Classmates.com? More Like NoSecurity.com!
I usually try to write about sites I've used and, true confession, I've never used Classmates.com. Neither has my husband, Geoff. Nor has his friend Michelle. Maybe we should tell Classmates.com that.
For at least two years Geoff and Michelle have been getting weekly emails from Classmates.com addressed to "Gayle" and "Mary." (Both Gayle and Mary had the same respective last names of Geoff and Michelle.) They assumed it was spam. But last week, in a fit of boredom at work Geoff decided to test it. So he went to the site, and sure enough it greeted "Gayle." He said he (or she?) had forgotten his (or her?) password. Classmates sent Gayle/Geoff the password. No security question. He went back to the site, logged in and could see all of Gayle's personal information. Same thing for Mary/Michelle. He forwarded me the link and I could pull it up on my computer-- without even entering her user name and password. The site and profile appeared to all of us to be legit.
This was sent to Geoff's Comcast email account, which he's had for about six years. So there's little chance Gayle had it first or anything like that. So what's the story? As far as I can tell it's one of two things:
- This is an incredibly sophisticated -- even if odd, misguided and
deceptive-- marketing scheme to rope in new users. And one I can't
imagine ever working.
- Classmates.com has horrific underlying technology that can't
remember an accurate email address and has no security at all. Pretty
shocking since 3 million users or so actually pay Classmates.com for
premium messaging services.
And this post on TechCrunch details why their traffic and financials don't look so great either. Perhaps the most damning figure, other than slipping market share, is that only 12 million of their 50 million registered users actually use the site. Oh, and the FTC was investigating them for some sleazy auto-billing tactics. Last December, Classmates.com pulled its IPO, putting it at risk of repaying some $50 million in debt.
From an outsider's point of view this just appears to be a walking-dead company in a market where there are such better alternatives. If you use Classmates.com-- please tell me why you like it. Because allegedly there are 12 million people out there who do. And if Gayle is reading this, Geoff wants to know if you mind if he deletes your account.
Comments
You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.
The comments to this entry are closed.
New Book
An unforgettable portrait of the emerging world's entrepreneurial dynamos Brilliant, Crazy, Cocky is the story about that top 1% of people who do more to change their worlds through greed and ambition than politicians, NGOs and nonprofits ever can. This new breed of self-starter is taking local turmoil and turning it into opportunities, making millions, creating thousands of jobs and changing the face of modern entrepreneurship at the same time. To tell this story, Lacy spent forty weeks traveling through Asia, South America and Africa hunting down the most impressive up-and-comers the developed world has never heard of....yet.
Buy it from these sellers
Sarah Lacy is an award-winning reporter who has covered high-growth entrepreneurship for more than fifteen years. She is the founder, CEO and Editor-in-Chief of PandoDaily.com, the site-of-record for the startup ecosystem. She lives in San Francisco.
Updates
Sarah's Latest on Pando Daily
On the Blog
- Africa
- Argentina
- Blogkeeping
- Books
- Brazil
- Brilliant, Crazy, Cocky
- China
- Food and Drink
- India
- Indonesia
- International Travel Tips
- Israel
- Media
- Once You're Lucky, Twice You're Good
- Silicon Valley
- Singapore
- TechCrunch
- the always controversial sarah lacy
- Travel
- venture capital
I am one of the 38M who refuse to ever go back onto that site. I also don't know a single person who uses it.
I remember reading recently that Classmates.com is the largest buyer of ads online. That could explain it - they just annoy/harass people into signing up.
And no, you may NOT delete my account ;-)
Gayle/Shafqat (I sometimes forget who I am, but so does Classmates.com)
Posted by: Shafqat | May 11, 2008 at 02:03 PM
I wonder if there's some age -based divide, or maybe it has to do with your techiness quotient. I was on FB for ages waiting for my 80s-era former school mates to show up. They never did. One day a few months ago I happened to check out Classmates.com and discovered that several HUNDRED (!!) were listed there. So I signed up and sent a couple of dozen people I was friends with "hey, what's up" emails. Only one was answered right away, two more replies trickled in over the next few weeks and the rest: nada. So it does seem like a weird ghost world.
Posted by: Aaron Pressman | May 11, 2008 at 02:29 PM
Facebook has absorbed this space as of late. It offers 100% of Classmate's functionality (for free), and a good chunk of Classmate's actual userbase.
Sometime last year I took a quick survey: I looked up my old high school and checked graduating years from 2006 back to 1988 or so, one year at a time. The vast majority of recent graduates are on Facebook, of course, but it tapered off to a smattering for graduates prior to 1997 or so (who graduated from college in 2001, largely before the age of social networking).
Well, checking back recently, I see more than a smattering for the pre-1997 set. Even for graduates from the early '90s, about 20% are Facebook users and have tagged themselves with their High School class. (For my N. NJ highschool anyway.)
Classmate's userbase was mostly the result of a massive marketing campaign and from the growth and demographics Facebook has seen lately, Classmate is clearly a zombie firm.
Posted by: Gabe | May 11, 2008 at 04:39 PM
Classmates.com is basically a scam. They have a slight veneer of legitimacy versus the average Nigerian spammer, but the end result is the same: they're using phony stories to separate people from their money.
Posted by: Chris | May 12, 2008 at 12:35 PM