As I was checking my e-mail the other day I noticed I had an invitation from a friend to check out a new social networking site called Quechup. Usually I just ignore these, but this time I was intrigued and decided to have a look-see.
After signing up the service offered to check my contacts to see if anyone else I knew was already on the service. This is not uncommon in the world of social networking so I agreed.
BIG MISTAKE!
Quechup has now sent multiple e-mails to all of my contacts inviting them IN MY NAME to join the service.
This is quite embarrassing. My contact list contains the addresses of all my friends as well as listeners to my radio show and readers of my column who I have corresponded with in the past.
As of this writing I have been thanked by some, questioned by others and had some very unpleasant things wished upon me and members of my family.
If you received an invite to Quechup from me, please ignore it and accept my apologies. If you did sign up I encourage you to delete your account and not let it scan your contact list for any reason.
Dwight Silverman has written a good article about the Quechup scam on his Techblog called “Spam Alert! Just say no to Quechup”
Hey Jay,
I read this after I already replied to your Quechup invite… I sent the answer back with a bunch of quotes from twitter, mainly written by your colleague Dwight Silverman.
Oh well… As once a great Greek philosopher said (and I believe a wise old Chinese man said too…) – S**T HAPPENS!!!
Take care,
Geri (Gary) Druckman
While I was flattered that I got an invite from you, I couldn’t figure out what the hell it was for. A google search lead me back to this blg entry.
So, what is Quechup any way?
I am glad I ignored the invites. To date I have gotten 14 invites. I have no doubt now the none were legit invites.
I’ve only gotten one invite, so Jay I guess you are my only friend. No worries. It happens to the best of us.
Been one of those days hasn’t it?..*thud*
Once, I sent Jay an email with a URL in it.
He let me know that that was a no-no. When I
got an email from Jay with a URL in it, I knew
not to open it! Thanks Jay!
When I saw the invite was from you, I thought, “Gee, must be pretty amazing. I better check it out!”
I slammed to a stop when I saw the deceptive plan to send invitations, especially since Gmail makes almost everyone you email a contact, and I didn’t think the lady at the DMV or a myriad of eBay sellers really wanted to take our relationship to this level.
Still curious, I used the bypass link to complete registration and… yawn. Instead of a cool new social networking app, it looks like just another mad junior high wankoff to tally up friends. No sense of community, and definitely not Jay Lee calibre.
So, thanks for the post; until I checked here, I was sure you’d been bought off!
Glad I passed on the invite. I’m at my daughter’s and didn’t want to have innumerable emails/spam coming to her address. Thought I’d wait til I got home and then check with you. Thanks for the update.
I got a couple of invites too, but luckily I had already seen the brouhaha over it on Twitter, so I was able to avoid it all together.
I’ve already posted to Dwights’s blog that I may call in Wednesday to tease you.
[...] My post describing my Quchup shame has been mentioned in Dwight’s Techblog, Mike McGuff’s personal blog, Anne Heathen’s Librarianne blog and Dan’s Wisdom of a Distracted Mind blog. [...]
No Problem. Was flattered, of course, but it’s not the first time something like this has happened
[...] Delete ‘em if you know what’s good for you. Link to one of many first person accounts, Link to another. And another, and another (punch line: the spam blast created by Quechup caused Google [...]
You love me you really lo, wait it’s spam, you dirty no good rotten varmint, them there’s hanging words, quick someone get a rope, we do know where he’ll be wednsday night
the proceeding was a poor substitute for humor and in no way implies that the writer of said passage is intending to physically harm Jay Lee
It happened to me too!
It happened to me as well. Let us launch a blog campaign to bring down these spam bandits!
[...] "Quechup has now sent multiple e-mails to all of my contacts inviting them IN MY NAME to join the ser…" [...]
[...] Jay Lee, who writes for the Houston Chronicle and hosts Technology Bytes Radio says: Quechup has now sent multiple e-mails to all of my contacts inviting them IN MY NAME to join the service. This is quite embarrassing. My contact list contains the addresses of all my friends as well as listeners to my radio show and readers of my column who I have corresponded with in the past. As of this writing I have been thanked by some, questioned by others and had some very unpleasant things wished upon me and members of my family (see the full post here) [...]