I’m curious as to whether the industry will start moving from last-touch attribution to first-touch (or multi-touch) attribution instead.
The only reason last-touch (last affiliate link gets all the credit) is commonplace now is because it’s easy to implement. No need for long-term tracking. What the industry really wants is either first-touch (first affiliate link or ad you click gets the credit) or multi-touch (the payment is split between every affiliate), depending on who you ask.
You probably can’t definitively say they don’t just by isolated checking. There could be a lot at play here. Maybe they turned it off while the heat is on, maybe whatever affiliate you were looking at didn’t actually have a matching affiliate link on their side. Maybe there’s an a/b test where they only jack a certain percentage.
When Linus Tech Tips first took them out as a sponsor they didn’t appear to be jacking then either. But it would be very simple to build a system that turned link jacking off for certain users or during certain times or at certain thresholds.
Brave got caught doing it, and then stopped because the backlash was going to be worse than the advantage. Brave still had plenty of other ways to make money via search, selling advertising and BAT. I honestly don’t fault brave for trying that because they are funding significant development to block ads.
Honey’s base business model probably falls apart without some linkjacking. You go to a website to buy something and it says no no go buy it from these people instead. They’ve got to have it a lower price still have enough margin to sell it to you at that price, and pay honey for the redirection. It’s kind of a sales worst case dilemma.
Honey’s base business model probably falls apart without some linkjacking. You go to a website to buy something and it says no no go buy it from these people instead.
Additionally, the video asserts that Honey does not always find users the best discounts, either. Despite the browser extension’s past advertising, the video showed multiple examples of Honey not presenting the best coupon codes to the consumer. Further supporting this claim is wording from Honey’s FAQ page for partner businesses and its terms of use agreement. According to the FAQ page, any business that has an official partnership with Honey (in order to partner, a business must pay Honey a 3% commission) can add or remove codes from the platform. Additionally, the following paragraphs can be found within Honey’s terms of use agreement:
While we try and find you the best available discounts and coupons, and to identify low prices, we may not always find you the best deal. PayPal is not responsible for any missed savings or rewards opportunities
This one is now opt in with very ambiguous language and doesn’t tell you what is doing. I like suggested search results and might check that if I didn’t know better.
All I know is, I downloaded NewPipe thinking I had a thing, and it doesn’t work 70% of the time, but what it DOES do it have a button that says “Open in Browser” which I hit and the video opens in Brave and NO ADS.
Aside from the element of deception towards their sponsored creators, I wonder if this will set precedent for what is a relatively common practice.
https://sirlinksalot.co/affiliate-hijacking/
Honey isn’t the only one doing this. Brave Browser does it too:
https://github.com/brave/brave-browser/issues/10134
I’m curious as to whether the industry will start moving from last-touch attribution to first-touch (or multi-touch) attribution instead.
The only reason last-touch (last affiliate link gets all the credit) is commonplace now is because it’s easy to implement. No need for long-term tracking. What the industry really wants is either first-touch (first affiliate link or ad you click gets the credit) or multi-touch (the payment is split between every affiliate), depending on who you ask.
Does or did? It’s not clear from the link at first glance.
They don’t do it any more. Source: just checked.
Interesting how brave stills gets dragged through the mud for this, meanwhile firefox gets to walk free about the looking glass fiasco.
You probably can’t definitively say they don’t just by isolated checking. There could be a lot at play here. Maybe they turned it off while the heat is on, maybe whatever affiliate you were looking at didn’t actually have a matching affiliate link on their side. Maybe there’s an a/b test where they only jack a certain percentage.
When Linus Tech Tips first took them out as a sponsor they didn’t appear to be jacking then either. But it would be very simple to build a system that turned link jacking off for certain users or during certain times or at certain thresholds.
Brave got caught doing it, and then stopped because the backlash was going to be worse than the advantage. Brave still had plenty of other ways to make money via search, selling advertising and BAT. I honestly don’t fault brave for trying that because they are funding significant development to block ads.
Honey’s base business model probably falls apart without some linkjacking. You go to a website to buy something and it says no no go buy it from these people instead. They’ve got to have it a lower price still have enough margin to sell it to you at that price, and pay honey for the redirection. It’s kind of a sales worst case dilemma.
That’s not what Honey does.
Yes exactly, honey finds you coupon codes. It doesn’t redirect you to go buy from someone else.
Because the Firefox looking glass fiasco wasn’t close to the same level and they immediately responded to criticism on the issue.
Meanwhile there is a pattern of behaviour like this from Brave.
What, sorry? I think you have a typo.
This one is now opt in with very ambiguous language and doesn’t tell you what is doing. I like suggested search results and might check that if I didn’t know better.
https://brave.com/blog/referral-codes-in-suggested-sites/
They have a habit of doing pretty terrible scammy practices, funnily their bugs all seem to make them money:
https://www.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/191yu33/why_is_brave_highly_disliked_in_the_privacy/
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42353473
All I know is, I downloaded NewPipe thinking I had a thing, and it doesn’t work 70% of the time, but what it DOES do it have a button that says “Open in Browser” which I hit and the video opens in Brave and NO ADS.
EVERYTIME.
So do you. “Precedent”
Ha! Fixed, cheers. :)
Edited