Going Full Circle
Waaaaay back in 1995, I worked for a small startup called InfoSeek. They were developing a way to access the growing amount of information available on the internet. To do this, they created a search engine, and were the first to do so, I believe. (This was so long ago that they actually charged to do searches, and also offered a free version of the search.) As a summer intern, my job entailed two activities:
1) Searching the web for sites that linked search engines other than InfoSeek, and asking/suggesting that they add InfoSeek as an option.
2) Perusing Usenet for posts about finding information on the web, and responding with suggestions to use InfoSeek (and giving an example of how easily the information could be found).*
So, imagine my surprise when I was on the receiving end of a direct marketing attempt nearly identical to the one I used back in 1995. See below for the email I received. It was sent from a company that does book price comparisons, and they want to be listed on my site, too. I took a quick look at their interface, and I wasn't too impressed. Their comparison table doesn't show shipping/tax, but they do list the lowest "Buy It Now" price from eBay. I haven't decided whether to add them or not. Let me know your thoughts.
*In response to one of my posts, I was flamed. I informed my boss (due to the negative publicity to which InfoSeek was being subjected, and she ended up discovering that a relative of hers was a friend of the flamer.
From: Ankita Mishra
Subject: Request for a link on http://blogs.yucs.org/~dwallach
Date: Friday, June 25, 2004 7:06 AM
Greetings:
We saw your website http://blogs.yucs.org/~dwallach on net and found that
you have given a link to AddALL, BookFinder.com etc for online books.We
are writing to inform you that we have a similar website,
http://www.XXXXX.com , where we compare prices of books across such
major online book sellers in real time. We even find book prices on eBay.
We would appreciate if our website could also be a part of your collection
of links. If you decide not to add our link for some reason,
your feedback would be really helpful for us in making our site more
informative and useful.
Best regards,
Ankita
----------------------------------------------------------------------
This email was sent to you from XXXXXXX.com. We can be contacted at
following address:
PO Box 753, Pine Brook, NJ, 07058.
If you do not wish to receive any emails from us, please send an email to
info@XXXXXXX.com and write "unsubscribe" in the subject line, and we will
not send you any more emails.
Comments
Would you get paid? I dont think it would be a good idea. Linking to Jewish parents may be a good idea.
Posted by: Daniel | June 28, 2004 11:32 AM
They made no indication that I would receive compensation in any manner. I also tried out the site over the weekend, and was not impressed. They didn't seem to have anything "extra" to offer, other than an ebay search, which is easy enough to do, and many times people don't want to deal with ebay anyways. I've been meaning to add a link to JP for some time now, and I've done it, now that you reminded me.
Posted by: David | June 28, 2004 11:35 AM