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So..
http://www.etsytuesday.com/
Yeah..
We can pay to make the front page? Remember when cuppy cakes were outraged at the accusation? Mmm-hmmm..
Now, they're in talks with Admin to make sure its not against TOS to do what they're doing.. Whatevs. How fucking shady.
Sunday, January 30, 2011
So, you can really pay to play in popular Treasuries..
Posted by The Sneaky One at 8:34 PM
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35 Comments:
hinky. Was there more on that page beyond we're not taking more names now? How the hell could a non Etsy group promise to get you to the front? If it is actually Etsy affiliated - shit.
They just can't stop over there
Links to the cached version of the site before they removed all of the pages:
Main page - http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:OqI0nVFOdSsJ:www.etsytuesday.com/+http://www.etsytuesday.com/&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=ca&source=www.google.ca
FAQ - http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:3F3u4gUIcnwJ:www.etsytuesday.com/tfaq.htm+http://www.etsytuesday.com/tfaq.htm&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=ca&source=www.google.ca
Purchase - http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:ZZikr6Pp9bQJ:www.etsytuesday.com/purchase.htm+http://www.etsytuesday.com/purchase.htm&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=ca&source=www.google.ca
Going by their FAQs, the fact that they're so big on confidentiality points to the fact that they knew this was a no-no.
For someone who's so big on anonymity, you think they would have made their whois info private.
man. NOW will anyone believe that Etsy is a predatory, dishonest, listing scam???
i noticed this when it was tweeted out last week - how sad.
etsy has certainly come a long way from its original intent to help people make a living from handmade - it's a shame it's not the handmade creators who are making the living :(
ebbandflo
Isn't it interesting that they dropped their privacy bomb just after this little gem came to light? Like I needed help with my conspiracy theories.
And the inmates continue to run the asylum.
Why, yes you can.
Of course those admin girls still pick the front page, but if you are in 100 paid treasuries a week, chances are they'll find you.
They will just think you are popular.
This has been going on for a pretty long time. I think it just flew under the radar.
My treasury team was told that someone who paid for lots of treasuries last summer ended up being a featured seller in the fall.
Exposure, brings exposure.
Considering Etsy wants each shop to pay for their own advertising, how can they rule against it?
And with Etsy working harder each day to make it more about social Facebook fuckwittery and less about running a profitable businesses, who can blame the desperate sellers who have a family to feed?
Wow. 400 customers. I bet I can guess who some of their regular customers are.
it's just the tip of the iceberg, I'm sure. Just another example of how easy it is to "game the system" they have set up, as well as how selling on Etsy is FAR from a level playing field for its users. It's really F*king sad.
A lot of BS has been going on over there - and by popular request the Etsy Refugee Society has listed a few of them on the blog. I'd love to see EB do some digging. You might find a truffle, but probably just uncover yet more bullshit.
You know, back a year or so when it was rumored you could pay for a treasury spot, I just figured it was a couple of curators who regularly made the front page making a few bucks off sellers. I never dreamed it was a real business.
So, we don't know who the curators are, but I can guess they are all the ones that regularly make the front page with their treasuries, which are also many of the ones who are also in those treasuries. I can't imagine paying unless I was pretty sure I had a good shot at making the front page.
Sure makes a lot of comments from certain people who didn't seem to mind front page repeats appear in a different light now. Hmmmmmm...
And Etsy had no knowledge of this until now? I have a hard time swallowing that.
Seems to me since treasuries are a great traffic and link builder, it would make sense that Etsy would support a group of sellers who would make hundreds of treasuries a day with the kinds of things they favor. Even if it wasn't 'officially' sanctioned.
Does get one thinking, though.
I'm confused but I love you guys and this sounds so juicy! Who is Etsytuesday? Can I/we get a little back story about this?
WHAT BALLS!
They can do nothing else that will suprised me-except reinstate my shop, which I do not want them to do. What a bunch of....... I have no name to call them that fits, there are too many things to call them that fit. How about this....greedyairheadedassholehipsteridiots?
Just one more way to separate hardworking artists from their hard-earned money? Disgusting.
Ugh.
I have seen hundreds of gorgeous treasuries never make the front page. There is such favoritism.
Both this scheme and the treasury teams are ways of gaming the system.
To the invisibles, come to ArtFire. You will be seen.
I'm so confused - what is Etsy Tuesday?? And how did someone find out about this and why are the links now dead?
Does that mean many Top Sellers that got exposure on the front page might have been part of this pay to play sham? And how long has this been going on?
I still don't understand what is being said (either the post or comments)... Can anyone enlighten me? Is it the BNR treasuries? Or some scam to get money that is posing as Etsy (or Etsy itself involved or overlooking a scam)? Or something else? Anyone?
Can't even see the cached pages now...
And yesterday I saw in what is left of Etsy's forums a post bitching about how Artfire changed around it's forums. And how predictable that they are reactionary to Etsy.
Very sad.
E is hiring... http://www.glassdoor.com/Job/Etsy-Jobs-E42751.htm Look in the upper right of the page and read the E Overview. Do you see what INDUSTRY they consider themselves to be in?
Information Gathering and Delivery...
Just an extension of the rest of the Esty apparatus focused on fave sellers and products. Those few sellers get $100's of thousands $$$ of free advertising from Etsy every year, so their resulting sales profits can easily pay for treasury spots.
There are many more hidden benefits of being Etsy faves, and each new trick added to the Etsy fogmakingmachine has, at the forefront, one more promo tool that reinforces their fave status.
7 years of a front-loaded-fake-retail model begets the same behavior from the few who always benefit from its source -- Etsy.
A "social network" based on blatant clique-y behavior may be a breeding ground for even worse behavior - wait and see, it will happen!
I've been here since 2006. This pay for play has been going on along as the etsy admin with shops used to put themselves in the gift guides.
I think what notthatmaria said is quite true. The person that was the FS in the fall was boasting to all that would listen, that she paid to be in treasuries and they got her noticed.
This service - paying a third party to feature your items in treasuries - should be disallowed, it's tantamount to shilling.
I've never understood what was supposed to be so fucking hard about making treasuries in the first place. And I also don't understand the nitwits who got their panties in a wad when they changed the system so that everyone could actually participate. Watching some of you jackasses be nostalgic for the good old days when we waited for shit to expire on the internet is like watching a dog shit on the rug.
But anyway.
"etsytuesday" should not be allowed to continue this practice. If they are, then I guess sock puppets are a-Okay. Am I supposed to believe that the "curators", who I assume are also paid, are really running etsy shops or are actual paying customers?
This puts the front page regulars in a new light, for sure. I guess you all felt you were entitled to it because you literally paid for it. That's something.
It might be because I used to be a girl scout, but I've never found it difficult to feature actual random stranger's items in a treasury; and I do make them frequently. That's the funny thing about actual altruism. It's also why I probably find the incestuous treasury teams to be so unappealing. Although it amuses me greatly when I can watch one team morph into a completely additional team of almost the exact same members. It seemed weird to me at the time, but now it makes perfect sense. One team member's moral reprehension just tarnishes the whole thing, right?
I seriously doubt etsytuesday's paying members were all (or in any large part) comprised of those crafty but not camera-savvy SAHM's who make kleenex box covers, fridge magnets, or assemble jewelry entirely from findings from JoAnn's or other weird crafts that only you grandma can identify.
I guess if we have to spend more time "being social" then we all have less time to do actual work. Artfire keeps looking better.
How we found out? The "owner" outed herself by advertising, I believe on UEF. Talk about misjudging your audience...lol.
Somebody on UEF ran a WHOIS on her site. And now we know who she is.
But this could be the tip of the iceberg.
Ah, it's a good job that not only did I save the FAQ webpage itself, but also saved the cached version too.
http://tinyurl.com/etsytuesdayFAQ
It sucks big time, what a scam!
Thanks for the caches, sushimom. I'm just...meh...
not to make any false accusations, but look up etsytuesday.com on
whois.com and you'll find the site's domain is owned by a D. Tremain, look for info on D. Tremain connected with etsy you will find a connection to buyhandmade.org (not sure what the connection is)
Buyhandmade.org is a collaboration between Etsy, Craftster, indiepublic, Craft Magazine, Interweave, Burdastyle, The Austin Craft Mafia, Design*Sponge, and The American Craft Council
uhm not sure what if any conclusions this leads to but just sayin'
Went to the website today (Feb 5th) and its now the godaddy holding page. Guess Etsy said NO. LOL. I can't look at the front page without being disgusted by all this.
Thanks for the link Layla, it acutally worked. I can't believe all of this, but now all of the repeats on the front page are making more sense.
"Buy Handmade" has been around for at least two years, and the consortium of people who own it have never made a secret of who they are--Etsy included. It's a group trying to promote buying handmade by means of a sticker you can download and include on your website or blog. I don't think there's anything too sinister about it. Lots of people have the sticker. It may be that D Tremain has one, but I don't think she's a mover or a shaker at Buy Handmade.
I finally put my Etsy shop on permanent vacation. Too much time being appalled by greed and stupidity, not enough time making art or sales.
But still I waffled wondering if I was doing the right thing. No artist likes to close down a venue, after all.
Ironically, the moment I finished, I was taken to the front page, and lo and behold. Some good soul baking glittery mustache cookies!!!
Felt better. Much better.
Our service is 100% confidential ! We create treasuries under different usernames and only include 1 paid member per treasury to protect your confidentiality. Nobody else will ever know you paid to be included in treasuries.
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In other words, people are paying these people to create SOCK PUPPET accounts so they can be in a treasury. That right there is a violation of terms.
I wonder why their panties are in a twist when BNR treasuries have been around so long? The only difference is in who gets the money and the price. You still pay to play in the BNRs.
This blows my mind. I seem to get into tons of treasuries and never, never do these make the front page....but I never paid! I never knew people were paying...I wonder what cabal has taken over this racket now? Do you think something like this is still in operation?
I always like the comments from people who are new to Etsy like "Can you pay to be on the front page? I see the same people there all the time so I was wondering".
I noticed one seller was on the FP THREE TIMES within 24 hours the other day. And this person is in newsletters at least once a week... and the Storque every week or two. It's just so fucked up that Etsy has been doing this for years straight and denies it.
Then we get that saluting bitch in the forums feeding us crap like "Oh, I asked the people who put together the front page and they said they don't even look at the curator when they choose lists!".
I seriously don't know what the F is wrong with those people at Etsy. They seem to have the brains of pins, yet they think that we all have the brains of pins.
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