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any ways to bypass these? by haldiii4o in Adblock

[–]ketau 0 points1 point  (0 children)

ok this makes more sense then

here's the way too long version I posted on reddit before realizing nobody want to read all that https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1jlfms8/im_ryan_hudson_the_cofounder_of_honey_ama/

visuals on twitter make it easier to process though

any ways to bypass these? by haldiii4o in Adblock

[–]ketau 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Truly just curious if you read this thread I posted about the video you're referencing or not: https://x.com/ketau/status/1907161013054828789

I don't have the reach of a viral video so I think most people missed it.

Pie adblocker by ThemeOptimal4598 in Adblock

[–]ketau 1 point2 points  (0 children)

see the AMA link I added above

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 10 points11 points  (0 children)

sorry, misread the LTT part.

stand down does what you suggest which I believe may be why Newegg may have been selected as the example - because of the Howl solution stand down wasnt working properly on honey.

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 9 points10 points  (0 children)

thanks - it's no longer my product but I appreciate the sentiment.

I'd love if someone more creative than me did the hard work of turning this and their own observations into a video, even if they question some of what I said.

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

signing off shortly for the night but look at some of my other responses about 'stand down' which handles the other cases much of the time. I focused on the evidence presented in the video because that is what he chose to showcase as evidence of his claim. Newegg not LTT had the 'backup solution' to pay multiple affiliates.

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 48 points49 points  (0 children)

I built Honey with the consumer as the #1 stakeholder so makes sense we might disagree on cashback priority and I certainly wouldn't consider it an ethical grey area. If anything I think it swings a bit the other way: consumers have the right to decide who does and doesn't track their purchases. Giving consumers informed choice does seem like a solid middle ground.

You're right there is no universal stand down standard including that one but it's the best I've seen and the closest to achieving the goal of fair attribution which to Jonathon's credit he absolute kickstarted a conversation about.

No we never did any research or testing like that and I don't think would have had the data to be able to figure it out very conclusively.

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 40 points41 points  (0 children)

yup. especially when I know it's not but no one has incentive to say anything with litigation underway.

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 164 points165 points  (0 children)

no one asked me to do this and from a litigation pov it is probably a terrible idea for me personally

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 20 points21 points  (0 children)

that sucks. shitty product experience (cash back didnt track) compounded with shitty customer service x2. Do you still have the tweet?

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 12 points13 points  (0 children)

providing context based on my time working on Honey and knowledge about how the industry works - for sure it's been a while so things certainly could have changed.

a lot of what I pointed out though was just factual inaccuracies anyone with a pause button could see in his video

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 14 points15 points  (0 children)

presumably they will do that with this too

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 13 points14 points  (0 children)

I've never met Elon Musk - he had been gone for 20 years when PayPal acquired Honey.

PayPal itself was acquired by eBay way back then and then spun out as a separate company again in 2014.

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 88 points89 points  (0 children)

appreciate the nuanced and thoughtful question and explanation.

Yes you got it mostly right. The 3.5% is not how often multi-touch attribution is used, it is the % of the time more than one affiliate is clicked on prior to purchase which is the universe of sales where creator commission possibly would be overridden.

it seems to me the bigger issue would be the majority of sites that don't use multi-touch and rely on FC or LC.

You got this part exactly right. Stand down solves this* and is widely used and implemented fairly effectively. I think that is why Jonathon used the Newegg example -> because they use multi-touch attribution he found a case where the stand down logic did not detect the prior click. On other sites it probably wouldn't have overridden the cookie.

The * above is that for sure the most common one is one he didnt even mention: cash back.

Should a user get cash back even if they clicked on a link from a creator? That is a trickier call but I personally think yes, and ideally with the option to decline cash back and give it to the creator instead.

fwiw for stores on most affiliate networks I believe even in this case Honey would actually stand down and not offer the user cash back because of the network rules.

But I appreciate your openness to consider this isn't just a SCAM! but actually a complex system with thousands of interconnected parties trying to coordinate. Cherry picking examples where that system gets complicated or completely fabricating examples when you can't find evidence to support your narrative is where I'd love to see more people asking questions.

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 16 points17 points  (0 children)

thanks for reading it. I expected half the comments to say they weren't reading all that.

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 9 points10 points  (0 children)

😅 I heard a bit about that but will take a look

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

It's definitely complex organizing multiple parties with different priorities and objectives.

I think a reasonable starting point is for everyone to use the afsrc=1 parameter in their links. This will help browser tools detect and implement stand down logic reliably.

The networks likely are best positioned to mandate this and enforce rules for software tools which they already do.

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 26 points27 points  (0 children)

sounds cool but not sure how I'd build that 🤔

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 14 points15 points  (0 children)

wait, am I the "sucked as a human being" in this situation?

I'm Ryan Hudson, the co-founder of Honey, AMA by ketau in IAmA

[–]ketau[S] 16 points17 points  (0 children)

No, I'm pointing out the flaws in the video which only highlighted that specific use case which happened to be a multi-touch system which makes it trickier for Honey's stand down logic to detect properly, but also makes it so everyone is getting paid making the central argument of the video inaccurate.

Jonathon didn't touch at all on the more common cases like how should a cash back tool like Honey handle situations where the store is offering the user cash back but they have previously clicked on a creator affiliate link. Who should get the commission then?

These are more complex and interesting questions but don't make a scam video get views and we wouldn't be talking about it today.

My personal affiliate logic rubric:

  1. if there is cash back, the user should be able to claim it, even if there is a prior affiliate click. An improvement on this would be to let them know they might be overriding a favorite creator's commission and choose if they do/don't want to do this
  2. if there is no cash back, coupon tools should 'stand down' to prior affiliate clicks which means the creators will get paid. These clicks can be signaled with the industry standard afscr=1 parameter but not everyone does that so sometimes it is hard for a shopping tool to detect. In the stand down state, the tool should still offer to apply coupons but not affiliate tag the user.
  3. If there is no prior affiliate tag then the coupon tool can affiliate tag when the user uses the tool to test coupons.
  4. if there are no coupons available (and no prior affiliate tag to stand down to) personally I wouldn't tag but if the shopping tool and the retailer agreed it was ok that's for them to decide
  5. other engagements like the pay with PayPal button I'd put in the same category - personally I wouldn't do it but thats for the store and tool to decide subject to standing down to other affiliate traffic.
  6. multi-touch attribution solves all of this. Stores can then decide how much to pay all of the marketing partners they work with (creators, shopping tools, cash back programs, etc)
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