I'm As Mad As Hell, And I'm Not Going To Take This Anymore!

[Toby]

View the example image linked in my first post.

The two check boxes pointed at by the red text are pre-checked cross sales, meaning that the boxes are checked by default when the page loads. In order to NOT accept the offer the surfer must uncheck the boxes before they click the submit button to process the sign-up.

Look further down to find the fine print explaining the terms of these cross sales.

If the surfer fails to scroll down and see the pre-checks before clicking submit then they've actually just signed up for three sites instead of just one. If their spam filters eat the join notification emails (which is highly probable these days) then they'll be unaware of the additional trial memberships they just agreed to and therefore won't know to cancel those before the trial periods expire. End result. $1 for intended trial join, $1 for one of the cross sale trial joins, $39.95 and $39.97 for full month rebill on uncancelled cross sale trials. Total $81.92 before it shows up on their monthly statement. If the billing cycles fall just right, or they don't check the bill right away when it arrives in the mail there could be second pair of monthly rebills added on.

Do you think that surfer is ever going to join a porn site again?

On top of that, many times there will be additional cross sales on the cancel pages. If the surfer isn't on his toes he'll end up being billed for even more sales after thinking he's cancelled the others.

This sleazy shit has to stop before it kills this entire industry.

[InfoGuy]

Originally Posted by Toby

This sleazy shit has to stop before it kills this entire industry.

And the multiple popups, popunders and exit consoles are also big problems that will cannibalize the industry. This stuff only makes the anti-virus companies more aggressive in blocking ads, cookies and URLs.

[Toby]

Originally Posted by InfoGuy

And the multiple popups, popunders and exit consoles are also big problems...

Not even in the same league, and to be honest, pretty minor these days due to vastly improved popup blockers.

[ArtWilliams]

Thanks for taking the time to explain it.

Originally Posted by Toby

View the example image linked in my first post.

The two check boxes pointed at by the red text are pre-checked cross sales, meaning that the boxes are checked by default when the page loads. In order to NOT accept the offer the surfer must uncheck the boxes before they click the submit button to process the sign-up.

Look further down to find the fine print explaining the terms of these cross sales...