Why is there this huge outcry over Zango...

you can target domains with zango.

So the advertiser can directly steal traffic from a specific affiliate?

There were discussions over Gator, maybe not in this joint, and they were successfully sued several times.

Bitching? wow... You should read Ben Edelman's site if you really want to get in tune with things. It's not just an ad, it's much more and morphing(as all these scumware companies do) every time they get busted doing shady things.

Do you like to pay a 1.00+ per click only to have some sphincter from somethingsexyplanet steal those customers? I guess you could call it the cost of doing business...............

http://www.benedelman.org/spyware/180-affiliates/
http://www.benedelman.org/news/112006-1.html
http://blogs.zdnet.com/Spyware/?p=856

Gator was a hot topic for awhile too.

From a specific affiliate program, a specific paysite, or even a competitors entire program - as well as any specific domain name you would like

Gator isnt as big at this point in time.
But if you love Zango so much why dontcha download it

Yes that's why everyone was pissed off about AFF, is because they were popping ads over their own affiliates pages. So if a you sent a surfer to them that was infected with zango well it's a pretty good chance your sale was taken from you.

To my knowledge they are still doing it.

Great links. At least it looks like it will be shut down at some point.

Gator hasn't been a threat for years as far as I know, but you're right, zango is huge:

http://www.alexa.com/data/details/tr...=www.zango.com

If you like giving up 5-10% of your revenue to Zango/Others then keep supporting them.

Maybe you should install it, and surf your own sites and see what happens, you might actually get pissed off.

What did you found 4pic?

I would like to know cuz I never used that sponsor and never will but I would like to know what did you find?

Because zango and those sponsoring it sucks

Back in like 99 we were hit hard by gator's software and "took care of it" pretty easily. Definitly targeting the advertisers is the way to go imho.

Downloading it now...

Hope I can get rid of it when I want?

Whatever the current legal status of the practise, to all practical intents and purposes, hijacking surfers between traffic source and destination is theft. However you want to describe it, the use of scumware goes far beyond legitimate competition.

I despair of all the short-sighted ways that so many people in this business sacrifice tomorrow's dollars for today's pennies, but the "Zango" issue is on an entirely different level. It is being sanctioned - even employed - by some of our biggest sponsors. Thus instead of being universally condemned - as it surely would have been in other circumstances - many other sponsors are still cross-selling to the culprits and many big TGP's still promote them.

The effect is to legitimize one of the worst, possibly the worst scam this industry has inflicted on itself to date and there is no way that the damage will be restricted only to such losses as people are suffering directly now. Basically we have sent out a loud and clear message that providing you can get at least one big sponsor behind you, this industry will tolerate anything. Anyone who believes that message will not be heard is not merely naive, but a fool.

As far as AFF in particular are concerned, this issue is just the most recent in a string of dubious business practises, of which allowing their sites to be advertised on file-swapping sites is another example. Such sites are based on content from paysites that is being used illegally: it is a nonsense that one of the biggest sponsors in this business helps make such sites worthwhile. It is perhaps even more of a nonsense that such a company did not long ago become a pariah in this industry.

I have zero interest in professionalism or what you might call "business ethics", for their own sake. The fact is that online porn reaches the world and is selling one of the most appealing products imaginable. Yet last year XBiz published some stats which put us - after more than a decade - at only around 5% of the total value of "adult entertainment". Recently AVN (apparently: I have seen it referred to, but not read it) published an article claiming that our growth last year barely beat inflation.

I see these dismal stats as a consequence of the reality that for more than 5 years - with a handful of honorable exceptions - we have spent more time and energy trying to cut corners and prey on each other than attempting to expand our market. You see it at every level, from reps adopting moronic board personae to reel in the terminally gullible, through to traffic brokers selling near worthless traffic. Designers, busy enough to keep clients waiting for weeks, apparently don't see any reason to take the time to learn how to code properly. Half-assed, over-priced scripts are abandoned once the author gets bored or fulfils his petty ambitions. Etc. Etc. Most affiliates are busy promoting expensive, third-rate crap on which they wouldn't spend a dime of their own money, just because someone is offering a high payout or the chance to win a Hummer or whatever.

All these things are related and to change them, the example has to come from the top. Were that to happen, I believe we would quickly see that the money we have made to date is just a fraction of this industry's real potential. A good first step would be to shun the likes of Zango and anyone who is not actively opposed to their existence.

I wish I could put this in my sig. Great post man.

WOW!! bump for Jayeff well said.

best post ive read in awhile.

You make too much sense. Sadly, I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for any of the abovementioned to happen.

awesome post, jayeff!! you summed it up perfectly. i have a couple of questions:

- is there anything affiliates can do to make this happen ("the example has to come from the top"), any type of pressure we can put on, besides not promoting zango & co?
- is there a way i can check if zango is stealing sales from my ppc campaigns without installing the zango shit?

Bset post on the subject ever.... Graet post dude.

Change in business practises, exactly like social, political and economic change, are almost always driven from the top. This is because among the ranks as it were, there are those who like things the way they are, and more importantly the majority - usually - who are too lethargic to act.

However the motivation for change comes when someone at the top perceives that there is something to be gained from it. That perception can be triggered by a sizeable minority. That is one reason this industry already has a few sponsors who do operate professionally and why some have used the opposition to Zango to score a few brownie points for themselves.

The answer to your question, tiresome as it is, is just to keep banging away, not just about scumware, but about anything which bugs you. For example, Jace has been making a fuss about RSS feeds recently. It may be that only a couple of sponsors will pay attention this time around, but if the pressure is kept up, others will follow. Eventually, producing non-working and/or ineffective feeds will be the exception and not the rule.

There is a potentially good thing about Zango, which is that if you look at the life cycle of any industry, it starts out as a wild west scenario with everyone preying on everyone else. As large operators emerge and grow more, it becomes less worth their while to prey on individuals and inevitably they start to prey on each other, as the only targets rich enough to be worth their time and effort.

That is the point at which you see widespread change and although I suspect Zango is about 5 years too soon, if not Zango, something similar will be the key. The thing about scumware is that while it affects a lot of affiliates in a very small way, its impact is greatest on other sponsors. As those who have become complacent because they have fulfilled their ambitions, are replaced at the top of the tree by hungrier newcomers, anything but legitimate competition will become increasingly less acceptable.

This is true of everything which broadly comes under the heading of "professionalism", because industries do not stand still. Those who want to rise to the top today cannot use the same methods as worked for those who are already at the top. To displace existing companies, they need to be better. Thus standards inevitably rise, no matter how much that is resisted.


Not that I'm aware of and even if you do attempt to check (by infecting a spare PC for example), you only get a snapshot of that moment in time. A week or a month later, their customers and targets will have changed.

Great read Jayeff ;-)

Zango = cocksucking thieves



No better than someone coming into your house and taking shit.


Not too long ago I installed Zango on a PC I was formatting and selling, I browsed one of my sites, www.newpornchicks.com, and I wasn't shocked to find that I was getting popped over VERY often.

i just noticed this....yeah, that is my goal, and it is actually starting to pay off...more sponsors are finally stepping up to the plate to get shit done right

it takes a while, but it works

why would VeriSign approve of them and be on their site?