The following is a guest post by Jeff
Lyons, a current student in my IDC4U class.
Recently, I was tasked with creating a page
with “Storify” for a school assignment. Now, I'm
always leery of signing up for new websites or services, as I highly value both
my security and the amount of space in my inbox. Nevertheless, I signed up with
Storify, handing out my email as requested, and began amassing the links and
information required for my topic, despite the difficulties involved (my topic
was DRM
and Piracy in games, and the school board blocks most gaming news websites and
blogs.) Everything was going along fine, until I signed off for the day and
returned the next. When I went to edit and format my page, I was greeted with
this:
Connect with my Twitter account? You mean
the one I don't have? The one you never mentioned before? Well that's just...brilliant.
I hope the dripping sarcasm is oozing through your monitor right now.
I realize, I'm the last of a dying breed,
that most people have Twitter these days, and spend hours on end tweeting to
their hearts content. Myself, I don't see the need. I'm just one person. I
don't have news or updates to post concerning a product I'm working on. I don't
need to inform people of what towns I'll be performing in, what times, and how
much a T-shirt will cost. And I certainly don't have a group of staffers
crafting my next political barb. If I want to stay in contact with those close
to me, I'll contact them over Facebook, or give them a call, or gasp have
a face-to-face conversation
with them. But I digress. This isn't about me not needing to use Twitter.
This is about Storify springing it on me. Not once in the account creation
process, or in the terms of use, does it mention Twitter. Not once. And if it
requires something, surely it should notify the user of that beforehand,
shouldn't it? If I go out to buy a game, I can look up the minimum system
requirements before forking over $60 (an overly high price, but that's for
another day) for a game my computer can't run. If it's multiplayer, or runs on
a content-delivery system such as Steam,
or Origin, it'll mention that
an internet connection is required, and that an account on those services is as
well, for the latter.
So why are they telling me after I
start using Storify that I need to also give them my Twitter information? Why
do they require it in the first place? Is Twitter integration mandatory?
Would they, if I made a Twitter account for them, tell me to give them my
Facebook username and password at a later date? (You can choose to use your Facebook
or Twitter accounts to sign up for Storify, but I prefer to keep my
educational, work, and social lives as separate as humanly possible) And it's
not just because I don't have or want a Twitter account. It's not just because
they require one for use.
It's because they spring it on you like
this. “Oh hi, there! We see you're enjoying our product! Now, if you want to
continue using it, fork over your info!” I mean, if they do this now, what's
next? My real-world address? My Social Insurance Number? They can't even say it
was in the fine print. I checked. There is no fine print.
Okay, maybe there is. My mistake. But does
it mention requiring other accounts anywhere? Nope. Not anywhere else in the
TOS, either. Ctrl+F is quite useful in that regard.
You know, this is a really shady way of
operating, this cutting the user off suddenly and demanding account
information. It's basically holding the account for ransom. And I don't
negotiate with terrorists. I guess it's a nice ironic twist that my chosen topic
was DRM. Most current forms of DRM are really scummy too, and end up preventing
legitimate customers from playing more than it does the pirates. Well, no
matter. I have other options, other steps to complete the assignment.
And Storify? You just lost yourself a user.
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