  Sumas Member Username: Sumas Post Number: 582 Registered: 01-2008 |
Bored one night, I signed up free. Now, I keep getting messages from them via email saying old friends want to "talk" to me. But I am told via the board I need to pay to get my messages which I refuse to do. I am not very internet savey, am I missing something? I feel terrible that people might be trying to contact me and I can't (won't) respond because of fees I will not pay. Advice anyone? | ||
Pam Member Username: Pam Post Number: 4869 Registered: 11-2005 |
http://www.consumeraffairs.com /dating_services/classmates.ht ml | ||
Bigb23 Member Username: Bigb23 Post Number: 3371 Registered: 11-2007 |
Funny, on a consumer site with hundreds of complaints against Classmates. com, who advertises under the Banner ? Classmates. com, of course.  | ||
Jcole Member Username: Jcole Post Number: 5523 Registered: 04-2005 |
Actually, that ad probably shows up because you have a cookie with Classmates.com info. It's targeted advertising | ||
Bigb23 Member Username: Bigb23 Post Number: 3373 Registered: 11-2007 |
I'm pretty good about managing cookies, Jcole. It's like Google, text reading ad placement. Enter "Space Alien Traps" and a Target store ad will appear on the sidebar with Space Alien Traps. Although, Amazon.com has them cheaper. | ||
Ravine Member Username: Ravine Post Number: 3005 Registered: 01-2006 |
Sumas, I get that horse manure all the time, too. I would be absolutely astonished if it is the result of any of my former classmates trying to contact me. Cripes, most of them didn't want much of anything to do with me when I was in high school with them. (I'm certain that my brooding countenance and loner-verging-on-isolationist personality had little or nothing to do with it.) I can't imagine that any of them would be attempting to contact me through this trifling dot.com... | ||
Pam Member Username: Pam Post Number: 4873 Registered: 11-2005 |
quote: She signed up and then got the emails about contact. You have to pay to see who is (allegedly) contacting you. That is the scam, because nobody really is or you don't actually know them. (see link with complaints) | ||
Ravine Member Username: Ravine Post Number: 3006 Registered: 01-2006 |
Yeah, see, I caused it, too, by signing on to the site once. I sort of thought something real might be going on because A) my brother made the unsolicited, foolish mistake of giving my high school's alumni group some "updated" info about me, with the result being that B) a company, which had been contracted to put together some big-ass (and hideously expensive) alumni-related book, had recently contacted me via telephone. My brother is known for determining what is best for other folks. | ||
Sumas Member Username: Sumas Post Number: 584 Registered: 01-2008 |
Alright. Will clean up files on Internet Options a bit more regularly. Any other suggestions? | ||
Grumpyoldlady Member Username: Grumpyoldlady Post Number: 323 Registered: 06-2005 |
I signed up with the Denby chat board at Delphiforums.com While they DO have a Paid option, I can reply privately to messages that are posted on the board, and set up private contact info. I've reconnected with many old friends this way. You can search for your high school or other groups that interest you and join for free. I am very happy with it. | ||
East_detroit Member Username: East_detroit Post Number: 1830 Registered: 11-2003 |
Darn, no former class mates on Delphiforums are looking for me, either. And here I did a pretty good job of disappearing. No "Paging East_Detroit" thread on DetroitYes, either. Depressing. | ||
Barnesfoto Member Username: Barnesfoto Post Number: 3550 Registered: 10-2003 |
High school was a long time ago, and you didn't have much in common with those people back then. So why would you want to think about them now, especially if it costs you money? | ||
Flanders_field Member Username: Flanders_field Post Number: 1535 Registered: 01-2008 |
Without paying for a gold membership on the classmates website, you can leave a message that your intended contact and non-paying old classmate can read on their profile...IF they ever get around to checking it once in a blue moon. Also you can check for the last dozen or so dates that someone actually bothered to browse your particular grade and high school page, by clicking on the messageboard tab. On the top right there will be a drop down list with their names. I recently browsed my St. David Grade School in Detroit classmates page to see if anyone new had joined, and the last visitor was over 6 months ago. | ||
Flanders_field Member Username: Flanders_field Post Number: 1536 Registered: 01-2008 |
I clicked on the link that Pam listed and read some of the complaints..LOL!! Complaining about being spammed by the Classmates website in their email? I set up a half-dozen free email addys from Yahoo! looong ago to handle various types of necessary online registrations, each used for a different type and importance, so I could choose to check them often (or not) at my leisure. Classmates got an email address that I do not check very often, and when I do, they all get deleted quickly. I could also use the half-dozen free Yahoo! email keyword feature that is offered, to send any emails, as from Classmates right to the trash folder. | ||
Iseries840 Member Username: Iseries840 Post Number: 994 Registered: 08-2005 |
Facebook is free. | ||
Chrissy_snow Member Username: Chrissy_snow Post Number: 427 Registered: 07-2008 |
Classmates used to be totally free. I dont' know what happened, they seemed to get greedy. I know they made enough money off of ads to remain free, but perhaps they felt they were losing too much market share to places like Facebook and MySpace, also Ning, which is where my alumni group is now. I joined Classmates back when they first launched and it was free, you could email people and do everything that you can't do now! Too bad for them they didn't even consider grandfathering the old timers into the new plan, so now they have ruined what could have been a great service. Reunion.com did the same thing, started out free and then even stopped letting you email unless you upgrade! Oh, Classmates did something really weird and disturbing to me a while back that made me completely delete my profile. I had a message in my box that of course I couldn't read unless I upgraded, but it had the name of a person I knew, someone I'd been actually looking for - but it had them listed as a student at another school. The school is actually my elementary school in another state - the person was my HIGH SCHOOL boyfriend. I was shocked and I couldn't figure out HOW Classmates was generating this fake mailbox message to get me to pay to upgrade just to read it. Did they read my other messages where I had discussed this person's name? It was just bizarre! I knew there was no way this person had signed up under that school. I found out later, after interacting with this person on the free alumni site, that he didn't even have an account at Classmates. It's like they've got bots crawling through your accounts looking for names, and then they generate these fake messages to get you to upgrade. Very creepy. I shut down my rarely used free account at that point and I really try not to even visit the site for fear of whatever other bots they have working for them! | ||
Bigb23 Member Username: Bigb23 Post Number: 3755 Registered: 11-2007 |
I had that same thing happen on my anonymous/throw away Yahoo email. I made sure that not a single bit of personal information was entered for the sign on, for safety's sake. Well lo and behold - I get a generated campaign e-mail from the Knollenburg for Congress campaign headquarters, with my full given name and city on the header of that anonymous Yahoo account ! Did the fact that that this guy was already in Congress, give him special snooping privileges ? That was very creepy too. | ||
Raptor56 Member Username: Raptor56 Post Number: 750 Registered: 05-2007 |
I get e-mails all the time on my work e-mail address from companies telling my sister how she can reduce her debt. Or how my dad can get a free acai berry sample. The e-mails use their full names. not sure how that happened since I never e-mail them from my work e-mail address. For awhile I was also getting spam e-mails that said they were from me in the From box and had my coworkers names in the too. Weird |
