CJ’s PSA - Todd says trust us
by Sapphire (October 17, 2005)
I’m urging everyone to read the PSA at CJ very carefully. It allows for transaction reversals at any point in time (even though CJ promises they would never abuse it) and demands a privacy policy on OUR sites that would legally make us responsible for any cookie abuse CJ or its advertiers commit (even though Todd says just a standard PSA is okay).
Here’s a quote from Todd’s latest response on CJ’s insane new PSA. You should read the whole post - and make screenshots, in case you end up in court and the judge wants to know why you didn’t think the PSA was to be taken at face value - but this quote sums up what’s wrong with agreeing to it.
Affiliates should give us the benefit of doubt that CJ will be strict on this issue, since CJ doesn’t get paid either when a chargeback occurs.
My, that’s a lot of trust we’re being asked to give, isn’t it?
Let’s say we do trust CJ now and give them the benefit of the doubt. Who will be running CJ 5, 10, 20 years from now, with that PSA still in place? Do we trust [whoever] not to start handing out non-existent transaction reversals for which they re-pocket our commissions without losing a penny to the advertisers? And while anyone attempting that on a large scale would get caught quickly… this is the kind of thing unscrupulous executives do right before shutting down a company, changing their names, moving to China and daring us to figure out how to sue them. They could, at the very least, steal everyone’s last batch of commissions under fake reversals, and make off with that money. If they’re feeling really cheeky, they could bill folks for additional fake reversals, and actually attempt to collect that money while disappearing into little untraceable corporate entities.
Sounds paranoid? I’d have thought it an extreme example a few years ago. Since then, I’ve had a cell phone provider go out of business and bill me aggressively for calls I never made, leaving me no one to contact - not even an entity to sue.
While I still think the PSA is totally unenforceable - I keep thinking lately… you have to have an entity to sue. This PSA looks just right for a company to clear out of town with a whole bunch of loot at the last minute.
I’m not saying CJ would do that. I am saying it’s not reasonable to expect us to agree to a PSA that allows for that kind of abuse, on their word. There’s a reason you can’t seal a deal with a handshake anymore - people get replaced. Companies get bought. They get gutted and sold piecemeal.
I’m going to keep some CJ links around in hopes this will all be changed in time - and as a newbie, I hardly have any money to risk as of now. But I’m going through all my sites now to make sure they’re 75% ShareASale and 25% CJ, wherever possible.
Sorry, CJ. That benefit of the doubt works both ways, and I don’t see any trust or concern for honest affiliates in that PSA.
Now, the problem is, the only way to avoid agreeing to the PSA is to write CJ via registered mail and blah blah jump through hoops blah blah labor of Hercules, and stop using the CJ network, period, before the PSA goes into effect. Personally, I’m not going to do this. But if you’re going to stay with the network, and I think most of us are, there are a few things I think we can do to protect ourselves. I’ll post them tomorrow.
Posted in Affiliate Marketing
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