It's ironic that probably the biggest victims were youtubers and other "influencers" who mindlessly promoted this extension to their viewers, for money of course.
replies(2):
It's ironic that probably the biggest victims were youtubers and other "influencers" who mindlessly promoted this extension to their viewers, for money of course.
Genuine question I was wondering when this went down - wasn’t this completely unknown at the time? If that’s the case, I feel like I can’t blame those who promoted it. I don’t have all the info though.
If they didn't know how it works, then how could they promote it as an awesome tool and something good? I expect people to have some integrity, not "god money above all" mentality.
You can and IMHO actually should blame them for promoting crap. No sympathies on my part towards promoters of Honey, to be honest. Especially the so called "tech" channels. But this time they've tasted their own medicine.
BTW., here's a very interesting comment about the issue with regards to LTT: https://old.reddit.com/r/LinusTechTips/comments/1hkbtlr/peop... .
The problem is Honey was dishonest about how it works.
Their marketing claimed that Honey automatically applied coupon codes for various online retailers during the checkout phase. Nobody really had a problem with this.
What got found out and landed Honey in hot water, is the affiliate link hijacking behavior which they did not disclose. Basically, any time you follow an affiliate link with Honey installed, it replaces the original affiliate code with their own. Leading to this flow:
1. YouTuber takes Honey Sponsorship and their followers install Honey.
2. YouTuber posts new content, with affiliate links for equipment or parts.
3. YouTuber sees their affiliate links aren't getting near the amount of traffic they used to despite their videos performing just as well as before.
Shops could also pay Honey to use a lower % off code instead of them finding ones and giving that, so maybe there's a 10% code out there but Honey only gives users a 2% one because they got paid by the shop, and tells the user they tried their best. It's a scam in all directions.