Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]

[warescouse]

I personally think the robots.txt issue with Phorm/webwise has still a long time to run. Yes I consent to my website being visited by the Google bots. After all they can make my website money. But no I don't consent to Phorm/webwise/OIX pinching my potential customers by tempting them elsewhere.

Hopefully some big players in this market may step into the fray and put their legally earned cash into some anti Phorm/Webwise lawyers pocket and worry a few ISP executives. Perhaps we should start a donation hat fund for the incidental expenses involved .

Websites should have a proper Opt-In arrangement. I consent to Phorm/Webwise intercepting my site traffic - NOT!

[Kursk]

Originally Posted by Pasanonic

for a new company, seemingly very proud of acquiring such a prestigious client base in a short space of time they appear to be a little short in delivering their promises.

Not a good sign for prospective customers.

Oooh, that one hurts . I'm sure the PIA will be out soon

[Angry@VMedia]

I have just had a phort, has google made any sort of statment about this phorm/webwise/oix polava?
I would really like to hear from them to see what their views are and what,if any response to kent saying what they are doing is just what google are doing?
If it was a choice of just phorm or google, google wins hands down every time!

[mark777]

Originally Posted by Pasanonic

for a new company, seemingly very proud of acquiring such a prestigious client base in a short space of time they appear to be a little short in delivering their promises.

Not a good sign for prospective customers.

I suspect it might be the client delaying the delivery!

I've a nagging suspicion that Phorm, it's ISPy stooges and 80/20 might be tearing each other apart behind the scenes, a big blame shifting exercise and lots of (not very nice people) quoting contract small print to each other.

Let's hope so anyway.

[warescouse]

Originally Posted by mark777

I suspect it might be the client delaying the delivery!

I've a nagging suspicion that Phorm, it's ISPy stooges and 80/20 might be tearing each other apart behind the scenes, a big blame shifting exercise and lots of (not very nice people) quoting contract small print to each other.

Let's hope so anyway.

Now that's a nice thought to go to sleep on.

[Pasanonic]

Originally Posted by mark777

I suspect it might be the client delaying the delivery!

I've a nagging suspicion that Phorm, it's ISPy stooges and 80/20 might be tearing each other apart behind the scenes, a big blame shifting exercise and lots of (not very nice people) quoting contract small print to each other.

Let's hope so anyway.

Oh I absolutely agree that the results of any independently produced and unbiased PIA will no longer contain information and results that are conducive to Phorm's business model given the pressure and public outcry from groups such as ourselves. However it would be very crass of me to make these thoughts known and I would be a much better person if I just assumed that 80/20 went on holiday again

I think that Kent's bold statement of "publish and be damned" might have been rescinded or at least be under careful consideration

[AlexanderHanff]

OK I have just written an article for CF (published later today when Mick logs on) with regards to my legal analysis. I have now finished the paper so anyone who can't wait for the article to go live, feel free to download it here.

I have proof read it about 20 times so I am hoping I didn't miss any errors, but if I did, I apologise in advance

Alexander Hanff

[OF1975]

Ok still no news on the professionally filmed footage. There is no justifiable excuse for this footage not to be released by now. If there IS wrangling behind the scenes delaying its release then we deserve to be told.

[AlexanderHanff]

I will phone Simon again later and see if I can get an update, but I need to get some sleep first.

Alexander Hanff

[BetBlowWhistler]

From the ZDNEt article..

""We're optimistic," said the spokesperson. "We're hoping to have [the technology] in place by the time we do the trial." "

Didn't they say that they were going ahead with this trial in it's 'current' cookie -opt-out phormat? I wonder why they've changed their tune. Couldn't have anything to do with them trying to avoid adding another 10000 RIPA offences to their list could it?
Yeah yeah, I know - it still breaks RIPA because of the web site consent not being obtained - but it does show that they are *very* worried.

[OF1975]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHanff

I will phone Simon again later and see if I can get an update, but I need to get some sleep first.

Alexander Hanff

Thanks Alexander. I appreciate that very much. I understand that Simon is very busy not just with the 80/20 stuff but also with his campaigning for P.I. such as the council use of RIPA issue etc etc. That said I think its urgent that this footage is released very soon as it has been dragging on and the longer we wait the more people will speculate as to what is going on. Get some sleep and once again thanks.

[The Other Steve]

On a related note, this is a fun fun read :

http://www.brandrepublic.com/DMDaily...datory-opt-in/

"LONDON - The direct marketing industry would face ‘armageddon' if mandatory opt-in was imposed in the UK, DMA chairman Rosemary Smith has said.
Her comments came three weeks after the Information Commissioner Office's decision to impose an opt-in only regulation on the ad-targeting system Phorm.

Smith, also a director of data protection law consultancy Opt-4, said that the market would "change dramatically" if all businesses had to obtain permission before contacting new or current customers."

I note with interest how she muddies the waters, since the "Direct Marketing" industry really has very little to do with contacting existing customers, and in fact (AFAIK, IANAL, etc) there isn't any legislation existing or mooted that prevents you from doing so, unless you want to sell them something outwith your current relationship, in which case they aren't your existing customer.

Having had the distinct misfortune to have had a personal look inside of the grey areas of such "marketing" (A euphemism for "hard selling"), I think bringing down Armageddon upon it would be an excellent thing. IMHO it's a poisonous industry full of poisonous people, and does nothing but spread a low grade, gritty, hard to remove evil into the souls of all those whom it touches.

It's because of the constant whining and lobbying of people like the DMA that we are where we are today with Phorm, if ICO and co had taken the bit between their teeth when they had the chance..., well, to late for recriminations now. Bring on the fire and brimstone, say I.

Other opinions may be available (they'll be wrong though )

---------- Post added at 09:40 ---------- Previous post was at 09:34 ----------

Originally Posted by OF1975

Thanks Alexander. I appreciate that very much. I understand that Simon is very busy not just with the 80/20 stuff but also with his campaigning for P.I. such as the council use of RIPA issue etc etc. That said I think its urgent that this footage is released very soon as it has been dragging on and the longer we wait the more people will speculate as to what is going on. Get some sleep and once again thanks.

I rather suspect that 80/20 have the problem faced by a lot of small start up companies, in that they have become victims of their own success and are finding it hard to keep up with commitments.

Cut them some slack, I'm sure they will post the video when they get a chance, probably in tandem with the PIA. I know they gave a date that has passed, but we've all missed deadlines. Well, I have, but then I was a coder for 7 years

[Rchivist]

Originally Posted by BetBlowWhistler

From the ZDNEt article..

""We're optimistic," said the spokesperson. "We're hoping to have [the technology] in place by the time we do the trial." "

Didn't they say that they were going ahead with this trial in it's 'current' cookie -opt-out phormat? I wonder why they've changed their tune. Couldn't have anything to do with them trying to avoid adding another 10000 RIPA offences to their list could it?
Yeah yeah, I know - it still breaks RIPA because of the web site consent not being obtained - but it does show that they are *very* worried.

I hope they've thought carefully about how they will "invite" people onto the trial. Originally it was going to be a popup web page, but unless it pops up while I am logged on to my BTYahoo! customer account pages or logged onto as a customr at www.bt.com, I will consider it an illegal interception of my browsing. They've kept quiet about that.

If you are a BT customer and get a trial invite, we need to know several things.

- What were you doing when the invite popped up? Were you browsing non-BT or BTY pages, or were you logged in to your BTY account, or your bt.com account? (the first would be an illegal interception, the second would be a customer service announcement)

- What did the page say? (full copy of page,including any FAQ links that are accessible BEFORE making a decision and before you click on any buttons) so that we can see how much inphormaton is being given about the TRUE nature of Webwise/Phorm, and inphormation about the potential legal challenges and liabilities of both ISP and customer if they switch it on, with respect to RIPA, DPA, Fraud Act and civil action from website owners as well as the risk of finding yourself locked out of many Webwise-resistant Dephormed sites if you browse to them with Webwise ON.

- What was the address of the invitation page? (?? Check browsing history or logs before doing anything with the page?)

- What action you took and what cookies you found on your machine afterwards, and what cookies started to appear when you browsed, and what began to show in your status bar when you returned to normal browsing (any strange redirections for example).

That's just my ill-inphormed non-technical guesses - can any of you clever guys and girls add to or improve this list? When I get a decent set of instructions for customers, I will do my best to get them circulated in the BT Beta forums and BT newsgroups, along with a list of urls that will allow them to phorm their own opinions.

IF the trial DOES go ahead, we need to make sure BT customers have a decent chance of finding out the truth behind the Ertugrul Webwise spin. There are between 2 and 3 million of them out there, 10,000 of whom are supposed to be getting invites, and most of whom don't understand a dingo's kidney about all of this and have probably never even heard of Phorm or Webwise and will happily sign up to "improved anti-phishing" technology that "gets rid of irrelevant adverts", which is what BT may well think of as informed consent.

[OF1975]

Originally Posted by The Other Steve

I rather suspect that 80/20 have the problem faced by a lot of small start up companies, in that they have become victims of their own success and are finding it hard to keep up with commitments.

Cut them some slack, I'm sure they will post the video when they get a chance, probably in tandem with the PIA. I know they gave a date that has passed, but we've all missed deadlines. Well, I have, but then I was a coder for 7 years

With the greatest respect I completely disagree. I have already given them a lot of slack. Unless 80/20 are editing the footage themselves (not likely) then it should have been up by now. It is now a fortnight since the meeting. Lets remember there were only 2 cameras. It shouldn't be taking this long.

If there are disagreements behind the scenes about the editing or where the footage will be hosted etc then we deserve the right to know. All I am asking for is information. It takes how long to put up a statement for the website?

Anyway, Alexander is going to call Simon after sleeping and thats good enough for me. Very interested to see what Simon says to Alexander.

[The Other Steve]

Originally Posted by OF1975

All I am asking for is information. It takes how long to put up a statement for the website?

Anyway, Alexander is going to call Simon after sleeping and thats good enough for me. Very interested to see what Simon says to Alexander.

OK, I take your point, if they are busy, they could just say so.

However, with the greatest of respect to Simon et al, the question of how long it takes to put up a statement on a website has a variable answer depending on several factors, including one's technical ability. Having read the interim PIA, I am assuming that Simon may not be his own webmaster, perhaps he is waiting for someone else to update the site. So I will also wait with interest to see if he comments.