Someone's funding Spyware

January 12, 2005 10:26 PM

Everyone hates spyware (even MS is getting into the anti-spyware game) for a whole host of obvious reasons, but someone out there must like it, right? One person tracked down the people that love it so much they've given millions of dollars in funding for spyware companies. That's over $100 million to make more spyware. If you check out the portfolio of some of these investment firms (1, 2, 3, 4 and even the dude in charge of The WELL is in on it?!) there are quite a lot of everyday brands funded by the same group that fuels such great software as the uber evil Gator.
posted by mathowie (19 comments total)

From the Corporate overview of Claria (which devoured Gator):

"Claria Corporation is a leader in online behavioral marketing, serving tens of millions of consumers and more than 1000 Advertisers to date. Claria publishes advertising messages for top tier companies and agencies to consumers who are part of the GAIN Network, Claria's network of tens of millions of consumers who agree to receive advertising based on their actual online behavior."

(I added the italics)
posted by the Real Dan at 10:50 PM on January 12, 2005

And Garage Technology Ventures, who invested in Claria/Gator, is run by Guy Kawasaki, former Chief Evangelist for Apple. He's also the author of the great book Art of the Start. Don't hold Claria against him ;-)
posted by premiumpolar at 10:51 PM on January 12, 2005

Neo will protect us all.
posted by TheNakedPixel at 10:52 PM on January 12, 2005

Who's going to step up and publish the names, addresses, and home telephone numbers of the people funding this stuff?
posted by mullingitover at 11:00 PM on January 12, 2005

I remember seeing something about the 180solutions funding in the paper a while ago - I nearly choked on my bagel when I was reading it (30 million installations!?!?). Seeing some of the stuff that the private equity firm or the adware executives say is really bizarre - 'he has dubbed 2004 "the year of the consumer" at 180solutions', euphemisms like "contextual search marketing".
posted by milkrate at 11:02 PM on January 12, 2005

I met the 180solutions guy some time ago, in a semi-professional capacity. These birds are difficult to observe in nature, so I was happy I had a chance to ask him some questions.

One was about the way 180 would automatically pop up a new window with the entire Dell site, if you just typed "Dell" into google. I asked him, what's in it for Dell, exactly? Don't they then have to pay you if anyone does anything on that site?

Of course they do, he answered, it's a valuable service. I asked, what makes that service valuable?

This was his answer, and I have to tell you that he looked me straight in the eye when he said it. "Because it would be horrible for them if the Dell keyword loaded up Gateway's site. Wouldn't it?"

It's an amazing business. If you see a real expensive car driving around Bellevue, Wash, with a "180" something on the license plate, that's him. Honk if you love Zango!
posted by cloudscratcher at 11:41 PM on January 12, 2005

Follow the money...good strategy - at least now there is a focus for complaints. Gator makes me rethink my stance against capital punishment.
posted by madamjujujive at 12:17 AM on January 13, 2005

30 million installs, eh? My guess is that's 15 million ignorant net-noobs who think it's part of their browser, 10 million people annoyed by it and savvy enough to have uninstalled it, around 5 million lusers who know it's not supposed to be there but too clueless to get rid of it, and somewhat less than 1 million who actually buy stuff.

Hey cloudscratcher, that's 20 million people who might be willing to pay you $1 to hire some heavies to work that car over with a tyre-iron and set fire to it. Hell, I'd give $5, and another $5 to see the video on-line.
posted by aeschenkarnos at 12:18 AM on January 13, 2005

I wish my pentium 9000whatever and MS word could keep up with what a 486 used to be able to do.
Bloat bloat and more bloat.
I will avoid discussion about heavy graphics forcing an obsolesence to the traditional dial-up modem.
Eventually spy-ware will be upstream at the service providers point, allowing them to sell data en masse to business.
posted by buzzman at 12:36 AM on January 13, 2005

From Bruce Katz's Affiliations:

Founding member, Business for Social Responsibility

ha! ha!
posted by gsb at 12:54 AM on January 13, 2005

I have two friends who work for Gator, now Claria. Every time I talk to them I have to use The Force to stifle the urge to vent all the spleen I've gathered over the years of figuring out how to uninstall the b.s. that their industry has shoved up my Windows butt.

I'll tell ya what,though, they make VERY good money, which means this is an industry that is going to be VERY well protected against any legal headway that might be made to criminalize this kind of stuff. I'm sure they've got lobbyists on call and with investors like the one's outlined, I'm feeling very much like David without a stone to cast.
posted by spicynuts at 7:42 AM on January 13, 2005

I believe Bruce Katz left the WELL many years ago. They're now owned by Salon. I'll have to check and make sure that Katz has nothing to do with the WELL these days, but I believe that to be the case.

The WELL, by the way, is still a wonderful, smart, engaging place -- much like Metafilter in its own way, but vaster because of the extensive structure of conferences.
posted by digaman at 7:48 AM on January 13, 2005

I have two friends who work for Gator, now Claria

How do they do it? Even if you're really desparate for work, isn't working for Gator a bit like taking a job stabbing puppies?
posted by uncleozzy at 8:14 AM on January 13, 2005

Much as I like these two people, they are young and simply victims of the dot com collapse. I met them while working at a dot com that eventually went bust and you know, after 6 months of unemployment, if you are 25 years old trying to pay rent in NYC and someone comes along and offers you 75 grand, a 401K and a great health plan to stab puppies, you just might consider it. I mean, plenty of people work for lawyers. They are probably sleeping ok at night.
posted by spicynuts at 8:18 AM on January 13, 2005

I'll tell ya what,though, they make VERY good money, which means this is an industry that is going to be VERY well protected against any legal headway that might be made to criminalize this kind of stuff

Maybe. But phone telemarketers made money hand over fist too, and that didn't stop Congress from punching them in their collective cock once they finally got it through their skulls that their constituents hated them.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 8:23 AM on January 13, 2005

that didn't stop Congress from punching them in their collective cock once they finally got it through their skulls that their constituents hated them.

What, that little love tap? Pshaw.
posted by rushmc at 8:31 AM on January 13, 2005

Maybe. But phone telemarketers made money hand over fist too, and that didn't stop Congress from punching them in their collective cock once they finally got it through their skulls that their constituents hated them.

Yeah, and how long did that take? Twenty years? Thirty?
posted by spicynuts at 8:31 AM on January 13, 2005

In fact, it wasn't Congress, it was the Federal Communications Commission, in coordination with the Federal Trade Comission, that acted against telemarketing. And the FCC didn't act until a large number of states had passed and implemented opt-out regulations of their own, with yet more considering this.

By the time the FCC acted, it was clear to telemarketing companies that it might be easier (less expensive) for them to deal with a single (national) list of opt-out phone numbers, as opposed to 30, 40, or 50 lists, state-by-state. So there wasn't a huge amount of resistance.
posted by WestCoaster at 10:30 AM on January 13, 2005

The thing that never ceases to amaze me about spyware/adware is the fact that companies (especially big ones like Dell) will actually pay good money for people out there on the interweb to associate their products with EXTREME ANNOYANCE.

Seriously, forget about targeting our spleen towards the adware companies and their employees - let's focus instead on the companies that support their practices.

I highly doubt that a big billboard above Times Square reading, "Dell supports spyware!" would be too good for their business.
posted by afroblanca at 5:31 PM on January 13, 2005