I had never heard of Spacelocker before, have you? Apparently, it’s a social network where you can go to “meet friends and connect to online stuff” but not to upload and store photos, videos, or music. So essentially it’s like Facebook or MySpace but without the goodies. Or Twitter, but then offering an “evocative experience that is fun, free and functional”. I have absolutely no idea what that means either, and I won’t find out either because I never actually signed up.
We got an e-mail from Son Lee yesterday, who wanted to alert us to the misleading registration process Spacelocker boasts and particularly the way the company handled her complaint about it. After reading through the communication and taking a peek at Spacelocker, we’ll gladly oblige.
What happened was Lee registered for the service using her Gmail account, and Spacelocker didn’t waste any time sending all of her contacts an e-mail with an invitation to try it out too without her explicit consent or knowledge. These sorts of things regretfully happen all the time, but there’s more to the story.
When Lee complained to the company about the whole situation, she not only simply got her account wiped out, but she also received this jaw-dropping, unprofessional response:
Hi Son,
You obviously can write English. However I think you have a problem reading English; or are careless when you read. The sign up page has 2 forms on it. One form is to be used by those who want spacelocker to automatically invite their friends. The other form is to be used if you do not want to invite your friends. There are big red letters on the left side form that tells you to read the note on the sign up page before you sign up. The note on the sign up page tells you about the sign up procedures. There is a link to a blog on the sign up page which further explains the sign up procedures in detail. The terms of service and privacy policy of Spacelocker clearly set out what you have agreed to by signing up. You obviously failed to read any of that before you signed up and now you want to blame us for your carelessness!!! Incredible!!!
Her is a link to the sign up: http://www.spacelocker.com/signUp.php Read it and think if you can!
Spacelocker Ltd
www.spacelocker.com
the happiest space on earth
The rudest space on earth, more like it.
Technically, sure, the company has a point. There are in fact two separate forms one can use to register for the service, and only one has the annoying habit of spamming the hell out of your relatives, friends and colleagues. The problem is that it’s very misleading and obviously designed to confuse users as much as possible while steering clear of doing anything illegal. Just take a look at the sign-up page.
The registration form on the left reads “use your aol, gmail, hotmail or yahoo account” while the form on the right lets your register with a different e-mail address. But if you don’t want to spam all your contacts, the latter would actually be the form you’d need to use, even if you use a webmail account. Despite the fact that it reads “don’t have webmail? sign up here!”. How’s that for misleading?
Oh, and does the company effectively say they’ll be sending out an invitation to all your mail contacts when you sign up using the form on the left? Sure it does. See that microscopic line at the very bottom of the screenshot above? There’s that clear policy of theirs right there!
My guess is the red line that reads ‘please read the note below before signing up’ was added only after complaints started trickling in, but to me it’s clear that Spacelocker is purposely trying to trick new users so they can get some extra e-mail addresses to spam. And to add insult to injury, they feel the need to behave so rudely when a user files a formal complaint.
Classy, Spacelocker, very classy. I think I’ll go look for an evocative experience that’s fun, free and functional elsewhere.
Sorry, this gave me a good laugh. They won’t last long.
I was totally mislead by SpaceLocker’s setup process.
Received the email from someone I trust and that always send me good stuff (this person introduced me to twitter!). So, I was in a hurry to know what it was.
I don’t remember any text in Red, but remember looking for the text with (*), which only says I agreed with the service terms.
Didn’t bother to complain, suposing that a company that use this kind of tricks, would answer in the way they did with Lee. It seems I was right this time.
Maybe I should read more English to avoid getting fooled this way. But I recommend SpaceLocker staff start reading too.. they could start reading Seth Godin’s books.
#IHateSpaceLocker
Well apparently lots of other well known social network sites use this technique and nobody dings them for it.
It’s well known that the reason Flixster became so successful is exactly through this spammy technique. And after they have signed up the critical mass of users did they go “legit” and being less stealthy about spamming your address book contacts.
No, lots of well known social networks offer an address book import feature, but I don’t think ANY well known networks automatically send messages to those people on your behalf without being much more clear about what they’re doing.
Au contriare. I know for a fact Flixster and Tagged were VERY tricky on this. Users would be tricked into thinking that they will have a chance to choose who they want to notify after entering their Yahoo/Hotmail login info… but in actual fact once they did that, the service just went ahead and spammed everyone anyways.
Go ahead and Google “Flixster” and “spam”. There are tons of complaints. But guess what? They’ve successfully roped in enough users and no longer need to resort to such trickery. But that’s how MOST of the second tier social networks operate.
This is the Password Anti-Pattern. This IS developer negligence. There is nothing funny about this at all.
http://designin...rd_Anti-Pattern
Also notice the glaring XSS vulnerability on the front page and there is probably SQL injection lurking around there as well… erghhh……
I ‘m actually thinking they could make a hit if they would become the world’s first rude network. you know where you can call your friend’s names, bitch about them as a rule etc. now that would be a new dimension to socializing
who funded them
Mom’s Basement, LLC
why assume that they have or even needed funding? basic social networking stuff can be had on the cheap these days…
Don’t circulate that blurry low-res pix of the supposed founder (we can google it ourselves, thank you). This Nigerian scam company probably stole it from some poor girl’s facebook profile.
Lame, vulgar and rude bloggers hang out on TC and no staff has ever done anything about it. This aint no saint site.
MyLocator ( tm ) of course being a prime example of the lame bloggers who hang out here.
It’s a scam!
A company founded to get emails to sell to spammers and acquire passwords to webmail.
But lets say I’m wrong, and they are a real company (right…). In that case, a piece of shit flashed down the toilet has a better chance of becoming a successful company.
The source of the Evil, it’s her:
http://www.onli...r_pics/3771.jpg
http://www.onli...?author_id=3771
They have the address in London in German. Fail.
Hey Robin, just a heads up you wrote Lee as both a he and a she.
“Lee registered for the service using his Gmail account, and Spacelocker didn’t waste any time sending all of her contacts an e-mail”
Dear Spacelocker;
A company blog is just that, a blog for the company information and news, not your personal crap.
seriously wat
Heyy Robin,
After all the hullabaloo since yesterday, did someone actually find out the REAL issue? i.e. any update on the status of Son? Is he a she or a he or is she a he or a she???
PS: You better clear this out as a lot of peeps are betting their money on either side.
Hey Robin,
The warning message was there on 1st August, Check the Google Cache version of the page :http://74.125.47.132/search?q=cache:JBG4j7yGdsEJ:www.spacelocker.com/signUp.php%3Ffromid%3DNjIxMA%3D%3D%26ifrom%3DYWxlZ29tZXNAZ21haWwuY29t%26ito%3DY291Y2hyZXN0QGdvb2dsZWdyb3Vwcy5jb20%3D+http://www.spacelocker.com/signUp.php&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk
It wasn’t on July 19: http://bit.ly/Eiq3X
Wow. This is ridiculous. To think they are competing in a space dominated by Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, FriendFeed and the like (not to mention the tons of smaller but perfecty functional sites), and this is the best they would come up with. Rest assured this post by TC will ensure their active users number might never reach double digits.
Also, go read their “About Us” page. Coming from the same people who talked about having good English in the email, it is sure to crack you up. Perfect example for startups on what NOT to do.
Jesus, that made my head hurt trying to read their About Us page. Wow.
Looks like someone from Spacelocker is watching TC…page info for the About Us page was last Modified: Fri Aug 7 12:38:02 2009
Seems they used something other than Babelfish to translate their About Us page to English.
ROFL! Those sorry hypocritical nut-suckers.
Dam… that was hilarious…
And shocking on how these few innovative brains spam the hell out of your email account.
Thank GOD, didn’t signup and NEVER WILL!
Bear in mind, we are seeing Spacelocker’s reply out of context. Who knows what this Son Lee had already said. Not defending Spacelocker, but I really doubt that was an unprovoked response…..
Context doesn’t really matter. This is customer service, you don’t get to be a jerk and you have to expect the customer to be mad. So if Lee wrote (hypothetically) “you deceptive idiotic twits sent some lame spam to all my friends. You suck! Idiots!” (replace all adjectives and insults with appropriate foul language), the customer service person still has to reply with: “we apologize for any inconvenience you might have had with our site. We will take your recommendations into consideration for future changes to our sign up procedure. Here is a coupon for a free internet.”
Agrees.
+1
Well said
no, i dun think i have written anything like “you deceptive idiotic twits sent some lame spam to all my friends. You suck! Idiots!”
i’ve sent an request thru their web contact form asking why they can use my contact info without having my permission. then i got a 3-line reply from them that my account is deleted. so i sent another mail saying that i need an explanation instead of just a notification of account cancellation. and i got the reply as all you have read in Robin’s article…..
anyway, TKS ROBIN!!
Just to be clear, I wasn’t implying you actually wrote anything of the sort, just saying they shouldn’t have replied that way no matter what you wrote.
I guess they were right, reading comprehension isn’t his strong suit.
Still, sneaky practice from the company.
If some site had confusingly spammed all of my contacts I would certainly be angry. As noted above, the “READ BELOW” line was added in the last two weeks, so it can’t be the first time they’ve had to respond to this.
Well for sure they designed it for purpose but they clearly mention of sending invites to your friends.
..
What surprices me is there so rude kind of reply. Hats off to those guys-for saying the happies place on earth. I suppose the person who responded got a beating from his wife
Dead meat.
Thanks for the warning. I have a habit of signing up for these things even if I don’t end up using them.
I’ll be quite a bit more circumspect for ALL of these in the future now… the fun of checking out a new service isn’t worth the risk of spamming friends.
It’s ironic that a social media site would do this. I wonder why they thought it necessary?
Maybe it’s a canny PR ploy to generate attention. They fix the problems and future people say “hay guise, they’re not that bad.” See: RealPlayer and that Outlook central contact manager service. I can’t believe I can’t remember what their name is. No, please don’t supply it in reply, they don’t need the exposure.
Didn’t every major social network use this exact same process (minus the insulting emails) to get new users?
I think the kids used to call it “viral” marketing. I have always considered it an unethical tactic.
yeah that a marketing practicies which companies uses by getting into your network.
That’s not viral marketing — at least, not as it’s defined today. Viral marketing is the voluntary word-of-mouth spread of a specific message among social networks. This is the involuntary spreading of such a message. So while it is “viral” in the negative sense of the word, that’s not how marketers define “viral marketing.”
We call that “black hat marketing.”
I let blast them with mails. Everyone reading this post should write a mail to them about there way of working.I suppose that wil teach them a lesson on how to create “Happiest space on earth”
Actually I got some emails from sparsely known people to join them on this stupid site. Now I know… poor guys.
Ouch. Major marketing fail; I would love to see how the Space Locker PR team respond to this little disaster. It’s hard to see what unique angle they offer anyway, so getting this kind of adverse publicity should certainly speed their progress from social media wannabes to the social media scrapheap.
By the way, you really do need to make your mind up if Son is male or female; other than that, very entertaining read.
Do you think Spacelocker has a PR team?
Well, seems like they do know how to issue a press release:
http://www.news...com/news/43840/
So… giving them a story on TechCrunch will help people avoid this website like the plague?
All looks clear enough to me.
Looks like Lee is a muppet.
I expect the email is out of context – anyone that goe whining to tech site to sort out their clusterfuck is highly likely to be a tit.
Most likely fires off stupid emails to the company, and after their patience ran out (some folks just don’t get it), someone fired off the nastygram that we have been shown. Not saying it is right, buy anyone who deals with the public has been in the situation where enough is enough
proof? there is a world out of your imagination, dude
No! No company should ever be rude to a customer or even potential customer! This is not a way to conduct good business and will NOT grow a company. Customers and their referrals should always be respected they are your income. I cannot believe someone would write an email such as this to a customer nor be allowed to have a job after they did so.
@Derek
Then going by your parameters and illogical argument, it is also possible that you are now spamming here on behalf of Spacelocker guys. Your justification for something absurd looks real fishy. You might be one of the crooks behind this site, and worse still you might be injecting some malicious code in the TC comments to hack all email addresses on this page.
Hows that for some creative imagination?
Actually that sign up page looks pretty clear to me. It specifically says they will invite your friends on the left form.. Not just in tiny print at the bottom.
i commented below before i saw yours. i should have just said, “i agree, techcrunch and the user are the idiot here.”
Really?
Google doesn’t lie.
http://209.85.2....com/signUp.php
very unprofessional of them. But the whole email thing was not much of a big deal- facebook use to do that back in the days as well
There is so much here to wonder about.
1) What kind of person thinks now is a perfect time to start a new social network?
2) Where would they get the idea that being a jerk would help?
3) Are there still really people who say, “Gosh, I’d like to deal with yet another social networking website?”
Looking at the about page yields answers for 1 and 2: someone from Switzerland who thinks school lockers in cyberspace is the wave of the future. Yes, somebody apparently still uses the term “cyberspace” unironically. Perhaps she saw the term on a billboard while driving in on the information superhighway.
A little more googling and it turns out that Spacelocker’s owner is “a gifted Medium, a Channel and a Communicator of the light”. Translated to English: a nut-job with an endless capacity for self-delusion.
So that’s Spacelocker. I still can’t figure out why anybody thinks they’re just dying for lack of one more social network to join.
I’m not sure what was being communicated in that email, but it sure as hell wasn’t “Light!”
1) I’d say they started this over a year ago when facebook and twitter still had chances to fail
2) after a year and a half of working their asses of (I’m sure there are only a few peeps on this team) they gave up on niceties
3) those late adapters who want to be “first” THIS time.
all hypotheses but plausible.
there are always room for more, better approaches — e.g. google, myspace and facebook all came in late to the game.
@William
Correction, its not Switzerland but “Smart Island country of Malta” (as seen on their ‘about us’)
Heh. That’s where the company is allegedly based, but their founder is from Switzerland. The Maltese are quite nice, so I suspect this letter isn’t their work.
More like – A nut-sucker with an endless capacity for self-nut-sucking.
Frankly. Just by looking at the screenshot it is VERY EASY to figure out that the left form is a NO GO.
You’ve been warned now suffer the consequences.
There’s a lesson here for users too – why on earth would you hand out your email password to some faceless company (or anyone else for that matter)?
Oh look, we’ll invite your friends or search your contacts for you! Yeah, how about no, you can’t have my email account password, if I want to search for anyone or invite anyone I’ll do it myself so you can’t use my email account to send spam.
While I disagree with the tone of the reply that she got and definitely think that their customer support department needs to be replaced, they have a point. In fact, it is something that happens quite often. No one reads the TOS or any other required reading before signing up. Most of these TOS “contracts” are full of legal terms that no one understands regardless and are in small type (even on a computer – I don’t get that one – its not like web pages have issues with screen real-estate).
She most definitely signed up using the wrong sign up page. Simple and Clear. It is her fault and she should not have complained about it.
Many people don’t like the practice of doing so, but most people forget that these social sites (especially the young ones) need the exposure.
The real issue is the fact that the popular email providers do not put a stop to the ability for a site to read the contact list. In the Windows world, for example, whenever an application tries to access the Outlook contacts list, a popup appears on the screen advising the user that this is what is happening and asking for approval. Facebook, for example, does the same thing. Gmail, HotMail, and Yahoo need to implement the same type of mechanism where if a site wants to gain access to your contact list, it has to go through a similar process. Once that is done, issues like this one will dwindle down to almost none. If the user did not read the sign up page correctly then there is still another layer of protection.
She made a mistake, but the company made a bigger mistake in how they worded their reply back to her.
there was a company called funnation that did a similar thing last year – except when you signed up they didn’t give you ant warning on the sign up page they were going to spam your contacts.
This company got 2 million facebook users to sign up to their site using this method – some might say smart move on them for getting “suckers” – but what if that sucker was your mother, brother or sister (etc.)
Would you be happy knowing a bunch of Russian’s with a direct link to the Kremlin (they designed their website!) had a database full of all your families details scraped off facebook including photos of your kids – for use however they please – including using your mothers/nieces bikini pics on various adult dating sites they own ?
There is a really grubby world attached to scraping e-mails – it nearly all leads back to getting your data for porno spam use – and who knows what a foreign government might want to know about about 2 million civilian’s location, habits
- complete profile and personal thoughts… they could sell it to terrorists for example research on the westerners psychology – find out what we really think/talk about on-line – then carry out a more sophisticated attack.
*lemon runs of to secret cold war shelter with bog roll and beans*
I wonder what the Disney folks would have to say about them calling themselves the “happiest place on earth”. I’d be surprised if they didn’t hold (and defend) a trademark on that.
Spacelocker.com is inspired by the high school locker. enough said… silly
Where can I meet a real cyberella though? Sounds neat…
In high school I never opened my locker, since it usually had several few months old sandwiches that I had somehow forgotten to eat. Also, I’d often forget my combo. Sometimes I’d spill a drink in there accidentally. Finally, if it got hot during the day, I’d stuff my sweaters in there, so that it was so full it was hard to open or find anything in it.
In short, a locker doesn’t really conjure any positive images in my mind.
your an idiot. You start of ranting that you never opened your locker then you go on about how you stuffed rubbish in there, put sandwiches etc.
How the hell did you put all these bad things in there if you never openned it ?
Idiot
The vents, duh!
“your an idiot.”
classic.
Me ribs! They be hurting!!!
LOL!!!
I have to say I was wondering about the whole “Space Locker” idea/theme in the first place. I can’t say it does anything for me. Sounds like another social network nut-sucker without anything of value.
I think it needs to be said that anybody that signs up to services like these, and uses the same password they use for their email address is almost as guilty as the service itself for misleading practices like this.
Unless I’m missing something and now theres an API which allows you to get the contact lists of a person with only supplying their email address and no other form of verification…
Along with that, anybody that thinks that they need to enter the password for their email address on a website that is NOT their email provider should expect something to happen to their email account.
Spacelocker is guilty on all counts, sure, but if people were just a little bit more careful, spacelocker and sites like it wouldn’t stand a chance to be guilty of such bad practices.
You are correct about no API allowing access to contacts without a password. So a dirty site could easily hijack your email account (you just gave them your pw in plain text afterall). If I were Son Lee, I’d change my pw asap.
I never liked those API’s in the first place – they always seem so…slimy. So I refused to put that functionality into my site.
The crazy thing was that tons of people actually ASKED for it after we launched! So I finally caved and added it (course we don’t spam ANYBODY! and don’t save your info — geeze). It still makes me cringe — I don’t even like going to that page.
I understand your pain. I’m currently working on a site where logging in to other services is pretty much the core functionality of the site. I’m making use of 0Auth and OpenID as much as possible…but sometimes it just isn’t, which really really sucks.
Why this site didn’t/can’t in the VERY near future do this is beyond me. I don’t think it really matters though, now that the entire internet knows what kind of asshats they are regarding the email sent to a user. Ridiculous.
This website is amusing. What a waste of locked internet space, ha ha.
And did you see the whole page they added on internet safety? “A Parent’s Guide to Social Networking Sites”? How old is their target audience? They write that guide for parents, but then their blog is obviously for teens and twenty-somes.
At least facebook has a reputation to uphold. They may use your pictures to sell things to your friends, but they won’t make idiotic racist comments.
Bad logo design… it looks PaceLocker.
FYI the homepage changed.
http://www.spacelocker.com/
That reply from SpaceLocker was great. Someone pissed in his cornflakes this morning.
spacelocker…deadpool
The English in the letter is terrible. How Ironic.
Yes, Son Lee chose the wrong form, but there’s no reason to have two separate forms (unless you’re deliberately trying to mislead people, or your designers suck). You could achieve the same thing with a single form and a checkbox labeled “Invite all your contacts!”, and on the confirmation page prompt to enter your other password.
That said, no site should ever ask for your password to another site. That’s reprehensible and retarded.
I actually signed up just now. Signing up was easy, but the user interface of what ‘is’ Spacelocker is crap. It’s obvious that they are targetting a younger demographic – I don’t think they will ever be taken seriously.
Yeah well they havent gave any new idea, So wont have that much users. I want to share this with you guys.
http://www.techmasher.com“what r u waiting for?”
I won’t be signing up with them. What sort of idea is that? Facebook/myspace are popular with anyone from age 10 to 100 and at no point have they resorted to using “text” speak to attract members.
why doesn’t son lee send over the entire email conversation instead of just this? My guess is that son sent many nasty letters and the folks at spacelocker had enough.
and who said TC is not a real site for news…they are publishing one side of the story.
I was wondering the same thing. She was probably equally nasty to them.
That still doesn’t justify the response she received. That type of response only alienates prospective users.
you can’t please all of the people all of the time.
I’m sure Lee has gone out on public forums and bashed this company, just like people do all the time. Look at Yelp. I see bad reviews for places i’ve never had problems with.
Also, to play devils advocate for a moment, how do we know son lee is not some disgruntled former employee and fabricated this email?
I choose the places I spend my time/money by how they treat me, not how others have been treated. If one bad seed is enough to stop people from trying the service, then maybe those people need to not go to any store or use any website as there are bad seeds everywhere. It’s like saying all cops are corrupt because of a couple of isolated incidents.
Or the company had way too many people sending emails to the company frustrated on the same issue causing them to lose it.
we regularly get these NASTY PO’d emails from customers of a company who recently changed their name to one more like ours and people think we’re them. People fuming and calling us names and threatening to report us. We apologize profusely, explain the situation of a mix-up (on their part, natch), and often we end up converting/recruiting new users by bending over backwards to be nice.
I’m surprised at how many commenters seem to think that Spacelocker’s goal is to compete with the big social networking sites. To me, the whole approach looks less like an attempt at social networking and more like glossy spam.
So, I wouldn’t compare Spacelocker’s offering to that of Facebook, I’d compare it to an email offering me free Viagra.
can someone sign up and share with us the login credentials?
If I were to do so, I would use the email address I’m using to add this comment. And the password would be the name of this blog.
Oh, the email add would be spacelockersucks at gmail.
And the site looks utterly useless.
spacelocker@anonymbox.com
pw = tech
This login RULES !
Yes Spacelocker is indeed a network to be avoided. We were hit by them a while back and blooged about it http://www.out-...l-your-friends/ . The most worrying part of this is that it is a service aimed at kids.
i disagree. it clearly says “and spacelocker will invite all your friends” above the box you type in. idiots that don’t read will surely be disappointed.
Straight from the Spacelocker blog entry titled “The Spacelocker Guide to Social Networking”:
“Although there’s a danger with networking online, it’s there when you network in the real world, too. Just like you do when you meet someone new at a club, school, or work—you need to always proceed with caution online. By staying aware of where you are and who you’re talking to, you can safely enjoy social networking. Use common sense and trust your inner voice to tell you if something doesn’t feel right.”
My inner voice is screaming.
it seems like many people are complaining about that company http://www.goog...3948b&hl=en
Wow… pacelocker should add phone number to the sign-up (so new users can get dinner time marketing phone calls) and home address (so pacelocker can come over and go through your underwear drawer).
Thanks for the info.
We hate you, you stupid, stupid users! We hate users! You’re stupid.
That was the best laugh (the story, not my comment) I’ve had on here in a while.
“Oh, and does the company effectively say they’ll be sending out an invitation to all your mail contacts when you sign up using the form on the left? Sure it does. See that microscopic line at the very bottom of the screenshot above? There’s that clear policy of theirs right there!”
…and also immediately above the red line of text, in blue, it says “and spacelocker will invite your friends”.
I can’t see how this is particularly confusing.
Someone’s boss is going to be a widdle bit upset with this person.
Let’s see:
Dear CEO of Spacelocker,
You have a novel idea! A social network, Wow!. You call it Spacelocker, also a novel idea! Forget hallpass, myyearbook, or any of the massive social networks out there. You are going to revolutionize!
That being said, please berate people for your clearly intentional misleading sign up page. This will create a clear competitive advantage in the marketplace with you early adopters. Any early adopter that tells at least 100,000 people on techcrunch that your site BLOWS will both lead to certain success and will make your mom happy when she loses her $5,000 angel investment.
But you are an entrepreneur! That should at least help you get laid at the next Techcrunch!
Warmest Regards,
Remeadial
Their ‘about us’ section does make me want to go and live on the ‘Smart Island country of Malta’
I’ve never heard of a Smart Island Country, but it certainly sounds interesting.
Any semi-intelligent web entrepreneur should be aware that bad customer service is no longer permissible in the self-policed internet. Thank goodness for sites like TC.
I think that Spacelocker has a point -most people don’t like reading. I think that’s a great way to treat lazy people like that.
Robin, you shouldn’t have given these guys free publicity … good or bad, they are going to benefit from it. They deserve to fade into oblivion.
I just sent this link to all of my Gmail contacts.
Copyright © Spacelocker 2009. All rights reserved.
Can’t You READ! We already reserved all your rights!
Now have a great time here at SocialLocker.
Following in the footsteps of Hi5 and Wayn and a host of others who did exactly the same thing, probably with even less warning, but without that kind of email. The unfortunate thing is these co’s are able to get traction through these means, then legitimize later once they have their user base. Social networks who try to do the right thing get left behind early on.