I can certainly understand people being paranoid about their personal
information, though it's certainly available in a lot simpler manner than
building a company like Plaxo. One of Plaxo's founders was a Napster
co-founder, and that's enough to worry anyone. But their revenue model is
straightforward, as is the way they intend to get there. They raised $20
million in venture capital, have spent ten million so far, and have
developed several products to add to the base products that are "for
profit". I know more about this than I can say, but it's not an evil scheme
to get your contact info. Here's an eWeek article that's fairly recent.
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1644423,00.asp
Dave, you said the only thing they have of value is a ton of personal info.
Not so--by the time they are ready to launch they will have about ten
million free service customers, of whom I suspect 40-50% will want to buy
their products. Say five bucks a month times five million times 12 months
per year. My.
You don't have to sell info to a spammer if you own the products and the
customers. As a marketer, I'd say this is a very, very good model.
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-fot@autox.team.net [mailto:owner-fot@autox.team.net] On Behalf
Of Dave Riddle
Sent: Monday, August 08, 2005 8:26 AM
To: fot@autox.team.net
Subject: Re: Please help me update my address book
At 06:14 AM 8/8/2005, you wrote:
>fot@autox. team. net,
>
>I'm updating my address book. Please take a moment to update me with
>your latest contact info.
>
>
>Click the following link to correct or confirm your information:
>https://www.plaxo.com/edit_contact_info?r=17180649914-55287433-44995500
>6
I would be very cautious of Plaxo. I for one will never update info at
their site as something just does not smell right about them. Given that
their service is "free" and they are spending a ton of dough to offer this
"free" service they must be wanting or planning to make money and the only
thing of value that they have is a ton of personal information that people
have supplied them that they keep updated.
The following is the warning that we prepared and supplied our clients about
this "service"
----------------------------
"We would urge you to be aware of the Plaxo terms of use to understand what
this "free" service may actually be doing.
Here is a bit about Plaxo from the website Spamcop and some comments from
others as to it's behavior.
http://news.spamcop.net/pipermail/spamcop-mail/2003-July/009833.html
http://news.spamcop.net/pipermail/spamcop-mail/2003-August/009845.html
http://www.nwfusion.com/compendium/archive/003589.html
This from the Network World (nwfusion) site.
"...Check out this paragraph from the Plaxo 'privacy policy':
"In the event Plaxo goes through a business transition, such as a merger,
acquisition or the sale of a portion of its assets, Your Information and
your membership in the Plaxo Contact Networks will, in most instances, be
part of the assets transferred. You will be notified of an ownership change
pursuant to Notification of Changes section of the privacy statement."
My opinion? It's a vacuum for email addresses that will eventually be sold
to the highest bidder..."
Must say that I agree with that assessment and can see why they are getting
themselves added to Spam Black Lists (like the one that we use -
http://www.ipswitch.com/products/IMail_Server/index.html - we run the
Professional version of their mail server and have since 1996)"
---------------------
Some other warnings:
https://www.pmbx.net/plaxo.php
http://wired-vig.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,56322,00.html
Might I be paranoid? Sure. But just because your paranoid doen't mean that
their not out to get you.
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