I was also irritated by this paragraph and not sure if my english is well enough to understand – but this part was because I hadn’t registered until now. Very strange.

Unfortunately, the new forums were launched without much testing, and definitely too many functional bugs. Their choice of forum software might have been one factor. To their credit, PDN did assign an individual to address technical issues and functionality problems on the new forum, though the results were limited and the forums are now one of the clunkiest and more difficult to use. The stated reasoning at PDN for their forum software choices was to combat spammers; oddly enough not much of a problem at all with the old forum software.

So the knowledgeable professionals and regulars at the old PDN Forums have largely wandered off to other forums. Those more interested in technology found other locations. The students through PDNedu perhaps are just getting into this semester, and not quite aware of the forum changes. Many of the more business oriented wandered over to ProPhotoForums.

I would expect the old guard of PDN regulars to keep checking in at PDN, and probably still grabbing up the printed magazines. Unfortunately, unless another major change happens soon, I think the website and the old forums are broken. It might be hard to build a community around professionals when you cannot easily accommodate them.

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In my book, it will remain “standard practice” unless enough people raise a stink about their practice. It’s sad when it gets to the point that you have to read a mile-long Privacy Policy before you ever give a company your email address. The best ones are right up front: “We will NEVER share, rent or give away your email address. Period”.

And with PhotoEast, it pretty much forces you to do business with Nielsen via email, since most everyone is coming from out of town, and needs to register in advance. If I’d been smart, I would have given my address as “NielsenSpam@mydomain.com”, so it would be simple to write a filter for it, when the marketing blasts started coming in. It wasn’t bothersome until it hit twelve or fifteen spam from various clipping path companies, digi photos labs, cheesey filter, fake-photoshop-border type companies, but after that, it really got annoying. You could tell that the companies were using the Shotgun Approach, and never bothered to differentiate between Olan Mills guys and advertising guys.

If PDN needs email address sales to stay alive, then the rumors about them are even worse than what’s going around. It’s just classless.

am I reading this wrong?

2. Fees and Payment
SUBSCRIBER shall make periodic payments as consideration for the SERVICE. The length of the period that SUBSCRIBER chose has been determined by the subscription plan it agreed to during the sign-up process. The periodic fees will be based on the rate schedule in effect at the time the SERVICE is used. Any applicable sales or use taxes will be payable by SUBSCRIBER, and may be included in each periodic statement. SUBSCRIBER’S use of the SERVICE will be subject to credit limits established for SUBSCRIBER’S credit card by the card issuer. Notwithstanding any provision herein to the contrary, the interest charged under the terms of this Agreement shall never exceed the maximum rate permitted by applicable law.

Can you imagine the nerve of PDN wanting to continue creating a revenue stream so they can stay in business? It’s just shocking.

As for getting spam after PhotoEast, that’s pretty standard practice at conventions and tradeshows. These are big money-generating events and the attendee list is a premium add-on that most vendors can purchase.

Rosh
http://www.newmediaphotographer.com

I tried to wade thru the legalese in the privacy policy, but I feel asleep trying to decipher the lawyer prose. At this time, I will not sign up, in protest of their spam practices.