Yahoo Knows Best, Resets Users' Marketing Prefs

Anonymous Coward writes ""Yahoo is pulling a good one on everyone. As a matter of some changes on their system, they have kindly reset everyone's marketing preferences. So,when you signed into Yahoo for a Yahoo ID, you were given a chance to set what sort of notices you wanted yahoo advertisers to send to you, well, they just set EVERYTHING to Yes for you. The poster was kind enough to include instructions on how to turn these settings back. In related news, we've signed you all up for a /. newsletter! (I am so just kidding.)

To change this...

Go to your Account Information screen (for each and every ID you have) and about mid screen you will see "Edit Your Marketing Preferences" link. Click on it and set them back to the way you want them, otherwise get ready for *LOTS* of advertising spam type emails from Yahoo's advertisers. Note also at the bottom, that you will be marked YES for 'By US Mail' and 'By Phone' as well."

In additional Yahoo News, smagruder writes: "Starting today, I noticed that Yahoo! stopped forwarding my mail and when I go to setup/change the POP Access/Forwarding settings, they display a page for me to give them money to get my mail forwarding back. The issue: In their recent widely distributed press release, Yahoo! said that this all would start on April 24, NOT March 28!"

Update: 03/29 20:24 GMT by J : Yes, of course Yahoo is a TrustE customer. For a small fee, TrustE certifies: "You can edit your Yahoo! Account Information, including your marketing preferences, at any time." Isn't that great? I can edit my marketing preferences that I had no reason to know existed! Thanks, TrustE!

Update: 04/07 11:54 GMT by J : Nine days later, Yahoo notified me that these preferences existed:

From: Yahoo! <[e-mail]>
To: [me]
Subject: Message from Yahoo! about changes to our Privacy Policy and your Marketing Preferences

[...]

In order to keep you up to date about our many new products
and services and how they might be of use to you, we have
created a new Marketing Preferences page

http://subscribe.yahoo.com/showaccount

within the Account Information area. It is designed to make
it easier for you to manage the marketing communications
you receive from Yahoo! and ensure you get the latest
relevant information to meet your needs. We have reset your
marketing preferences and, unless you decide to change
these preferences, you may begin receiving marketing messages
from Yahoo! about ways to enhance your Yahoo! experience,
including special offers and new features. Your new marketing
preferences will not take effect until 60 days after the date
of this mailing so you have plenty of time to decide what you
want to receive and what you don't. To change your
preferences, go to the Marketing Preferences page.

Re:I need help, what to expect?

[cscx]

Maybe all 12 are not very computer-literate and are having trouble reconfiguring their Yahoo! mail preferences. Who knows, you might even get some tail out of it! ;-)

Re:Illegal?

[Kamel Jockey]

Laws on telemarketing lists most likely do not apply here. In a strictly legal sense, Yahoo could be considered an opt-in list since you explicitly and voluntarily signed up for the service. Because of that, they can do with your account on their servers as they wish. On the other hand, laws governing opt-out lists work because you never voluntarily signed up on a telemarketer's calling list.

Re:Shit happens

[mnordstr]

... and of course an ISP that doesn't block port 25... =)

Whoops . . .

[TrumpCard]

Due to technical service inconveniences, Yahoo!(tm) now owns your soul, per accidental user agreement modifications. We apologize for any inconveniences or misunderstandings this may cause.

Re:Illegal?

[czardonic]

Didn't you hear? We need more commerce to strengthen our economy. The least you could do is pay attention to the urgent commercial updates that are painstakenly assembled for you by patriotic marketing operations. What, with all the human effort and natural resources devoted to these campaigns, the least you could do is read them. Would it absolutely kill you to buy something you don't need or want once in a while?

In other news...

[e4]

...Yahoo announced that it will change its marketing slogan from "Do you, uh, Yahoo?" to "You WILL Yahoo."

Re:Civil Case?

[cjpez]

Yeah, why don't you go set that up? I'm sure that a judge will be just ecstatic to hear about how a bunch of people using a free service are upset at what the people providing the free service want to do with it. I'll sign up just as soon as I can . . .

Re:Illegal?

[Kamel Jockey]

Surely they can't retroactively change that agreement.

Of course they can change the agreement. try to imagine dealing with Darth Vader in The Empire Strikes Back ("I have changed the conditions of our deal, pray that I do not change them again!") That's what all that fine print at the bottom of the contract is :) But seriously, you don't really believe any company adheres to its "privacy policy" do you? :)

Thank You for your Post

[shawnmelliott]

NOTICE: Since you've posted to /. we have kindly modified your preferences

[Y] Spam
[Y] Pr0n
[Y] support HP merger
[Y] something..something...cowboyneal

Have a nice day

Kidding

[SavingPrivateNawak]

In related news, we've signed you all up for a /. newsletter! (I am so just kidding.)

We SO just have to wait and see...

Re:Sure, it's bad on principle...

[spezz]

Dude, I have a ton of your mail.

Re:In other news...

[Hiro Antagonist]

More like "Stick it in your Yahoo!", "Take it in the Yahoo!", or "Let's all crowd into your Yahoo!"...

Re:wow, who knew?

[ender-]

I was able to use this story to go ahead and change all my marketing preferences back to "fuck off and leave me alone"

I chose a slightly more vindictive method, since this really pisses me off.

Instead, I set up an alternate email of [e-mail], and put in the name and address of Yahoo!'s Marketing VP, and told it 'yes' to everything, including the USmail and phone options...

I hope this REALLY pisses them off to the point that they realize what a pain in the ass that stuff is.

Of course, I've now made backups of all my Yahoo Mail in case they feel it's worth killing my account over, but now that I run my own email server, the Yahoo Mail is superfluous[sp?].

Ender

Been doing that for a while

[drew_kime]

You'd be amazed the number of free-registration-required sites you'll be able to get into using [e-mail] and the zipcode in Redmond as a password.

Yahoo offers are GREAT!! Opt-in!!

[kindbud]

I didn't uncheck any boxes. I want all those Yahoo offers to be sent to me in the postal mail. They are just too good to pass up! And I want all my Yahoo offers to be sent and stored on my Yahoo account. Soem of them are valid for YEARS after they are sent. You never know when you'll need one, so I'll keep them all on my free-of-charge Yahoo mailbox, forever.

But I just noticed that my street address and phone number are way out of date in my Yahoo account. I just updated it. Here's my new street address, to which all my paper mail will be sent:

Mr. Stop Spamming Me
701 First Avenue
Sunnyvale, CA 94089
408-530-5062

Of course, no one but me should be using that street address. I wouldn't want to get flooded with a bunch of paper spam at "my" street address, so don't any of you go changing your street address to send me any of your offers. No sir, that would not be very nice. Don't do that.

I LOVE /.

[ljaguar]

I love it when /. headline sounds like something from the onion.

Re:Illegal?

[dustman]

Of course they can change the agreement. try to imagine dealing with Darth Vader in The Empire Strikes Back ("I have changed the conditions of our deal, pray that I do not change them again!") That's what all that fine print at the bottom of the contract is :) But seriously, you don't really believe any company adheres to its "privacy policy" do you? :)

In fact, every company does adhere to its "privacy policy"! It's just that if you do read all the fine print, the privacy policy is "you have none. bitch."

Yahoo Reports Yahoo's Screwup

[sohp]

Amusingly enough, the CNet story got onto the syndicate feeds and ended up on the front page of My Yahoo. [yahoo.com]