We would like your input on potentially modifying or removing the Guideline prohibiting the use of Yahoo! Groups for commercial or advertising purposes . Our original goal in establishing the Guideline against commercial use was primarily to prevent spammers from using Yahoo! Groups. We still intend to strongly enforce this prohibition but believe that the broad prohibition on no commercial or advertising use of Groups may not be the best approach. We have not made any final decisions and would need to figure out how it would work, but we wanted to get your input as we consider potential alternatives.
Here are the two changes we are considering:
POSSIBLE CHANGE #1: Removing Guideline # 6 (The ban against using Groups for commercial or advertising purposes).
POSSIBLE CHANGE #2: Adding a line to Guideline # 4 (Stay on topic) to let group owners know that if they post off topic commercial messages they may run the risk that it is considered spam, which is not allowed.
What do you all think of this proposal, do you have any concerns? Please share with us by posting in the comments area below.
Thanks!
Yahoo! Groups Team
Was a decision ever made on allowing moderators to post advertising within their own group?
Leave things alone please! Those of us who actually use Yahoo groups to “communicate” ideas and information can find/receive plenty of advertising and ‘offers’ elsewhere.
The main group that I own (over 3000 members) is run strictly to stay on topic, and to trim excess messages before replying, many members never get off moderation because they don’t mind these rules. I can’t imagine the nightmare of having to moderate out Yahoo-allowed advertising.
BJ Gates
More and more spammmers are using Yahoo Groups to solicit illegal goods, like “Canadian pharmacy” drugs as well as replicas.
Under no circumstance should advertising of any sort be allowed.
I think that a lot people are just trying to sell their stuff by staying inside of the rules on groups dedicated to selling. It’s all of the people who do not stay within any rules but indiscriminately spam any email address of any group where they can post teir stuff that should be eliminated.
Possibly, if yahoo were to give us a way of labeling spam in each message like all of the other email website would allow. Then, ban or block emails from these people or IP addresses would make a lot more sense than going after a lot of online flea marketeers and casual yard sale folks.
I have used Yahoo Groups years ago as part of a discipline we took in the college. We did it because we thought that Yahoo Groups was easier and nicer to use than the official forum we had at the University. However, I have unsubscribed from this group a long time ago and I still receiving spams in my inbox! I just don’t know what to do about it!
It’s not working.
I am now receiving lots of new yahoo group emails like the one I’ve pasted below from this user: thaddeuskey@animail.net
I can’t report it as spam, can I? So I guess you guys better come up with some ways of knowing when spammers are using your system…
James
————-
Whatsup
I dont like, people who are very fat.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/yourgoktcdk2
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As someone who has moderated hundreds of Yahoo groups with tens of thousands of memberships over the past 4 years, I strongly support “POSSIBLE CHANGE #1″! Kudos to Yahoo for considering it – and BIGGER KUDOS if they actually do it – it’s good for Yahoo, it’s members, and group Moderators, and I’ll tell you why:
1. I know that I’ve put in more than 7,500 hours in moderating my groups. While this was integrated into other work I was doing – it still is a considerable amount of time. Even the smallest amount of earnings from that large amount of hours invested would serve as an encouragement to those moderators who take their moderation duties seriously.
2. Though there still is an inordinate amount of good things we can do with our groups on Yahoo Groups, the temptation to earn a few dollars by developing groups or moving our Yahoo groups to other platforms is lessened if we can get even a modicum of compensation for our work. (And running these groups *IS* work – sometimes quite hard work, actually.)
3. In my estimation, commercializing groups has nothing to do with spamming. Indeed, we’re going to have to confront spam on an ongoing basis whether or not we commercialize our groups. If the groups can be commercialized, Group Owners will have an even greater stake in keeping them as spam-free as possible.
4. Finally, it is quite hard work keeping a large group on topic. Doing so eats up the Moderators’ time. It’s a job, it’s a job, it’s a job keeping these groups on topic.
Thus, I can think of no justification for not removing these particular ban(s). I vote yes…
Thanks, and Keep STRONG, Everyone!!
VW
The only reason I use groups is for the need of our commercial company to have multiple people receive emails from a single email address. Basically the mailing list feature is what we use to accomplish this.
We have a Yahoo! business account where we set up our emails using our domain name. I was trying to use a single alias and tag it to multiple people, unfortunately an alias can only be assigned to a single person.
If Yahoo! business emails would allow a single alias to be assigned to multiple people I would not use groups – but I was told to use groups as a backdoor way of doing what we need.
Is Yahoo! working/investigating ways to allow a single alias to be assigned to multiple email accounts?????
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Thanks to everyone for sharing your thoughts and perspectives.
Since it appears that several of you may have misunderstood the proposal, I wanted to reiterate what Gordon shared above:
A change in guidelines would NOT mean that Yahoo! would be increasing the number of advertisements in groups. In fact, Yahoo! wouldn’t be changing anything.
We’ll consider all feedback we received and post our decision in the coming weeks.
Thanks again for weighing in with your thoughts.
Best,
Jami
Groups Community Manager
Its Really A good idea, i must appreciate it.
What about groups that ask for a membership fee? I am a member of a Yahoo group for local alumni and the moderator has recently started asking for a $20 “annual membership fee.” Messages include a link to “pay your membership fee”. Just to be clear, the “membership” is strictly to receive the Yahoo mailings from other members, the group provides no other activities or benefits.
Is that OK by Yahoo’s current rules? Should it be OK going forward?
(IMHO, it feels weird, but I guess it’s up to you guys at Yahoo to decide how you feel about people profiting from your servers and sysadmins in this way.)
I think groups should not be used for commercial purposes. There are far too many as it is now which violate the rules and spirit of groups I feel.
I do not the like idea of removing rule #6 because we are a group that is together for enjoyment, not business. I agree with the idea of changing rule #4.
Yahoo makes some of their money from advertising. Why let adult and porn sites advertise for free?
They are advertising for free now. They put links to their porn and adult sites on the home page for the specific group and then just abandon it. Other spammers come along and fill up the group messages with spam.
I even found a Yahoo group advertising a site oriented to making explosives and bombs.
A Yahoo employee told me there was a “report as spam” button on the home page for a group but I cannot find it. I also do not see a “report abuse” link on the group’s home page. There is also no “report as spam” button when viewing a group message on the Yahoo web site.
It sounds like Yahoo is just giving up when it comes to getting rid of spam.
There are so many bots that my ignore list is full in Yahoo messenger.
My only concern is deceptive groups that would be set up and advertised as ‘cures for (x y & z)’ or singles hookup groups with a fee, that are actually membership collection scams. You’d a way to preview the content of the group so you know you are ‘buying in’ to something you really want. Perhaps a ‘atke a tour’ feature that allows the user to preview a few of the latest messages, home page layout, etc. Just saying ‘buyer beware’ would not be a responsible place for Yahoo to operate from. Leave some tools so users can protect themselves from the inevitable crop of scammers who are only in it for the membership fees. A ‘how to report fraud’ link to instructions, either easily located, or when signing up for such a group (or both) would seem essential so membership refunds and complaints could be handled without Yahoo’s involvement. A way to report scammer groups to Yahoo needs to be provided, and Yahoo needs ‘stealth accounts’ t hat can go through the experience themselves and judge for themselves if its a scam, and shut down the group and report the scammer to the authorities.
With enough of these protections, it sounds fine.
My suggestions:
1. I would change #6 to read something like the following:
It will be the group owner(s) discression If advertisements, (of any sort). will be allowed in their group or not, and they will determine what is appropriate for their group.
2. The group settings (on the home page) should reflect if the group accepts or allows advertising or not, just as it now shows if attachments are allowed or not.
3. When searching for groups, an option to include groups which allow groups with ads to show up in the results, or not.
4. If a group is setup for the express or possible purpose of selling something, it should clearly say so in the group description. (You may have to increase the allotted # of characters to accommote this.)
I don’t mind commercial messages as long as they are pre-approved by the moderator, on an individual basis. Moderators know when/if the members would be interested in something offered for sale in the domain of interest of the group. Successful cases that I have seen typically do a one time only offer/info, but sometimes it becomes difficult when the topic goes to something covered by a vendor, for example a book that covers something under discussion. In that case the vendor-member is within bounds to refer the other members to buy the book for more detail, etc. I do not favor rigid guidelines across all groups because there is way too much variation between groups and member interests. Keep it under the control of the moderators as long as moderators have only fully transparent interest in the product.
rev.mary miller said“`
4. Yahoo needs to be proactive. YOU need to take better action when directed by monitors or members of spaming or phishing to take immeadiate action. NONE of this BS of 50 questions that take 5-10 days to mess around. Even better would be a TELEPHONE number for us to call (in monitors only area) so we can directly deal with the problem switftly. The longer it takes to report, the faster they have to hide.““`I agree with this.I belonged to a group for two days.a person that belonged to another yahoo group hit me up with a bunch of sexual links.I deleted all my profile .I started to get out of yahoo but changed my mind and stayed.I notified yahoo.They said we`ll check it out.I lost the moderator status and member.I rejoined.When is yahoo going to wake up.I complained to the group owner but not heard a word from him.
I think that any commercial venture that is completely owned and operated by a single “Member” of the group would be fine. Who wants to joine a group and get three pages a day of adds for Mary Kay, Tupper Ware or the like of that. If you make bird feeders or something of that nature, sure, bring it on and tell your friends about it. Just don’t wear me out trying to sell an additive that will give a 30% increase in fuel mileage. If I want to read about that sort of stuff, I just root through my junk mail folder.
Here are the two changes we are considering:
POSSIBLE CHANGE #1: Removing Guideline # 6 (The ban against using Groups for commercial or advertising purposes).
–What does this mean? That anyone joining any group could post unsolicited advertisements? Two of my groups are for the members to advertise certain well defined items and services for sell. It was this way always and back when we were on eGroups and before that as well. So if it means that anyone could post random, off topics “ads” or spam, then I have to say NO. Absolutely not. Ours is an open membership group (currently) and I do not want to have to change it to moderator-approval for membership. We do moderator all messages for content, because we do limit what is allowed content on our group very strictly, to prevent spam and to be most effective to the members.
–What I need is a way to ban and/or remove a member who has posted a link, file, photo that is off topic at the same time I am removing the item; and/or a way to remove all content on the group belonging to member who is being removed or banned.
–In an effort to reduce spammers, I am now needing to require members to remain a member of the group if they want their content to remain posted for the group. So if you place a link or a post, you must be a member of the group or it has to go when you do. That would be a valuable service for me when having to remove violators.
–Another thing that would be most useful to me would be no allow members to put emails to “no email”, as there is very rarely a special announcement, but I need all moderator announcements to go to all members, regardless of their email status.
POSSIBLE CHANGE #2: Adding a line to Guideline # 4 (Stay on topic) to let group owners know that if they post off topic commercial messages they may run the risk that it is considered spam, which is not allowed.
–Again, having trouble understanding the meaning here. Define “commercial messages”. Again our group is all about posting sale or trade items and has always been that way, so not sure how this would apply to us. However, is this saying that somehow the group owner would be responsible for spam messages on their list? If my group rules clearly states that I, the owner, can change the rules and limit posts (or accept posts) as I see fit to run the group, how does this affect me?
Hi!
I am glad I found this great opportunity to talk, share and ask. Coz’ I am very new here and have been running for barely around a month only. As a moderator, I find it nice and useful too, to share newly discovered websites or links to my fellow members who I think share the same passion, interest and concern as mine ( food related, particularly). And as a moderator of the group, I try my very best not to go out of topic, to maintain being a responsible and a wholesome mail sender. I think allowing commercials or advertisements is a good idea. I for example, have recommended to my co-members to check the InventNow.org or the Befiresmart.com to them. I know what are spams, and I am happy to say that I am not into it. Moreover, what are unsolicited advertisements for you; or how do you categorized them? Hopefully, if you now allow advertisements or commercials among groups, which I think is great!, may you continue to guide us closely and give good advises on what to advertise/endorse and what not to. I just want to be in track for I really find Yahoo Groups amazing. Thanks and More Power
!
I agree with the majority of responders that keeping groups non-commercial is best.
However, I have no problem with Yahoo introducing a second type of group which allows some type of commercial activity.
These new, more commercial groups, should be CLEARLY marked as such when someone is searching for a group.
I also feel it would be easier for Yahoo to administer these two types of groups if they remain separate Yahoo services.
An emphatic NO to the changes. If they are made I will have two choices and that is to ban all commercial posts and posters or the more likely choice will be to change providers. No one in my groups wants these. Also, “commercial” is very hard to define IMO. what is commmercial to one may not be to antoher. I also agree with other posters there are enough popups and advertismenst now. The message area keeps getting smaller and smaller with the ads as it is now.
Please – please – please!!!! We get enough spam as it is. The spammers always find a way of getting around rules and regulations as it is, and the porn bots do as well. They always find a way of getting spam to us. Consumers now have to purchase special programs to stop the spammers or keep it at a minimum as much as possible. I use Spam Cop and it works well, but the spam still manages to get through.
Let each group run itself and by the guidelines -without a TOS – Yahoo will revert to the old days which weren’t always the best when it came to Yahoo not enforcing their TOS. I’ve been around since One List – then egroups then when egroups and Yahoo combined and now we have Yahoo running the lists entirely, so I’ve seen a lot of changes. I like a lot of the new features, even if I may not use all of them myself and I think that unfortunately we must have some rules. Spamming rules are necessary and should be strictly enforced, when it comes to spammes, porn, that sort of thing. There are millions of places online that people can find porn, so why encourage it here?
I say you’re on the right track as it is – don’t let up on the spammers.
I actually have two questions now. Has a timeline been set yet for implimentation of commercial groups? Will you be able to convert an existing free group to a commercial one, or have to create one from scratch?
Thank you!
As a moderator I do not allow advertisng unless it has been approved by me. And that is very seldom. And normally it is just to announce a new book they just releases or something that is very on topic) I’ve set up database so that our members can list their business (if it is on topic) and I really don’t want any other advertisng in the group. To give someone the option of opening a group and charging a fee is ok but I think that sets up another whole can of worms. There would always be those who opened a group, took money and then disappeared.
Every time I stop someone from advertising on my group I get many thank you’s for keeping the group clean.
And as far as the email request to join different groups, I think they are all SPAM. (According to my header they are NOT from Yahoo) If you go and look for the group itself, they never exist. So, just like other SPAM emails, don’t click anything and delete.
obviously, something has already changed…i get spammed at least once a day now from somebody asking me to join their yahoo group…i’m considering leaving all the groups i’m currently in…thanks a lot yahoo
As a new moderator, I think that there should be clear guidelines.
These guidelines should delineate what is acceptable advertising and what is not within the context of the kind of Yahoo group.
Perhaps guidelines can be set up to address categories in which a particular group may fall. For example: Professional Networking would permit members to advertise products they sell, barter or trade, Family Private Communication (One must be a member of that family for membership), Arts and Crafts for Sale, Arts and Crafts as a Hobby.
Maybe it can be distilled down to groups that have a skill or product to sell, barter or trade. The alternative would be groups whose members wish to discuss some topic(s), share information but do not have something to sell, barter or trade.
Since, I join the latter types of groups, I feel there should be no advertising in such groups.
Brian MK a/k/a dhalgrin57
HAHA yahoo asking our opinion – yeah right. Let me guess something right now, the bad will be lifted. If yahoo brings it up they are trying to figure out a new way to make revenue. Too obvious.