SimulScribe Boldly Spams TechCrunch Readers

LOL I got the same email and was wondering if TechCrunch authorized it or if they were just taking the liberty to spam folks that wanted signed up for SpinVox. I guess it backfired :P.

Yeah, I got it and thought it was colossally bold and stupid at the same time. Especially since I *suspect* that if Mr. Spammer had asked for your permission to offer a side-by-side trial you would have probably given him the opportunity right? But how many vm-to-text solutions does a person really need anyhow… In the future perhaps you can implement a vote or survey for registered readers only where one of the responses is “sign me up and please pass along my email address” rather than having us put our addresses in the clear?

First, I agree that SpinVox should give everyone that responded a free account. Bring it on!

Second, I too received the email from SmulScribe. I realized immediately that it was a competitor. I did not feel ‘taken advantage of’ nor do I see it as a big deal whatsoever. I put my email address up there knowing full well that I would likely get more spam as a result.

I do not consider the message from SmulScribe to be spam. It was written directly to me in a response to something the sender knew I had an immediate interest.

Hmm, maybe the viagra spammers know something about me that I don’t!

I got this email as well. Very confused as to why TechCrunch would endorse such a solicitation. Now I know the truth.

Too bad for Simulscribe. They have just pissed off a key person at one of the largest consumer internet companies in the world.

Of the four comments so far, I note that two people were confused as to if and why we endorsed this email. Such a bad move.

I also receive Simul’s email and I’m curious if there message falls under the definition of spam. Sure it was unsolicited, but according to wikipedia the message has to be bulk to be spam. So if they went one at a time, it’s just slightly weird marketing.
If the message had been more forthright, I don’t think this would be any problem at all.

Do 300 emails constitute “bulk”? Either way, this is spam.

Receiving bad publicity is NEVER a good thing. However, let this be a lesson in “Spamology” about what is — and isn’t — spam. It seems many people have a poor definition and understanding of what SPAM really is.

Maybe this is my CRM bias, but wouldn’t it be easy enough to link to a lead capture form that Spinvox maintains? Requesting posted email addresses is pretty messy, as you’re discovering.

You should immediately remove those comments and then submit a hard copy to SpinVox because this article seems like it is promoting others (who didn’t think about taking those emails) to go there and grab those emails. Just an observation but this certainly is spam with a bold move.

That is pretty funny. I was definitely thinking of putting up my email the other day but I knew I was too late to be in that 100 that got a free subscription so I just told myself no. Finally, I can see a company spam people and get in trouble for it because they did it so blatantly. Hopefully this is a lesson to all those that are trying to snake their way into businesses like Simul did. Thank for posting this Michael.

I’m not sure how anyone (except SimulScribe) would argue this isn’t spam - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-mail_spam.

Do you think this is the spam you need to worry about when posting your email on a blog? Ha ha ha. Way to go, attack this company and leave all those others alone.

Michael, don’t you think you should be taking most of the blame for requesting email addresses on your blog instead of relaying the blame to probably the smallest abuser of your mistake?

Yes, James. I agree that this and most of the other world’s problems are my fault. I know that the apology in the post above, plus the fact that people wrote their emails knowing the risk does not mitigate my blame, and I should now be publicly attacked by anonymous commenters as punishment.

I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.

I’m certainly not amazed, Arrington talks about the number of spammy comments and whatnot that are blocked here all the time; seems pretty obvious that putting your email addy up there (despite your clever john (at) site dot com encryption) was going to open you up to some unsolicited emails.

…well that certainly deflates my self righteousness, James. The normal response is “Screw you Arrington LOL” or something similar.

An interesting side-story to this, though, is that allegedly Spinvox are into spamming themselves too?

bold and aggressive with a touch of finesse.

it’s good to see that the competition is bold enough to ask direct for my business (regardless of the the slight foul in harvesting my email from a public post). it’s demonstrates they want me as a customer.

now, it’s up to both companies to show that they can deliver.

-stan

Not trying to be on SimulScribe’s side but there are two kinds of Spam and we should not paint both with the same brush.

There’s the untargetted, bulk, unsolicited and anonymous crap that we get shoved in our inboxes and then there’s the personal, kinda targetted but unsolicted emails.

Now yes, the tactic does seem a little shady, but a point can be argued that the people who got emailed may actually benefit from SimulScribe IF the service was suitable for them since they did ask for free accounts at SpinVox.

That’s a lot more different than telling those recipients that a loan has been approved for them and they should contact the sender to get the new low interest mortgage!

Michael, how about you stick to covering interesting and innovative Web 2.0 startups and technologies… or has this site offically gone Valleywag? This is the most pointless topic I have seen covered yet, not to mention the fake adgenda of trying to say positive things about Spinvox, when your only point here was to cry about someone using the TechCrunch® name to get some business.

How long until Spinvox shows up as a paid sponsor??? Unbelieveable….

John and others criticizing Michael - this seems like a pretty clear cut case of abuse and one that should be called out.

I feel that SimulScribe would have been much more ethical by sending an email to TechCrunch requesting some coverage themselves, or maybe they could have just commented on the original article.

Either way, they shouldn’t have just harvested the addresses. While it’s not a huge crime by any means - it does not portray them as ethical which is very useful to companies and always has been.

I do not think it is Spam. Sure some peoples’ definition of Spam includes anything that is not a direct reply. I have heard people refer to email with 30 recipients on the cc as Spam. I have also heard people refer to anything they don’t like as Spam (e.g. eyeblaster style ads).

I am not saying what this company did is morally right, but Spam is too general a term when it covers 10’s of millions of automated penis enlargement emails and 300 fairly well targeted manual emails. Heck, I even remember the olden days use of Spam when it meant to get someone in trouble by overloading their mail server during a flame war.

Three hundred emails is nothing - that quantity cannot approach a reasonable definition of bulk.

Ah, that’s the fun of the industry. Right now it’s cut throat. People with sites need exposure and badly. TechCrunch is a champion of exposure among early adopters. When TC ignores your request for a small mention, it gets frustrating. I speak from experience.

With my now-closed company, FuelEmpire, we had a superior product to our competitors (by account of any of our users), we just lacked exposure. Boompa.com got a feature on TC and has started gaining traction. I guess because we didn’t have a tag cloud or irrelevant name, we weren’t worthy of a feature.

My point is, it’s cut throat right now, and TC has a lot of power.

I was thinking that that would happen when I read that post, that post was a targeted email marketers dream, they new all of the email addresses there were valid and currently being used and those people were interested in the services that they are offering.

It just goes to show that the marketing department at SimulScribe is doing their job really well.

It also shows the influence of Techcrunch.com!

To me the issue isn’t that the emails were harvested from the page and mail was sent. The issue here is one of morality and deception. SimulScribe attempted to make the email look like it was coming from and/or endorsed by TechCrunch, as a part of (or related to) the 100 free accounts that were being given away by Spinvox. THAT, folks, is the issue. It is both deceptive and an outright lie, and that is why they should be called out on it. While it’s not the typical “Hot, new Web2.0 site” usually blogged about here, the post is justified so TechCrunch could clear its name and let the community know that the email was in face NOT solicited by them. It’s called saving face, and apparently many of the affected users needed an explanation.

This should be a good lesson for the TechCrunch Kids. This was an example of aggressive direct marketing. The solicitation was well written and pertained to the service you expressed interest in. The email subject on topic, the offer clear, and it included all the contact information of the soliciting party.

You were in a public place and expressed interest in a service. It was also known that the number of accounts being offered by Spinvox was limited so based on the number of responses some would be denied a free trial. Simulscribe was simply offering to fill that demand gap in the market place by offering you a free account, albeit through their competing service. It shows they want your business too! Competition is good and raises the bar on both companies.

Mike, to forbid such activities in the future simply add a ‘no harvesting’ clause to TechCrunch’s terms of use. And if such a clause already exists, shame on you “SimulScribe!” Bad, bad!

-Stan

Also, it might be a good idea for Techcrunch.com to take those email address’s in those posts out because there are plenty of so called “marketing bots” out there scanning web pages for email address’s to ad to their lists.

Those posters might find themselves receiving a lot more less targeted marketing emails in the near future.

Well, I didn’t post my email, so I didn’t get solicited, and I’m out of the debates… but reading the phrase “millions of automated penis enlargement” before noon has made my day. Thanks dan

I think the move was bold. Some may see it as spam, some may not, that’s a personal preference.

SimulScribe should have asked TC before using a sneaky email subject. A regular email subject would have been fine by me, instead of riding the coat-tails of the previous Spinvox article.

The motive is understood, but many of us with a startup would know that harvesting competitor emails like this would be bad for PR.

Also, I think it would be wise for TC to use a private form for submitting emails, so that this cannot happen again.

I think this was an ok decision by smulscribe. I got the email, had not heard about them, and now and willing to give them a try.

They are probably a bit peeved that this european thing arrives on the scene and gets this neat/free techcrunch boost, while they have been slogging around and gotten no coverage. I don’t if they suck or not, but also I don’t know if spinvox sucks or not.

I got an invite from you all (thanks by the way) and will give it a try.

With this post you just gave them 100x the publicity they would have every hoped to receive …

Mike,

Here’s an easy way to collect email or any other info next time: Zoho Creator allows you to include an entry form in your blog post. Readers can input their data but only you will have access to the full list.
I’m sure the Zoho folks will be happy to set it up for you:-)

When I received an email from SimulScribe last night, I immediately knew what they were up to (ie. not officially endorsed by TC), and I thought it was a pretty ballsy move. Since I had received two information request forms from SpinVox but no service yet, I figured I’d go ahead and try the competitor. Thirty minutes later I was leaving my first test message.

So was it spam? Well, yes…but no different than the other companies who specifically target my blog asking me to demo their new service (I have a statement posted welcoming these solicitations, so I guess it doesn’t really qualify as spam in my case). I like trying new things, but probably wouldn’t have tested or even paid very much attention to voicemail transcription if I didn’t have a free account to play with. But now that I’ll have two to compare and see which one I like better? This consumer wins.

:: Lisa
:: adora [at] techslut [.] net

The worst part is that spam filters sometimes filter out the good stuff too. For example, I forward my Michigan State e-mail to my GMail. An HR rep from Accenture sent me an e-mail to my MSU account and it ended up in my GMail spam.

Mike, I also use Akismet spam filter for Wordpress too, but lately spam messages have been finding ways around the filter on my blog. Are you also having the same problem?

Fair play. SimulScribe saw an opportunity to send an email for people wanting a free trial for a speech to text service and took it - good on. The most successful business always bend the rules along the way.

However, I agree with Rob Smith, Blockquote that the best way would have been for SimulScribe to send in an email to techcrunch with a similar offer.

I think techcrunch is trying to shit the focus away from their mistake by trying to publicly shame SimulScribe

How is it a tradmark violation Mike? Is TechCrunch really a famous and universally recognized tradmark? Maybe for us…

I think what they did it sketchy, but I don’t consider it spam. It’s only slightly worse than the methods every company in the world uses to do cold sales. They should have been more forthright in the email, but the email itself doesn’t strike me as something extremely dishonest. A bad move probably, but perhaps not worthy of trying to slander their reputation by suggesting that pulling emails off a public web site means they’re cavilier with private information

In fact, I think it’s a bit odd that you take offense that someone might email your readers, who willingly posted their email addresses, but feel completely in the right posting the CEO’s email address for all to see without his permission. I realize it’s a backlash, but two wrongs don’t make a right :).

My 2 cents - I like to play devils advocate.

300 is bulk, you would be correct. I misunderstood “some people” to mean a handful.
Can I say, though, that the Spinvox service is amazing? I’ve already recommended it to a few other people that have signed up for free trials.
It’s seriously awesome, so I hope they do take your advice and extend my trial to a full blown free account. I’ll sell the world on this…

FYI, a thread has been started in the TechCrunch Forum about this article.

All of you saying it’s fair play or not spam are on crack.

Fairplay would’ve been posting in the comments, saying hey I’m the CEO of a competitor, I think our product is better, use this link to sign up for a free trial (it will be taken down in 12 hours).

As it is, he took people’s emails that were specifically meant for someone else, and blackened his company’s name in the process.

I don’t think so, Jake. I just think that:

1. Mike hates spam
2. Mike is feels responsible/protective of his readers

But do you all see the different opinions on this tactic? This is why spam continues - because it’s low/no cost and 80 no’s for 1 yes is worth it.

Perhaps somewhat spammy…but do we hate all “spam”?

In the rare case an offer shows up in our inbox *exactly* when we’re looking for that specific product / solution, aren’t wer happy?

Legalities aside, that’s exactly what happened here, the email wasn’t just blindly sent to *any* email list. It was sent to people who had just declared their interest in this kind of service … not really evil, IMHO:-)

I got their email, and thought it was a pretty smart move on their part.

I am guessing 90% of the people who left their email as a comment, probably left a spam account anyway, fully expecting to receive junk. So at least this email was pitching something i was interested in. I took them up on their offer and I am very impressed with their service and will probably end up singing up after my trial is over.

Actually I agree with Ted in #41. It would have been better to make the offer in a comment. My whole point above was on the fact that while the form was wrong, the content basically offered readers what they had stated they wanted.

I, for one, was glad to receive the email and learn about another option. Well targeted advertising.

Leland - you mean well targeted spam.

Incredibly stupid move by Simulscribe. What they should have done instead was post a comment on the original post offering to match or beat the offer by Spinvox. That way they still get the message across and they don’t spam the individual commenters. Additional benefit would be that EVERYONE who read the comments would see the offer instead of just the recipients of their spam.

Also, Techcrunch FYI - there’s a typo in the title of this post.

Yeah, I got this crap the other day as well, and promptly deleted it. I don’t want to get emails for anything I didn’t sign up for.

No Thanks.

Spencer - or they could have emailed me and we probably would have written about it.

I went and checked it out– alas no Cricket

Mike, not to second-guess, but in the future, wouldn’t all you need to do is grab the emails out of your database of comments? Just have them enter something to identify that they want in (”SpinVox Trial” or a number or something) on the deal and grab them out of SQL that using that value. No published emails, no changes to software or additions to the site.

Morgan - that would work, but the time it would take based on the way wordpress is set up would mean it wouldn’t be worth it. I’d say it would take 45 seconds per email address.

The funny thing is that now SimulScribe has gotten linked from TechCrunch and I’ll bet this long discussion is worth more stickiness than those 300 emails.

I’d consider this to be at least “UCE” - Unsolicited Commercial Email - given that it was not from the company/service people had explicitly expressed interest in.

Mind you, I got my last job because of a comment I made on a competitor’s blog (with a link to my site), so maybe I shouldn’t be too critical. Not all unsolicited marketing is necessarily bad/evil.

Oh and, “screw you Arrington LOL”

BillSaysThis - yeah, but they were linked in the original post, too. I wasn’t trying to hide them from the world, I was just writing about a new startup. Then they spammed all the commenters.

It’s nice to know that if you get discussed on TC your competitors are watching

I got the same e-mail and was also wondering if TC authorized so that the “losers” would have another option. BTW, i’m not a loser. my mom said so.

Receiving bad publicity is NEVER a good thing.

I’m not one for cliches - whether one is in ‘agreeance’ or not - but now I know who SimulScribe is, and the only misleading they did was throw the TechCrunch logo in with their pitch.

In the pantheon of f*cked companies - this is not even a footnote.

I certainly would have contacted everyone who left their email in the TC comments. Not doing so would be grounds for dismissal for and bd/marketing person.

Blaming a startup for taking advantage of your poorly implemented promotion seems kind of silly.

I am more interested in what was exchanged for the account giveaway promotion you did on your site?

To avoid this problem in the future, why not simply create a special email address and have people send their signup requests to it? Something like spinvoxtrial@techcrunch.com or even spinvoxtrial@gmail.com.

Publish the email address in your original post and then just remove it 4-6 hours later. By then you will already have gotten 100 or so trial requests. After that, who cares if the bots pick up on it and it gets spammed into oblivion, just shutdown the address.

garth - you are one of about ten annonymous comments we’ve received today asking about how much someone is paying us to pump their product or trash a competitor. It’s like this low volume background noise constantly annoying me. There is simply no way a blog can be successful by doing that. Knowing it’s impossible, why do you, at this single IP address, keep leaving different variations of the same comments. What’s YOUR agenda?

Are you taking actions about the legal trademark violating?

Asking people to post their email addresses in the clear on a heavily-spammed wordpress site and then getting upset when something innocuous like this happens seems pretty ridiculous.

Test to see if this post gets green highlight..

Automatt - I don’t think it is. That sounds like a “you deserved it because you dressed like a hooker” defense.

Yakito - my lawyer is looking at this. It’s clear from the comments our reputation has been harmed because people thought we endorsed this. A quick and public apology from the company would go a long way towards fixing this.

Figured I’d chime in here as I actually just got off the phone with SimulScribe’s Sales Director who was one of the most courteous and professional people I’ve spoken to in a long time. He explained to me that SimulScribe’s mission was plain and simple: To be the best Voice(mail) to Text transcription company in the world.

I do not think that this one act (’spam’) neccesarly reflects on their company’s morals as a whole. I, for one, am a loyal SimulScribe user - after meeting them at CES a few weeks ago (including James himself) I believe that they are a company with integrity and one that will certainly rival SpinVox for US Market Share based on their professionalism and IMHO superior product.

Thing is as of yet SpinVox have yet to get my voicemail working and after repeated attempts to talk to them I’ve given up. So SimulScribe might indeed be getting my business.

What SimulScribe did was a combination of several shades of gray that ended up being a black mark:
- harvesting the email addresses from the comments and reusing them for a different purpose
- using misleading subject line to imply an endorsement from TC
- not understanding, or perhaps not caring, that they violated the trust of potential customers (’if they did this, what else might they do in the future?’).

When it comes to the value of online services a lot depends on the level of trust people have with their service providers and I don’t think SimulScribe was smart in what they did.

It is one thing to do aggressive marketing, it is another to do deceptive marketing (though the resulting email was fairly clear once opened, you tricked people into opening it).

This tempest in a teapot would not have happened if either TC had asked people to email their email address to someone at Spinvox or if SimulScribe had not used a deceptive subject line.

Michael, it’s more of a “you asked people to walk out in traffic and they inexplicably were hit by cars” defense. =)

I personally think SimulScribe had every right to send a message to each of the email address’s listed. You are all confusing SPAM with DIRECT MARKETING. Would you rather them have clicked the website link to your blogs and sent you a message there?

TechCrunch Rocks!

I love reading all these comments, it gets me through the day.

Keep it up

Mike so you are trying to say if you dress like a hooker, than you shouldn’t get spam?

Anyways SimulScribe would of had my eyes and business if they didn’t claim to have the endorsement of TechCrunch. I don’t visit or “buy” into things because TechCrunch told me so, it is because they informed me of what the company is doing and it interests me. All SimulScribe had to do on that post anyways is just post a comment talking about themselves, and I would of found that exceptional.

Oh Well.

I use my real name and real email, I don’t really blog or have a startup to promote, but I don’t know if that makes me anonymous.

That low volume background noise that is annoying you is related to people having questions about impartiality. This is not just on techcrunch but everywhere as there just are no standards for bloggers, and it is clear that there is a willingness on the part of bloggers to push the previously established boundaries for journalists.

Techcrunch is a small niche site where there is a lot of discussion of these issues. PerezHilton is a much, much larger blog than yours, but the conflicts are less visible because of the subject matter. The people fighting for exposure there are the paparazzi that nobody likes.

Everything on TechCrunch is commercial in nature and the people reading are the same people trying to get promoted. Your face is on some of your client’s advertisements and you have stakes in several companies that you also have written about and accepted sponsorship for. There is also some vague mentions of undisclosed consulting work. These choices you have made leave me with some questions about the credibility of techcrunch’s journalism.

I also find it kind of silly when bloggers threaten commenters with “I know your IP”, you don’t, you know the single IP used by all of the employees here to access the internet. There is not a one to one relationship between IP address and a single person.

This article has been way more entertaining to me than the OP. Then again, I’m not really in the market for either of their services… I’m in the market for e-drama!

I didn’t sign up for the Spinvox invites, but I would be pissed if I had and SimulScribe harvested my e-mail address.

Using the “You knew the risks” defense is just plain silly. It’s like saying I shouldn’t carry money in my wallet because there is a risk someone could rob me. Yes, I understand there is a risk carrying cash, but if I get robbed, it does not excuse the robber. What the robber did is still wrong.

I agree that there are different types of spam, but it’s still spam. To me, it’s as though someone heard me giving my phone number to someone else and then used that information to telemarket me.

What SimulScribe did was shady at best, and Michael was right to call them on it. I, for one, will avoid doing any sort of business with them in the future.

Mike - I was also going to say you could grab the emails from the “mail” field - instead of doing it in WP - maybe get someone on that oDesk you love (sorry couldn’t resist!) to write a program to pull them direct from the db? I am guessing it wouldn’t take more than an hour. Couple if’s and a select and throw in a join and there you have it!

I will agree that even on Drupal its a pain in the rump to get the emails from the posts.

Maybe Mr. Mullenweg reads this and makes a plugin

I sent this asshole an email explaining very clearly how I will never use a product made by his company based on this pathetic strategy for acquiring customers.

Every please do all of us a favor and reply to this asshole and tell him exactly how much you don’t appreciate these tactics and how you won’t ever use their products based on this.

Maybe, just maybe, he’ll get the point that this is not an acceptable way of contacting potential customers.

jsiminoff@simulscribe.com

maybe we can get this wonderful man some much needed spam of his own.

kudos to SimulScribe - a brilliant marketing move on their part. even after you factor out all the tightwads that get all bent out of shape over this, they will have still gained a ton of free publicity (and probably many more customers) thanks to your reaction to this Michael. way to be!

like they used to say about newspaper coverage,” all ink is good ink” and “i don’t care what you say about me, just spell my name right.” you could probably modify that last one to be “just link to my site”

p.s. Scott-O-Rama your analogies are interesting because unlike “hearing” you give your phone number to someone (an event with very little temporal durability where you would be quite aware of someone eavesdropping) it would be more like you spray-painted your phone number on a bridge for anyone to see. slightly different.

How anyone can be defending this is beyond me. To me it’s extremely clearcut, and wrong.

@gill brilliant? I would call this brilliant when this is the kind of response you get from potential customers…

This is a snippet from the email I just sent every email address I could find on there website:

“I just wanted to make sure you know what you’re CEO is doing. Perhaps someone in the marketing department needs to have a talk with him.

He is harvesting email addresses and then sending out spam emails to potential customers.

This is easily the least intelligent business strategy I have seen in quite some time.

Even if by some odd stretch of the imagination I found any of your products worthwhile (which I don’t), I would never give you a single dollar because you clearly do not respect the rights of your customers.

You have managed to piss off several hundred potential customers. You also managed to piss off the owner of the 3rd largest blog on the internet. Like I said before, this must be the dumbest business strategy I have seen in years.

Maybe you will reconsider such acts of stupidity next time you’re trying to attract customers.”

Haa haa…

Mike, you seem to be getting too much worked up abt this.

1) Take legal action against the company that did this
2) apologize to those who got spammed (you’ve already done this)
3) Look for an alternative approach the next time.

I wont say that you’re 100% to be blamed — to request email ids in the comments. In context to what AutoMatt wrote above: “you asked people to walk out in traffic and they inexplicably were hit by cars” –

well, the people could see - rite ? And in spite of that, they decided to walk out in traffic.

There are so BLATANTLY SimulScribe peeps posting here. SS used TC’s name, claimed it was a TC offer…this is just plan, outright, undeniable SPAM. What losers.

I don’t think I would have a problem with it if they hadn’t used the TC name(Michael should definitely sick his lawyer on them if they don’t apologize for that)

While the “from TechCrunch” in SimulScribe’s email may have gone a step too far in implying TechCrunch sponsorship, I think what they did is well within the bounds of acceptable marketing.

Moreover, it was a can’t-lose proposition for them. They will attract new customers through the emails and through this post damning them. Any publicity is still publicity.

don’t be so narrowminded. you willingly gave your email address to one company for a free trial, knowing they’d be spamming you in the future. then you get a similar offer from another company. my vision isn’t 20/20 but i could have seen that one coming from a mile away.

@xxdesmus you don’t have a right to not get emails, you *think* you have a right to not get emails. and in my previous comment i already factored people like you out.

@paul i just like playin devil’s advocate - i have nothing to do with either company

so michael how much did spinvox pay you to promote their free trial? that’s what i really want to know. it’d be interesting to compare that figure to the $0 that simulscribe paid you to get the same or even more coverage. and now they can really claim that they were “featured on TechCrunch” since they have their own post!

I actually thought it was pretty smart and bold of them to do that, but unfortunately I don’t really dig the service.

There are no clear instructions on setting up the forwarding (which would be ridiculously easy to provide, considering that you give them your carrier name), but the bigger problem to me is the voicemail message that tells the caller their call is being transcribed with SimulScribe and to speak slowly. It makes the caller feel uncomfortable, plus you have to pay 5 cents a call to remove it.

I’ll be going back to CallWave until I get a SpinVox invite, or it opens up to the public.

I’m a bit confused by some of the responses - is the issue that they used the TechCrunch name to possibly create some confusion about the nature of the email, or that they sent the email in the first place?

The former I think is a vialotion of trust, but I’m not sure if it’s a trademark violation. I’m sure Mike is looking into that. Legal action would be difficult - one could construe the meaning of the subject to be “In regards to the free trial offer on TechCrunch”, which is a fair use of the trademark.

The latter, however, seems like a standard sales technique to me. If the CEO had sent an email pointing out that their service offers some interesting benefits over Spinvox, and he would love to provide them with a free account is they were willing. The email was not written well, but the act of sending the email (ignoring the use of TC as an intro for now) seems fine to me.

Gill, perhaps you’re jaded because TechCrunch chose not to right about your company, but Mike writes about any news he finds relevant to his readers. He doesn’t get paid to post announcements by companies. Come off it.

@86

SimulVox’s mistake was not putting a disclaimer in the footer of the email, as in “** This is an independent solicitation to provide you voice-to-text service and is not in any way affilliated or endorsed by Techcrunch or it’s partners **”

-Stan

Michael - I didn’t post my e-mail to that thread precisely because I was afraid it would lead to spam. I would’ve like to try a free Spinvox account but not enough to put my e-mail account into the wiuld like that.

As far as what SimulScribe did, I don’t know if it’s spam, but by suggesting the mail is from TechCrunch, it certainly is unethical.

If I publicly suggest an interest in a specific product, and a competitor with a similar product e-mails me a single message saying “We saw your interest in Product X; we think you might be interested in Product Y, ” I don’t have a problem with that. But SimulScribe clearly took posts that did less than suggest an interest - posting an e-mail trying to get a free account is not equivalent - and tried to be deceptive about it.

You can’t sue someone for stating a fact. Michael did have a small mention of simulscribe in the original article about spinvox, and the subject of the mail descibes what it is about.

The sent unsolicited mail, but there is no trademark violation, if Michael actually owns the trademark. It costs about $1200 to file and they post it up on a website, there is no tech crunch record. SimulScribe has one, Spinvox does not.

http://www.uspto.gov/

I wrote a response to this post but unfortunately trackbacks are broken on my Wordpress.com blog.

http://engtech.wordpress.com/2.....good-idea/

Michael,
Thanks for the opprutunity to interact with Spinvox. It has been a pleasure so far. Spinvox can be sure that I will be telling everyone I know about their product. As far as the other email goes, well I think enough has been said already.

Mike this is Stan from eNthem: I have a very simple solution to this problem for you, next time if another company will be giving free accounts to TC readers, just place a special “I want an account” field along with your post that will work similar to subscribe to newsletter field. Users will enter their email address, you will get it and give this info over to the company who is doing the promotion in the orders emails were received… We trust you, so that should not be a problem plus with this thing you can gain even more trust, assuming of course that you will not use that info…

Cheers.

The annoying thing about TC comments is so many posters are already pissed off at Mike for not writing about their suckie “companies”. To imply Mike was paid by Spinvox is idiotic.

How many times must it be said that Mike does not do that? What more does Michael have to do to show people how much he hates that sort of thing? (PayPerPost.)

Oh well. Mike, I seriously commend you for all the flak you get. That you take it, and don’t let it phase you is what makes you a great business person.

oh, it gets to me.

What a dumb move. Techcrunch has a loyal following and I do not understand how this company didn’t think the spam/subject line wouldn’t get back to you. I really hope this company does a public apology.

Wouldn’t it of been more effective if this company sent TC 200 test accounts so users could compare the two services? Or did they submit a review request and TC trashed it?

TC needs a Dumbass Pool.

boycot simulscribe! i got that message to thinking it was spinvox and i thought i won an account, those bastards! they are jealous of spinvox!

Hey Mike, if I spam your readers can I have a link from your homepage too?

heh.. there r no free lunches in this world!!!
dont intend to seem sarcastic - people leave their email ids looking for “free” accounts on the web and dont expect spam!?
Come on guys!

Dear Mr. Siminoff,

Please send me an invitation. My email address is billg@microsoft.com.

Sincerely,

Drama 2.0

Favoritism is fine, but TechCrunch seems a little too cavalier with its (lack of) objectivity here. SimulScribe, in the original release, has its link labeled as ‘charges’ (so of course nobody would want to click on it when the article is about a grossly limited, but *free* promotion). Then, when it shows itself to be proactive and not buckle down to how TechCrunch summarized it, the ‘victimized’ (lazy, really) TechCrunch writes what is probably libel.

TechCrunch, by which I mean Michael Arrington, should probably learn how marketing and competition works - I think he’s been on the other side of field too long and has let his status get to him a bit. By the summary at the bottom of it, I’m mostly surprised that a *third* competiter (and I bet there are more) entering the field is being posted. Slow news day, or perhaps Arrington doesn’t realise “I’ve been **lucky enough** to be using Spinvox to convert voicemails to SMS text messages since December” is the same as “I’ve been bought off cheaply”? I really don’t expect more from TechCrunch, given as most of its articles are probably filtered press releases and that’s why we come here (and more so, because the site reached a critical mass to be useful comment-wise), but the above posturing is disgusting or betrays an astounding naivete on both Arrington and many of the commenters above.

No, I’m not involved with any of the groups involved, but I have worked at a broadcasting company where we were cognizant of what marketers told us, how competition works, and the impact of our statements. Additionally, we didn’t blame our mistakes on others nor demeaned the community we depended on - we instead provided compensation and made sure our mistakes were not repeated.

@David Post #3
Work SmulScribe full time or part time?

My guess is that most of the posts defending SimulSpam are shills trying to do damage control for the company. Everyone knows what they did was low rent so lets not try to spin it any other way. With a CEO as dumb as Siminoff at the helm, that company has a tough road ahead.

First off… IMHO Mike did the right thing; called it for what it was: unsolicited mail, which nobody likes. The post is a little more dramatic than I would have written but hey… it happened… now you know… great

As for the guys at Simulscribe; they made a stupid choice yes, but was it malicious?… no! Just because “unsolicited email” sounds like the kind you get pushing random speculative stocks doesn’t qualify this as the same thing. It’s a letter addressed to you about something you publicly expressed interest in.

You put your email on one of the most trafficed blogs on the net, that’s not the smartest choice either and you’ll be lucky if simulscribe is all you get…

C’mon, life isn’t fair and neither is business, and forgive me if I don’t feel terribly bad for anyone who put their email address on a public website and ended up getting one piece of spam (which was relevant to what they wanted) from an entrepreneur who is apparently a little misguided and desperate for some business. If you’re lucky enough to live in a capitalist country such is par for the course. Now if he sells those emails to a bulk mail marketer then I’d be a little irritated, but thats the risk you took so until it happens consider yourselves lucky.

How about this:
If a goalie leaves the goal unattended and the opposing team scores a point, would you get mad at the guy who took the easy shot or the guy who left the goal open?

ehh maybe not the best analogy… haha

/end rant (-_-)

“My guess is that most of the posts defending SimulSpam are shills trying to do damage control for the company. Everyone knows what they did was low rent so lets not try to spin it any other way.”

Translation: Anyone who disagrees with me is a corporate shill.

I think Michael is right to be annoyed but for me personally, I didn’t mind. In the on-the-ground-reality, the downside of receiving a one-time email I didn’t specifically request is far outweighed by the offer of a free account from something I am interested in.

That doesn’t make it “right” if you are looking at it from an ethical perspective and I can see how people could be pissed off by it. When I received both offers it was clear what was going on. The subject line didn’t make me think that it was sponsored by Techcrunch. If it had and I thought they were trying to fool me I definitely would have been annoyed.

I think the real issue has little to do with spam or marketing emails. SimulSpam should not have harvested emails from another website. That I would term to be a potential copyright violation. If not, I would think at minimum it is a violation of the terms of use of this website. Michael, correct me if I am wrong. The more concerning issue is their use of the Techcrunch trademark. The subject line of that email is a complete misrepresentation of someone else’s trademark and brand. That is where they erred terribly. The sending of emails is really a secondary issue.

Bad move on SimulScribe’s part? I doubt it. Look at all the attention they’ve gotten! How many readers had even heard of SimulScribe before this post?! They’ve probably gotten more traffic as a result of this write up than ever before! They annoyed 300 people but attracted 30,000. As they say: There’s no bad publicity.

Ironically enough as I tested Spinvox I noticed the emails and was gobsmacked at the naivety of the twits who didn’t get it.

Seems I was right, as usual.

Speak-a-Blog Post
Jan. 18th, 2007 at 7:43 PM
This is Reginald Wally. I am a complete Wally for posting my email address in this public place. Thinking that it’s an answering machine. When in fact any fool can take my email address & start sending me spam or perhaps a lot of money if it’s venture capital. Don’t post your email address. Silly people.
Voice converted to text, Powered by SpinVox

http://simoncrowfoot.livejournal.com/60363.html

Hi Michael -

This is a disturbing move from the company…I suggest when you post about companies that do negative things you don’t include a hyperlink in the post…links from TechCrunch are