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TWPLY – From Alleged Spammer to Sold on Sitepoint in Less Than 24 Hours
Earlier today, ultra Twitter master Robert Scoble called Twply a spammer. Twply basically takes any "@" reply messages on Twitter and sends them to your email. It’s hard for me to call Twply a spammer because they ask each user if they want to send out a marketing message about their usage of Twply. Blogger Mathew Ingram says he selected the "no" option but the twitter message was still sent. I do believe that the language that Twply used on the marketing selection (sample screenshot below) was poor and could be considered confusing.
Update: Alex Hillman notes in the comments a similar situation to that of Mathew. I can assume either poor QA testing or just plain spammers. Either way, I’d change your Twitter password immediately if you used the service.
None of that matters now because the service went up for auction on Sitepoint earlier today. I can’t tell how many hours the auction ran for because Sitepoint doesn’t show a timezone on their posts. It looks like the auction was open for three hours. The auction was closed when a bidder used the buy-it-now option and purchased the service for $1,200.
From the auction:
Twply has been spread through twitter like nothing I have ever seen before, over 800 accounts added in one day. This site is being sold because our servers can not handle the load of the site, and the overwhelming traffic the site has been getting. Currently the site has sent over 8k emails.
I agree with Scoble when he says we will see more services pushing their marketing messages through their users to Twitter and other real-time messaging platforms. Will these messages be viewed as spam if the users select to run them? It’s up for debate.
In terms of timing, it seems Twply beat out JustHackIt by a few hours for fastest to launch and then go up for auction.
Allen a thoughtful post here rather than just piling on. I like Twitter and would hate to see applications like this muddy the waters, but I think the community effectively “policed” this problem very effectively.
May I ask what actual evidence you have that has brought out to the conclusion that Twply author(s) are spammers? You know, aside from pulling this shit out of your ass, that is.
Jordan – if you re-read the post you will see that I am not saying that the service is spam.
Thanks Joseph – I wonder what the blogger/twitter reaction would have been if:
a. the system for the marketing box worked (apparently it didnt)
b. if the wording was better
marketing through your users is fine.
The evidence that brought me to the conclusion that they are spammers is that once I deciphered what the f**k they were talking about (”giving love”), I purposely unchecked that little option and yet it still sent out an unwanted happy-go-lucky piece of crap out to people who had already seen the same gd’d message umpteen times. That my friend is sending spam out in my name without my consent.
Wow, that was a fantastic bailout, based on the pressure exerted by the likes of Sarah Lacy, and Scoble!
I am wondering to whether Jordan in this comment stream is a member of the Twply team, he seems to think the idea is good! Interesting!
NB- I must add that the fact Twply sold was not because Sarah Lacy and Robert Scoble told them to, I just felt that the Twply team may have seen the backlash from bloggers such as Lacy and Scoble and decided it might be an idea to move on and sell!
Perhaps it was a quick-flip app. I doubt they sold it because of Scoble.
I defiantly checked NOT to send out a message when I put in my credentials, and it tweeted anyway.
The same people seem to have http://www.tweetmanager.com as well (http://marketplace.sitepoint.com/auctions/53866 click on http://www.twautor.com – it forwards to tweetmanager). So anyone who may have signed up for that could be compromised as well.
Happy New Years, Allan. Thanks for the word of caution about this. I was going to check it out later, but had no idea about the problems others encountered. I’m really looking forward to your posts this year!
Question: Why is this worse than a Yahoo, Hotmail or Gmail message at the end of emails for these FREE services?
Question2: The wording of the “opt out” question was unfortunate, but does this episode mean that NO profit can EVER be made using Twitter – by its users OR its owners? I know that’s likely the pie-in-the-sky dream of some, but it’s not realistic.
good point on the email marketing… if you notice in my post, I don’t call what twply did spam. I think Robert jumped the gun.
I think the difference is that TWPLY is no gmail, hotmail, or yahoo.
You won’t find a site like that selling on Sitepoint to some amateur webmaster or spammer.
Glad I didn’t use that site…gees!
I use http://tweetbeep.com service as it sends me @replies and a few keywords I have configured … then it sends me email alerts anytime my @reply or keywords have been tweeted.
Cracking piece of journalism. Dredging up the depths of the Tech sess pool with this one. As if Scoble’s blog post wasn’t enough, CN feels the need to chime in with another redundant entry and both articles make it on Techmeme. Says a lot about the quality of Techmeme for you. Sigh…Funny, just below those two pieces is Om Malik’s announcement that 2009 will be the end of mediocrity. Does that mean Scoble, CN and Om Malik will all retire?
Hi Francis- thanks for stopping by tonight. Actually my post about the sale came before Robert’s post. In addition, I took an opposite viewpoint to Robert’s therefore I think it was worth posting. If you check my posts over the past 60 days, you will see that I rarely follow anyone anymore. I try very hard to bring new content every single day.
Just wanted to say that I find CN a great alternative to the echo chamber actually. You do a great job here Allen.
Allen,
Thank you for NOT being the echo chamber!
Your hard work and awesome blog are much appreciated!
Happy New Year!
Thanks Karl – appreciate your feedback!
Thanks Susan!
I changed my password as soon as I realize my mistake in handing it out. Spammer or not, what Twply did what pretty scuzzy. I’m wiser for the experience, and i hope everyone else is too. I’d certainly like to see the market reject this tactic.
http://thenoisychannel.com/2009/01/01/faux-viral-maketing/
It’s pretty easy to track Twitter mentions using the official Twitter Search RSS feeds. I certainly wouldn’t give up my password just for this service.