast asses.

Much like all things this will die out. Bunch of people blowing smoke (both sides) everyone's an enthusiast, but for some reason ego comes into play...last time I remember an enthusiast having a reason to be egotistical was...well never, they're just an enthusiast.:) Or as many people say, "glorified GP":eek:

Simple as this, everything could be resolved right now if the origin of the bad list was revealed. The apology that was put out was not very clear on that point and now there are talks of have sites shut down.

Mistakes were made and need resolution. That's all.

__________________

Pleasantly missing since 2006

I understand you are confused as to why the emails were harvested, but there may very well be a good reason for that. Also, there aren't any laws or rules against spam, so nothing can really be done. It wasa a simple mistake and people should just get over it. Other spam ads harvest email addresses all the time, and yet no one does anything about them.

__________________
TV/Event Guide Editor

I will deal with your posting by dividing it in sections.

[QUOTE]No one owe's anyone an explination. It's a news letter, not a threat.[/QUOTE]
I agree that a newsletter does not seem like it is a problem, and in practice, it isn't. I cannot speak for all of the people, but I don't see that as being what the concern is about. The concern deals with the way that the emails were gathered. Receiving an unwanted message is not a problem. However, if gathered improperly, it is understandable that perople would freak out. For example, let's say company X uses a harvesting program to gather all the emails off this site. There is nothing stopping that company from selling the emails to another company, which will then use the emails for spam. I am not saying that this is the senario that will occur between the two sites, but in this day and age, everyone is super paranoid and do not appreciate such things. Many of the people on the other board feel that the example I used is the reason that the email list that was accidentally used to send the newsletter was compiled. Since they see no reason for such a list to even occur, they immediately assume the worst. And unlike most pieces of spam, the newsletter seemed to be aimed perfectly at that board, which is the reason why the accusations began in the first place.

[QUOTE]Everyone talks of court, but come on, not many people can afford it, and for what?[/QUOTE]
I don't believe that it will ever get that bad, and there is no reason that it should. If everyone just calms down, this should just go away.

[QUOTE]In a round about way, TN's been getting some free advertisement. It may be bad...but I know if I heard a website sent out a bunch of news letters I'd want to go check out their website. And other websites talking about it, and downplaying it, would add to the fire.[/QUOTE]
Yes, there may be some initial increase in traffic, but when people get a bad impression of a site, that is usually hard to break. If they read a posting that is 7 pages long, and in it there are people badmouthing the site, and people from the other site are posting and responding to comments instead of just ignoring it and remaining on their usual site, the people who would be likely to check out the other site will immediately have a bias (I apologize for the length and the unclear writing of the last sentence). Also, you have to be careful with other members. As evident on both boards, there are definate feelings of togetherness, as a family of sorts. When the family has a problem with someone, usually the whole family goes together. While not all members feel the same, most of the members will band together.

[QUOTE]This should've never been made public, but handled behind the scenes. In other words, people should've handled this situation like mature-businessmen, not like thoughtless enthusiast asses.[/QUOTE]
I am not going to argue for either side in this case. The initial reason for the posting was to find out how many members of the board had received the message without requesting it. Members began posting that they had, and they had stories to bring up with it. After finding out what happened, should this have turned private, and not been discussed publically? I believe so. However, the problem with these message boards is that people can post and comment on things, causing threads to grow. I know that the post I am commenting onhas grown extremely quickly. As of the time I am writing this, that thread is experiencing a post every 10 minutes, which is impressive seeing that the thread was started a little over 48 hours ago. I have never seen a thread grow as quickly as that one. The only way that the thread could be stopped would be to lock it, but that would just cause another 50 threads complaining "Why was it closed?"

[QUOTE]Much like all things this will die out. Bunch of people blowing smoke (both sides) everyone's an enthusiast, but for some reason ego comes into play...last time I remember an enthusiast having a reason to be egotistical was...well never, they're just an enthusiast. Or as many people say, "glorified GP"[/QUOTE]
I absolutely agree with this statement. However, the problem is that no matter what walk of life and no matter where they live, there are always people in [U]every[/U] group who like to think that they are better than others. It is just something that has to be delt with. I find that ignoring it is the best way.

Edit: Basically Drewbie is correct. The people on the other site just want to know the reason for the second list.

I'll make this simple:

We're not mad that we got the newsletter...spam happens.

We're mad that Thrillnetwork has our email address when we never gave it to them.

What is TN going to do with a list of roller coaster enthusiasts' email addresses? Line the bottom of a birdcage? Sell it? Make a papier mache donkey? Search it for dirty names? The point is TN shouldnt not have this list in the first place.

-seth

__________________
ORA MONSTER
Goats

Realistically, I couldn't care less either way (spam is spam and all gets deleted equally), but how many other sites out there have your email address that never should have had it in any way? I've gotten dozens of emails before for how to lower my mortgage (I live in an apartment), increase the size of various assorted body parts (not all of which I have), and claim prizes for contests I never entered. I never submitted my email address for anything even resembling these sites / resources / services. You know what I do? I block the email addresses and move on with my life. The internet is not a perfect world, after all, regardless of how they get my email addy. Should they have had it? No. Should they use it? No. Do they? Yes. Do I let it bend me out of shape? No... Oh well, just my two cents.

__________________
Walk Beyond...

As I said, everyone gets a ton of spam. What makes this unusual is that the email was traced back to here, which is different than the companies out there that actually specialize in spamming, and advertises all their companies and webpages. That is one of the reasons why if you get one spam message, you get several.
Here are some definitions of spam, which the (now famous) newsletter does technically follow:
[url]http://spam.abuse.net/overview/whatisspam.shtml[/url]
[url]http://mail-abuse.org/standard.html[/url]
[url]http://www.crynwr.com/spam/definition.html[/url]
This one shows that even mistakes can harm privileges in some places (even though we all know that this doesn't happen in real life):
[url]http://www.auburn.edu/helpdesk/glossary/spam.html[/url]

[url]http://www.zdnet.com/anchordesk/story/story_1110.html[/url] - this one has the glitch that occurs in this site. One of the things is that you have to be able to undelete, which the webmasters admitted does not work correctly.

Was it a mistake to send out the newsletter? I would be willing to bet that most people would agree that it was. However, at least in the experience I've had, many people are starting to reach the breaking point about the messages. More and more, people are reporting spam to their providers, but there is no easy cure for it. Some webmasters protect their members as much as they possibly can, so when something happens that shouldn't, they take great offense to it. So if the entire email membership roll is in the hands of someone else, there is the fear that the emails could be sold to a spaming company. Word gets around, and if it is known that by joining a message board, your email will be filled with spam, people will leave the board and never come back. If someone sold the list to this board, I know that I would be mad because I don't want to deal with more spam than I already do. I have already been reporting as many as I can, however, it takes time, and I can't do it everyday. If it happens to an email that is a work or school email, for example, it can be extremely annoying, seeing that those addresses should only be used for business. Granted, some people do use those addresses for their only address, others, including myself, cannot fill up my school account with spam, or else I will be unable to retrieve papers and projects that I am working on.

If you read the last link, you will see that it can take some time to find out where the spam message came from. Unfortunately, this site sent out its message, and was easily traced. I do not believe that it happened on purpose, since it was so obvious where the message came from, and nobody who knew what they were doing would purposely do that.

People that never visited this site got newsletters by mistake. That is spam, and many people hate it with a passion.

__________________
TV/Event Guide Editor

Thank you coasterphil for describing it that way. I think I am being a bit too wordy in my attempt not to say anything that could be construed as favoring one group over the other. Basically, you are the Cliff's Notes to my War and Peace.

What message board are you guys talking about. I'm completely left in the dark on this one. I understand the mail part, but what site was the mail sent to?

__________________
"Cedar Point has a wide variety of wooden coasters" - Discovery Channel

Coaster enthusiasts all over got them, people who never gave TN their e-mail. This is the problem.

Atrace, specifically, I think they're talking about thispagecannotbedisplayed, there is a big thread about this there. Possibly other coaster mbs too, but I don't know.

I was not going to directly mention it, but yes, thispagecannotbedisplayed is the site that I am refering to. I cannot speak for other sites, since I know that one dealing with my home park never received the message, nor have 2 of the largest Cedar Point related (at least as far as I know).

Nice job reading, genius! I guess you just too darn smart for me!
[QUOTE] I have already been reporting as many as I can, however, it takes time, and I can't do it everyday. If it happens to an email that is a work or school email, for example, it can be extremely annoying, seeing that those addresses should only be used for business. Granted, some people do use those addresses for their only address, others, including myself, cannot fill up my school account with spam, or else I will be unable to retrieve papers and projects that I am working on.[/QUOTE]

And to everyone else who has posted comments in this thread, thank you for holding a mature conversation. It just shows that instead of returning to the childish behavior of name calling, people actually can use their intellect to talk about an event.

It is just sad that someone can complain about how awful and nasty people are in other forums, but are too blind to see themselves in the mirror for what they are - no better than those people that they hate.

I think the issue boils down to the fact that the webmaster of thispagecannotbedisplayed emailed Alex about the newsletter. Alex apologized for sending the newsletter out and said that the list of email addresses was compiled from several major coaster sites. He admitted to harvesting email addresses which is against the terms of service of his ISP's. Being a webmaster of a website and admitting to harvesting email addresses is not a good thing to do. It leaves those who never should've gotten the email with the question of "why does ThrillNetwork have my email address and what are they going to do with it?" This is why people are bent out of shape. Any name calling here or at thispagecannotbedisplayed is stupid and unecessary, but an explanation of the origins of the email list is necessary. The list is recent, as proven by thispagecannotbedisplayed members who created new email accounts for thispagecannotbedisplayed within the past 2 moths, yet got the ThrillNetwork Newsletter. So, in conculsion,

Why does Thrillnetwork have email addresses of thispagecannotbedisplayed members? How did ThrillNetwork get all of those email addresses? What is Thrillnetwork going to do with all those email addresses?

-seth

__________________
ORA MONSTER
Goats