I recently upgraded my copy of CorelDraw. Many years ago Amazon had a bad reputation for spamming their customers, as well as the rest of the Internet, so I had not done business with them for almost a decade. They offered a good deal on the upgrade, however, and from what I heard they had changed their ways and no longer were spamming, so I decided to give them another chance. I bought the CorelDraw X5 upgrade from them, and gave them a tagged email address to confirm the deal. I looked carefully for and unselected all “sign me up for email advertisements” types of check boxes, as I always do when I purchase something online. I prefer not to receive ads.
Two days later, Amazon sent me an advertisement full of “recommendations” for other things to purchase. That was strike one: decent (and smart) companies do NOT sign up new customers to be spammed! At the bottom of this interminably long spam was an “Unsubscribe” link. I clicked it. It required me to sign in. That was strike two: decent companies do not require people to log on or provide a password to unsubscribe from advertising emails, even ones that they had requested, as I had not requested this.
Worst of all, after I signed on with the password that I’d created when ordering CorelDraw, I found that I had been subscribed without my permission to the following lists of bulk emails:
- Musical Instruments
- Books
- General Offers (General offers and information from Amazon.com.)
- Software
- Shoes
- Office Products & Supplies
- Automotive
- Baby
- Beauty
- Grocery
- Health & Personal Care
- Home, Garden & Pets
- Sports & Outdoors
- Tools & Home Improvement
- Industrial & Scientific
- Jewelry
- Magazine Subscriptions
- Music
- Toys & Games
- Video Games
- MP3 Downloads
- Kindle
- Video On Demand
- Movies & TV
- Electronics
- Watches
- Amazon Partners (E-mails from approved affiliate partners of Amazon.)
- Clothing & Accessories
- Associates (Updates from the Amazon Associates program.)
Apparently Amazon has not learned a thing about good business practices, good manners, or not pissing off their customers in the past decade since I last did business with them. It is therefore likely to be at least that long before I do business with them again. My privacy and my attention are not for sale to any sleazeball marketer who appropriates them without permission, even a “big” one like Amazon.