71 out of 80 deals for www. tifili .com were posted by moderators - UPDATED
Please correct my counting. Thanks
----------
EDIT 12/02/13:
Counting needs updating as it has recently been revealed that user "SeeBell" is a mod multi used to plant deals and add extra heat (registered by moderator AndyWedge).
This makes 100% of deals posted for tifili posted by moderators or helpers.
----------
Why is this merchant being promoted by the site staff ? Whose interests are being served?
"Our generous affiliate scheme offers affiliates a commission between 3- 6% of the order value, and our cookie length is a massive 999 days. That's right the customers you send to us will hopefully shop with us on a regular basis over those 999 days and we will pay you everytime they do."
Moderators are allocated merchants to push on certain days. These are affiliate paying merchants. There is also a practice whereby merchants request that their deals are posted and collude with HUKD in order to create acceptable deals (n.b rarely these are hot deals).
It has also been confirmed that for some merchants at some times of the year, the moderation team receive incentives from certain merchants. I am unsure if this is one of them.
-------
Do we care where deals come from? Yes. This is a site for honest deals and it is very hard to compete with moderator spam.
Hotukdeals claims to have "member submitted deals" "No spam", "no nonsense". The people behind hotukdeals are exploiting the good will of the community and basically lying.
If you dont care where deals come from, do you think that voting works to get rid of this spam?
Answer: No
1) People are scared to vote moderator deals cold for fear of infractions and account restrictions (andywedgegate)
2) Moderators vote their own deals hot.
3) Moderators are known to vote each others deals hot even when they know it is not a good deal as indicated by private comments.
4) Moderators use multis such as SeeBell and Chun Li for voting to further distort the voting (check the badges of these users).
5) Moderators use multis in tandem with their main accounts to add supportive comments and bump up dead thread
5) How do you know the voting isn't further rigged? Remember the power of deal ninjas from the christmas lights competition? Was this a general feature.
-------
Finally, is this merchant an isolated incident? The answer is no. There are plenty of examples of moderators acting dishonestly when posting deals.
Hotukdeals does seem to be a massive pisstake when it could have been so good. Trust has evaporated because HUKD have been caught lying with regard to multis, deal planting, astroturfing and voting abuse by a whistle blower. It would appear to be authorised as there is no denial and the moderators and site manager whom engage in this practice currently continue in their roles.
Lots of vocal members have been gagged or banned (including myself) for trying to keep Hotukdeals honest and defend the interests of the community. Unfortunately commercial interests are exploiting and destroying the community. As a result many people have left on their own accord.
------------
UPDATE: 14/02/13 Please note that there has been censorship of comments by an anonymous moderator or admin both in the op and within the thread.
There are also insults being thrown at banned members in this thread. This is in breach of the code of conduct. However, this is tolerated presumably due the agenda of HUKD staff.
-------------
UPDATE: 15/02/13 Unfortunately, this thread is being taken over by trolls who have never had any interest in deals or feedback but seek an audience. They continue to assassinate the character of banned members who cannot reply on this forum.
I understand that the mods will censor my latest update but hope they will also remove the content that breaks the code of conduct at the same time. It is grossly unfair.. and no I cannot report individual comments because I am gagged.
-------------
UPDATE: 16/02/13
Hi Admin, I have contacted you through "contact us" as unable to PM. Hope you can reply and continue discussion. ( plus Reply emailed to admin on 17/02/13)
Top Comments (5)
I know I said I wouldn't post again after the poor response to the data leak and I'm sure you're very busy but I hope you find time to answer a few questions. I considered sending this by PM (to make sure it wasn't soft-deleted) but I'm sure others are interested to see HUKD's response.
1. Are you saying the chat logs recently posted elsewhere on the net showing collusion between your site manager, mods and merchants are fabrications?
2. Far from only creating multis for FS/FT, aren't the users chun_li and SeeBell mod-run multis created solely to plant the above orchestrated "deals" (over 2,000 of them) to appear as if they were found by normal members?
3. Don't the mods vote each other's "deals" hot even though they know they're rubbish?
4. Are site staff holding (now or in the past) data relating to users of the site (members and merchants) on their home PCs?
5. If so, is it only data users have supplied themselves directly to HUKD or is it harvested from elsewhere on the net?
6. If so, is it encrypted?
7. If so, is the password "college"?
8. Were the members who requested a copy of the data HUKD held on them sent everything or only that which HUKD could show they had a legitimate requirement to hold?
9. When site staff sub-contract their duties, are users details viewable by their whoever logs in on their account?
10. Are the mods doing the above on your orders? If not, are they doing it without your knowledge?
11. Given the inability to PM and the belief that Contact is rarely answered, will those who were recently gagged or banned and have asked for a reason why (elsewhere, Colorado can show you where) be given an actual reason via the email address registered to their account?
12. Were the complaints resulting in the only known occurrence of one of your mods being disciplined from members or other mods?
13. I understand you told your staff they are no longer to visit the website set up by the above disciplined mod. Do you know which of your staff have visited it?
14. Do you think this mess could have been avoided if HUKD was run in a less deceitful way?
15. Don't you think it would be better for HUKD if you and your staff owned up to and addressed your actions before others show just how little you care for those who use your site?
The chat logs aSB posted concerning what JB and the mods called fanpages, chesso, favevilangel and basquille were proved to be true so I'm finding it hard to come up with a reason to doubt anything else he has said/will say about HUKD.
You don't need to go into detail, yes or no answers will do, but I hope you will be able to allay any concerns that some may have who no longer see you or HUKD in the same light they once did by replying in this thread.
(Currently) Comment #74 (by Elton Chong) quotes one of my previous comments, but my comment has been removed.
There did not seem to be any "community skills" during the discussions about me in March 2012.
What this bitter troll has done is either fabricate a script or publish something that was private, and i address the latter point in my first post. Both scenarios totally unacceptable, both utterly self defeating and showing the character of this individual.
EC, please stop being so delusional, fp has put so much of his FREE TIME into helping and supporting this site, I'm sure if you had done the same you'd like to know what the staff were really saying about you behind your back...
Inb4 you wouldn't want to know.
All Comments (95)
Jump to unread Post a Commentat least they tried X)
Edited By: D_G on May 18, 2012 16:05
ohhhh.. she wants mod bad :D :p
Mods posting deals are obviously doing it for gain, most deals are copied and pasted directy from the affiliate newsletters.
Mods posting deals are obviously promoting companies to which they are connected, through the affiliate links.
It wouldn't be as bad if most went hot, but the vast majority are rubbish anyway, as evidenced by only 2 of 71 being voted hot above.
How often have you bought from them?
Edited By: colinsunderland on May 18, 2012 16:12
ohhhh.. she wants mod bad :D :p
oO give me a chance, only been helper 2 days :p It's not all about heat though is it? I very often post deals that barely make it into double figures, but when you look at the stats on amazon / play etc they've moved up the sales charts, in some cases dramatically, sometimes like my batman gorilla one I posted today they bomb X)
Edited By: wishihadadonkey on May 18, 2012 16:17
Mods posting deals are obviously doing it for gain, most deals are copied and pasted directy from the affiliate newsletters.
Mods posting deals are obviously promoting companies to which they are connected, through the affiliate links.
It wouldn't be as bad if most went hot, but the vast majority are rubbish anyway, as evidenced by only 2 of 71 being voted hot above.
How often have you bought from them?
I haven't yet, I tend to only post deals from people I've actually bought from so I know what the cs / delivery times are like, but as I said, it's opened my eyes to a new site, so may well buy something from them if its something I want, I hadn't heard of Box until last night, but have bought some home plugs from them ( which I shall prob need help with in installing ) so if they're ok, I'll start to post things from them :D
Edited By: wishihadadonkey on May 18, 2012 16:21
Mods posting deals are obviously doing it for gain, most deals are copied and pasted directy from the affiliate newsletters.
Mods posting deals are obviously promoting companies to which they are connected, through the affiliate links.
It wouldn't be as bad if most went hot, but the vast majority are rubbish anyway, as evidenced by only 2 of 71 being voted hot above.
How often have you bought from them?
I haven't yet, I tend to only post deals from people I've actually bought from so I know what the cs / delivery times are like, but as I said, it's opened my eyes to a new site, so may well buy something from them if its something I want, I hadn't heard of Box until last night, but have bought some home plugs from them ( which I shall prob need help with in installing ) so if they're ok, I'll start to post things from them :D
but that was a good deal, rather than a bad one ;)
Mods posting deals are obviously doing it for gain, most deals are copied and pasted directy from the affiliate newsletters.
Mods posting deals are obviously promoting companies to which they are connected, through the affiliate links.
It wouldn't be as bad if most went hot, but the vast majority are rubbish anyway, as evidenced by only 2 of 71 being voted hot above.
How often have you bought from them?
I haven't yet, I tend to only post deals from people I've actually bought from so I know what the cs / delivery times are like, but as I said, it's opened my eyes to a new site, so may well buy something from them if its something I want, I hadn't heard of Box until last night, but have bought some home plugs from them ( which I shall prob need help with in installing ) so if they're ok, I'll start to post things from them :D
but that was a good deal, rather than a bad one ;)
but who are we to decide what is a good or bad deal for everyone? as I said before one mans trash is another mans treasure, I collect Paddington Bears, any deal posted for them is great for me, but it wouldn't be everyones cup of tea :D
i seem to rememeber some bargain shorts... and more than once.
time to switch back to old skin again - what a crapcake the new one is flickering away
Edited By: brilly on May 19, 2012 21:50
You should. The impllication is pretty dire for HUKD. It's pretty hard to see how a mod would genuinely believe the majority of those deals were weorthy of being posted.
Slight aside, do Zavvi / Hut pay decent affiliate commision?
EDIT
Have they been removed now? Can't find anything searching by merchant using advanced search / deals by merchant
Edited By: Johnboy_1975 on May 22, 2012 18:43
You should. The impllication is pretty dire for HUKD. It's pretty hard to see how a mod would genuinely believe the majority of those deals were weorthy of being posted.
Slight aside, do Zavvi / Hut pay decent affiliate commision?
EDIT
Have they been removed now? Can't find anything searching by merchant using advanced search / deals by merchant
http://www.hotukdeals.com/deals/tifili.com
Any update on this ?
Edited By: fox2020 on Feb 11, 2013 20:18
Any update on this ?
did you bother to search?
http://www.hotukdeals.com/deals/tifili.com
incidently only 2 of 'tifili's' deals ever reached triple figures as the banned member realbender previously mentioned, poor show.
Edited By: casparwhite on Feb 12, 2013 06:25
incidently only 2 of 'tifili's' deals ever reached triple figures as the banned member realbender previously mentioned, poor show.
That's actually a good point.
The voting system on here works so I don't see the need for the site to apparently be misleading the community with mod multi's posing as members and mods who push retailers for cash. Why not just be upfront about where the deal comes from. Have a little indicator stating it is a sponsored link fed direct from the retailer and let the community decide if its a good deal.
Just in case admin has forgotten I'll remind him,
The purpose of the site is to escape from the marketing messages and ads that surround us and get genuine advice from other people about hot deals.
Any type of self-promotion or recommendation where the person profits is severely frowned upon. The basis of the site is that it is for honest tips from other people who don't stand to gain.
Can he honestly hand on heart say these values are still being adhered to.
incidently only 2 of 'tifili's' deals ever reached triple figures as the banned member realbender previously mentioned, poor show.
That's actually a good point.
The voting system on here works so I don't see the need for the site to apparently be misleading the community with mod multi's posing as members and mods who push retailers for cash. Why not just be upfront about where the deal comes from. Have a little indicator stating it is a sponsored link fed direct from the retailer and let the community decide if its a good deal.
Just in case admin has forgotten I'll remind him,
The purpose of the site is to escape from the marketing messages and ads that surround us and get genuine advice from other people about hot deals.
Any type of self-promotion or recommendation where the person profits is severely frowned upon. The basis of the site is that it is for honest tips from other people who don't stand to gain.
Can he honestly hand on heart say these values are still being adhered to.
to be fair ants neither of the companies spoken about are still being posted and as has been shown its ultimately the members that have the final vote
are there other instances of this happening recently?