Plaxo's Personal Card: Comcast to Acquire Plaxo; Pulse to Become Central to Creating Unified “Social Media” Experience Across the Web, the TV (and more)
Chris Messina
· 1 year ago
Not that this is necessarily a surprise (it's one of those surprises that makes sense in retrospect) but my initial reaction was definitely "Oh fuck." I have nothing but contempt for Comcast, except for twitter.com/comcastcares.
Man, I hope that McCrae and Joseph Smarr have positions of authority in the future Plaxo. They're the only folks I know from Plaxo, and the only ones I might at all trust.
Comcast, I don't.
therealmccrea
· 1 year ago
Factoryjoe, I appreciate your trust of me and Joseph, and look forward to proving to you that we will remain genuine partners in the effort to open up the Social Web, based on open standards.
Clint Boulton
· 1 year ago
John McCrea:
I think the consensus is "what a shame." How is this positive at all? Plaxo is getting absorbed by a big comms player. Imagine how people feel if Microsoft subsumed Facebook. Social-oriented sites cultivate customers who start to trust them When one gets acquired by a big comms player, the initial reaction is "I don't want that company's paws on my data." And now you can't guarantee that. All the work -- Pulse -- to free up siloed e-mail contacts is for naught, no?
therealmccrea
· 1 year ago
Clint, that's not the consensus I am seeing and hearing when I look at the coverage of this announcement. I see a lot of "smart move" observations, as this makes a ton of sense.
We will continue to operate independently and protect users' data with a super-strong privacy policy.
Ryan Cannon
· 1 year ago
"I see a lot of "smart move" observations, as this makes a ton of sense."
Yes, it is a smart move for the owners/investors of Plaxo: they're probably going to be making a ton of money off of the deal. The "what a shame" consensus comes from the users of Plaxo. Comcast is not the type of people you want to be associated with. It's just a smart move they'll be making with at least one fewer user: I deleted my account as soon as I heard the news.
club penguin
· 7 months ago
It's been amazing to watch the company evolve since its founding. You guys have grown the company masterfully.
Carter
· 1 year ago
Obviously you havent looked too hard. If I had a dime for every blog or "expert" that commented on how stupid you were to allow Comcast to purchase you, I would be able to purchase you myself. Comcast is garbage. If people were allowed choices for internet providers, Comcast would become the Bear Stearns of IPs.
Reynoso
· 1 year ago
Who says you will continue to operate INDEPENDENTLY? Who holds the key to the large corporate bank? That's what matters or you would not have been bought. I almost signed up for Plaxo until I heard of this news.
Scott
· 1 year ago
You'll have to excuse me if I sound a bit skeptical of Plaxo's ongoing commitment to current Plaxo users. I don't doubt the Plaxo employees desire to continue serving both Comcast and non-Comcast customers, but someone in Comcast corporate will have the bright idea of making Plaxo's service an "in-network" exclusive for their customers. At that time they'll probably kill off Pulse and use the best parts of it (photo sharing, etc) to enhance their own Comcast-branded online offerings. The Plaxo name will also die at that time. It will all be victim of some Comcast executive who wants to do cost-cutting.
It's a shame, and not because I don't like Comcast. I have never been their customer primarily because they don't offer service in my area of the country. I have no reason to like or dislike them as I have no experience with them.
And although I have been evangelizing Plaxo to all my friends and family, the new Pulse service just isn't gaining enough traction. If it was, they wouldn't have sold the company.
jamestille
· 1 year ago
Humm, I must be a rare exception to the rule. I tried other Internet providers and found that they did not have as good of product as Comcast. After much frustration with other providers, I bundled my phone, TV, and Internet with Comcast. They have provided nothing but quality service. My phone is up and working all of the time. Comcast provides a backup battery for power outages. My TV is up and showing the overwhelming majority of the time except when weather knocks out the power. My Internet connection is extremely fast and functional as I have not only Comcast's power supply but my own to backup that one. I plan to look into the Plaxo aspect to see if it might help me as an individual to sync all of my calendars from all of my various sources including my soon-to-be-purchased iPhone 3G. Profane postings seem to demostrate a higher level of inability to communicate one's ideas. I tend to disregard them as not very sound advise. I'll give the Plaxo product a try as a satisfied Comcast customer and see if it meets my needs.
ZenJD
· 1 year ago
I just got an invite to join from a friend of mine, not sure if it was automatic or not, as we currently connect on Facebook.
Congrats for the crew of Plaxo as every company hopes to grow and get bigger backing.
But considering that I've had a decade of experience in dealing with Comcast as a customer and on behalf of a municipality.. I can easily say I WILL NOT SIGN UP! !
Why? 1) Comcast has had my personal information stolen in the past. 2) Comcast has a lack of technology competent people working for them, (from my 20 years experience) at EVERY level of the organization. 3) I hope that the Plaxo people can stay in charge of things or else their service will become the joke that @Home with Comcast has become. (for those who don't have comcast high-speed.. advertised speeds keep going up hand in hand with rising down-time and slower and slower real-world data rates.)
Thom
· 1 year ago
I used the FREE Plaxo for a couple of years before signing up for Premium. I paid the $50 to benefit from 1) Being able to update more than 1000 contacts en masse, and 2) Being able to easily remove duplicates. Shortly after paying the money, I found that the duplicate remover didn't work (for me), and then they took away the ability to update en masse. On top of that, the Gmail sync has never worked for me which would have been a huge bonus. I've not benefited one cent from Premium. And the news of this merger makes me for SURE want to not renew because I am really not sure I want my whole database sitting out there with yet another communications compnay. Plaxo, you've changed. Please I would like to have my money back.
mfoellmer
· 1 year ago
what about the status of the lack of linkedin sync service?
Matt Agnello
· 1 year ago
I was seriously considering using Plaxo not only for some of its cooler features but also to sync contacts between Address Book and Gmail. After seeing this blog post, I'm seriously reconsidering that.
I think this is a great move financially, and it makes sense on paper. However, I think it's a huge PR mistake, and it will ruin the trust people have placed in Plaxo. People tend to trust institutions that not only serve them but are independent and won't mix its interests with that of something else. I don't want Plaxo to make decisions because it would benefit Comcast, I want to see Plaxo make decisions because it will benefit ME.
That, and the whole fiasco with Comcast paying people to fill up seats at its FCC hearing.
So I'm very excited for your investors, but sorry Plaxo, I'm going to have to go somewhere else.
Bryan
· 1 year ago
"It's the end of the world as we know it...."
I guess I'm going back to manually doing what you do, since Comcast screwed me so many times I have permanent anal issues. And after working for one of their divisions that they bought, then dissected, and left us in the cold, owing me about $6,000 in commissions, I KNOW what they are all about. I've never paid a dime to that evil empire since that day when they lied to my face, and if Plaxo now comes to me for premium dollar signups, you can wave my account goodbye too.
I'm sure someone else will fill the void left by Plaxo's digression into the worthless "social networking" miasma. I just hope it's sooner rather than later. No offense to you, Bob, Cameron & Todd - you're businessmen looking to make a profit and cash in. I don't blame you for that, it's the American way. But you will find a mass exodus with this news like you'd never have expected. Best of luck in your next venture.
ColinATL
· 1 year ago
Plaxo, I've been a very loyal customer for some time, pretty much since the beginning. I've had my ups and downs with your service, but it's been mostly ups. Pulse was a good idea, although it's made me a little dizzy. Your LinkedIn sync keeps messing up my address book ... wish you'd make that one just go one way. I've been syncing between a PC at work and Macs at home, and that used to work great, but lately, not so much. What I'm getting at is that I think you may have peaked. I don't wish that on you, but it's just my personal experience.
Now Comcast takes over. Seriously, I'm shaking in my boots. I'm going to stick it out to see what happens, but color me skeptical. Seriously, I can't think of a communications provider with whom I've had more bad experiences. I love Comcast's ads. I think their marketing department is brilliant. But operations, you know the people who actually deliver the service at Comcast, has been seriously lacking and underfunded for quite some time. I'm more than happy to relay my personal nightmare, but you don't want to hear that. Let's just say that it took 3 months to fix something that was ultimately fixed after only 18 hours when I finally got smart and copied all of my elected officials on the email I sent to the regional marketing VP. Amazing what the implied threat of re-regulation will do to a service provider.
Plaxo, I hope nothing but the best for you, but like I said, color me skeptical.
therealmccrea
· 1 year ago
Thanks for your support and for deciding to stick it out. I promise we will not let you down.
Carter
· 1 year ago
Famous last words. You sold to Comcast. The company awards the employee that let down the most customers. The only promise comcast can make is that they promise to piss you off.
Evert
· 1 year ago
Hmm... I just hope this doesn't mean Plaxo will go the same way as PlanetAll (remember them...?)
After they were acquired by Amazon it didn't take long before they were no longer there... :-(
therealmccrea
· 1 year ago
Thanks, Evert! We're not going away. We're going to keep innovating on our existing services and bring them to more users and more end-points.
Evert
· 1 year ago
If I recall they said something similar at PlanetAll...
But since I so far have no negative experiences at all with Plaxo and no experiences (positive/negative) with ComCast, I'll give you guys/gals the benefit of the doubt. 8-)
Ross McKillop
· 1 year ago
And I just deleted my Plaxo account...
Shawn Y.
· 1 year ago
Bravo in terms of corporate development, but as a paying, "premium" customer since you introduced the option, I see a future without Plaxo. I wouldn't trust Comcast any further than I could dead-lift and shotput their corporate headquarters.
Sorry to see it happen.
KiltBear
· 1 year ago
Sorry, but my first reaction is "Oh expletive!"
If Plaxo becomes anything like the nonsense sites of Facebook or MySpace, I'll be canceling quickly. I like Plaxo for 2 reasons. 1. The universal support of Address Book and Calendar syncing across platforms 2. It is a place to store real connections with people.
To me it is like Linked In with good software integration. I don't want Facebook or MySpace type crap.
Dean Simmer
· 1 year ago
My initial reaction was a much harsher version of "of bummer." I have had terrible experiences with Comcast as a customer in the past.
Alex Rodriguez
· 1 year ago
That sucks.....
Alex
· 1 year ago
Yes
David Weekly
· 1 year ago
Congrats, guys!!! It's been amazing to watch the company evolve since its founding. You guys have grown the company masterfully.
therealmccrea
· 1 year ago
On behalf of the team at Plaxo, thanks, David!
Sean Oliver
· 1 year ago
Wow, I hope you guys got paid. This sucks as far as customers go.
jgn
· 1 year ago
Congratulations!
Lynn Sorel
· 1 year ago
Personally, I do not want Comcast handling any data of mine, and I have heard this repeatedly as a News reporter.
I really think this is a major mistake. There are more negative responses to your announcement than good ones.
As a business surely you must understand that, if you do not please your customers (readers) they will just end up going someplace else. Are you killing Plaxo or helping it ?
I have interviewed many comcast employee's , you would be very surprised to hear what they say about their company. I hope you have done your homework.
I wish you the best of luck, LYNN
Nathan
· 1 year ago
Uh oh. Where were those instructions on cancelling my Plaxo account? Or should I try to dirty up all my contacts' data first? Comcast has a terrible reputation among everyone I've ever talked to for abusing customers' trust.
Marc Canter
· 1 year ago
congrats! Noww e get to see what happens next?
therealmccrea
· 1 year ago
Thanks, Marc! You can expect to see more good stuff and continued support of our shared passion: truly opening up the Social Web!
aschek
· 1 year ago
This is the end, my friend... and I just signed in for the premium Plaxo service...
DCSmitty
· 1 year ago
Yikes! Please remove me and all of my information completely from Plaxo immediately!
Daniel Ha
· 1 year ago
Congrats guys! I hope we continue to see great things from Plaxo under a new roof. :)
therealmccrea
· 1 year ago
Thanks Daniel!
rguion
· 1 year ago
I should have known something was about to happen when I saw Plaxo available on Comcast. I don't have hatred for Comcast--since I am a customer they often throw in great services like this for free.
I really like Plaxo; it has grown over the past year. I hope you will be making the same great improvements now that you are part of a bigger company.
Ferdinand
· 1 year ago
That's bad news. We sync our company contacts with Plaxo and of course we need 110% assurance that we have total control over our content. I don't know about Comcast, but I don't want that _any_ company in the media and information field has access to our data, since for them *validated* contacts are an extreme valuable good. How can Plaxo assure that there will be firewall around the content which prevents Comcast from accessing to our data?
For the time being we will stay with Plaxo, but as soon I see an alternative I will switch.
Ferdinand
· 1 year ago
It seems that Comcast is even lying to its customers:
The allegation: Comcast in blocking (often legitimate) P2P traffic [Quote:] US ISPs are generally perceived by users here to offer unlimited and fairly neutral connections to the 'Net for a monthly fee. Or they were, anyway, until Comcast admitted that it was "delaying" P2P traffic at peak times. [...] "Consumers have no reason left to trust their cable company. These Internet experts have also unequivocally demonstrated that blocking is not limited to times of supposed congestion. Their sophisticated testing shows that Comcast and Cox block BitTorrent applications at all times of the day—not just at times of peak traffic. [...] Of the nine ISPs in the US found to block BitTorrent, Comcast and Cox were far and away the most aggressive. Both blocked more than half of all attempted BitTorrent tests on their networks. [end qoute]
Comcast´s answer today (May 15, 08): [Quote]"Comcast does not, has not, and will not block any websites or online applications, including peer-to-peer services like BitTorrent." [end qoute] The quotes are published today: http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080515-u...
This company which obviously cannot be trusted at all will soon have access to our addresses? The longer I think about the deal the sooner I will cancel our Premium account.
Rudolf
· 1 year ago
This is what I posted on Gigaom.... Have to say it's probably great for your investors/competitors, but probably not for your company and future goals.
The trouble is that I see absolutely no fit whatsoever between Plaxo and Comcast. Comcast is a regional cable network operator in one country (yes you’re a big country, but still).
Plaxo is a global service provider, trying to capture a global service market. It will have to do this by working globally, but also bringing in national offerings to advertisers etc. There is no fit between Comcasts organization and all those national offices that Plaxo needs. Comcast doesn’t open any doors in Europe or Asia. It’s internal procedures are geared towards selling cable subscriptions, not to supporting advertising space in a very specific marktet.
Even a merger with Gigaom would have been a better strategic fit. Sounds like Endemol and Telefonica or AOL and Time Warner all over again.
Louise Marston
· 1 year ago
What am I supposed to make of this as UK user? I'm never going to be on Comcast's radar, so how can I expect any service in the future? I'm reluctant to remove my account, as I haven't found another service that will synchronise my stuff between work/home/iPhone as well as Plaxo does. But it does make we want to look again, as I don't feel like I'm going to be a priority for the Comcast-owned Plaxo in future.
nickc321
· 1 year ago
well, I guess congrats are in order. All I hope is that Comcast allows the current leadership at Plaxo to continue taking Plaxo to the next level. chances are probably slim, but we can hope and see.
charris1980
· 1 year ago
deleted my plaxo acct. too
Dirk Diggler
· 1 year ago
Comcast sucks and not got suckier.
Dariana Lau
· 1 year ago
Congrats old Plaxo friends! :)
Acne
· 1 year ago
Congratulations.... Go Plaxo!
By the way, I've never had very good experiences with ComCast in the past... I'm very pleased with Plaxo though!
Matthew
· 1 year ago
After using Plaxo for years, I just deleted my account. Lately, I think the company has lost it's focus on its core product. No one joined Plaxo for social networking - they joined to sync between multiple computers. Now that the Google contact sync API is public, a replacement for Plaxo will soon be available. I feel bad that the contact information of all my friends, colleagues, and family members are now going to be available for mining by Comcast.
Dane Santos
· 1 year ago
Congratulations! to the Plaxo team that has made it the success it is. May you reap the rewards you justly deserve.
Jon
· 1 year ago
After several years Plaxo had just earned my trust... boom that's gone again. My instinct is to delete my entire account immediately, but after investing so much time building my address book I'm hesitant to delete it. Comcast sucks...
It'd be nice if the Plaxo team could give us some guidance on what data will be shared between Plaxo and Comcast.
Rob
· 1 year ago
notice that plaxo is silent in response to this post
Ed McNichol
· 1 year ago
Off to delete my account - I'll never trust Comcast. Never.
dr
· 1 year ago
Feh, time to close my account. Comcast are only too happy to play net cop and I really don't trust them.
Steve
· 1 year ago
Goodbye Plaxo. I might have stayed around if it was not Comcast.
I dis-associated myself with anything less than 2 degrees of separation from Comcast about 10 years ago. I have used Plaxo for almost as long.
Those employed with Plaxo have little to woory about. Comcast will just throw some of the money they have extorted from their customers at you.
joana
· 1 year ago
Um mundo melhor para todos, com muito amor e carinho. beijos joana
remarque
· 1 year ago
... try Swahili next time :)
Tyler Struve
· 1 year ago
Since we are in the middle of your transistion perhaps you should allow us to maintain PLAXO PREM at no charge for exsisting account holders. I am a Comcast fan and have been since Dallas in 2000. You have come along way, however your fans like me with the reward to be part of this can refer people in return. I pay you guys for services or value, return the favor and comp our subscription and well at least I will get people on your behalf. In not thats fine too, suggestion only, not ever wanting someting free or a handout, only help each other with a reward for both parties.
greglins
· 1 year ago
Great win for Plaxo shareholders, and a bad move for the customer.
I won't rush off to delete my account, but I certainly won't be actively adding new contacts here. I mostly use LinkedIn anyway.
Data_NOT_Safe
· 1 year ago
You might want to RUSH to delete your account now...
A short term win unless "we" are missing something... the customers are the reason Comcast was interested in the first place.
I'm a LinkedIn user who just received a Plaxo invite that just did a bit of clicking to check Plaxo out again (been a while since I visited or received an invite) before signing up. That sign up part will not be happening.
Robert
· 1 year ago
I have been with Plaxo for quite a long time now both as a free subscriber and premium subscriber, In this world of mergers and keeping up with the competition online, I can just say that I have joined many services and the only one that I still use and have not deleted is Plaxo. It was a great innovation and it feels just as important as my word application or my cell phone. I really hope that the service continues as is and does not become just another social network with some really great functions because I will feel I have lost the privacy to my content and since I was one of the first people on I convinced my friends to trust you guys. On that note please don't make me convince them to delete the account it would a great loss of a great service. Comcast works with annual sales forecast and content acquisition platforms and of course Plaxo is a perfect fit for them but is Comcast truly a perfect fit for Plaxo?
Robert R
Denise
· 1 year ago
Are you still able to sign in ?? If not how do you aquire your data that is stored do you know.?? It keeps showing operation abort when i go to sign in Plaxo.. Never knew all this was happening . I have things in there i don't have anywhere else cause i trusted they would never leave.. Now what ..
Damn. I was using and loving Plaxo, but now I may look for an alternative. Any suggestions?
mysay
· 1 year ago
I was invited to join plaxo but will not. after reading this blog and finding that comcast will now own plaxo..........NO WAY WILL I JOIN!! comcast DOES NOT SUPPORT NET NEUTRALITY!!
nicholasyoung
· 1 year ago
Darn. I'm canceling my account now.
river runner
· 1 year ago
I have had experience with Comcast. They hold the monopoly on our cable service. Mention Comcast at a party. You will get hoots and derision. It's fine so long as it works, but try to get through to a person when you have a problem. Trust me, you won't. So happy for the guys and gals who got the checks when you sold. As for the rest of you, get set to be dissed - or worse ignored.
patent hunter
· 1 year ago
Wow! A wannabe company like Plaxo gets acquired for $175M? Comcast people must be blind or what? Wait until they find out Plaxo don't own any useful patents and there are patents out there that will kill their deal!
Brian
· 1 year ago
DAMN!
sohbet
· 1 year ago
thank you
mirc
· 1 year ago
thank you
Tony Costa
· 1 year ago
Well, my plaxo dollars will go to Linkedin or any other social media out there.
tupperwarequeen
· 1 year ago
Comcast should be known as comCUNT.
I have worked for them and they scammed me out of over 100+ hours on my paycheck and they said I didnt work it.
Also when I had paid service with them they told me my 1st bill would be $55.98 and when I got my 1st bill boy was I shocked it was $458.00.
lily
· 1 year ago
I hate comcast!!! they have the worst service and NEVER do anything to fix the horrible service I have had from them for 4 years. I don't watch TV so all my complaints are regarding their internet service. I usually don't complain about companies or people but the way they have treated me and my service has been beyond any good words. Some friends invited me over here to sign up but now I will have to re-think it. Wow, I just read some of the responses and am surprised at how many people feel the same way about bad-blood with comcast. I hope it works out for you.
Big O
· 1 year ago
I've been using Plaxo for a few years now and I have been nothing but happy with the service. I've recommended it to friends and family and they use it too.
I hate Comcast...I just don't know how else to say it. I've never been a customer but I have had friends and family who deal with them and I've seen their service and how they treat their customers. And it's NOT GOOD!! I just hope that even though Comcast is acquiring Plaxo that Plaxo is allowed to do what they've been doing without any interference from Comcast. I'm sure financially this will help Plaxo but I really hope that nothing changes.
I really, really, really, really, really, really, really like Plaxo!
PortPowerKS
· 1 year ago
Is it just me or does this story makes you think you're hearing Sam & Dave's "I'm Your Puppet"? Oh wait, that's Plaxo serenading Comcast..
gopsux.com
· 1 year ago
comcast sucks donkey. It ranked one of the worst utility companies in the US this year on MSN. In 2003 they came public and said they were going to view everything their customers were surfing, including email. Can you say "Quantico Circuit"?
Plaxo is going to be used for SPAMvertising from now on. You can't put anything personal on plaxo anymore and trust comcast won't forward your info to the FBI.
tragelguiding
· 1 year ago
Factoryjoe, I appreciate your trust of me and Joseph, and look forward to proving to you that we will remain genuine partners in the effort to open up the Social Web, based on open standards.
psychosmurf
· 1 year ago
I came here with the intention of signing up with Plaxo until I saw that Comcast was acquiring them. That ended that deal right there. Good-bye Plaxo!
Jonq
· 1 year ago
My dick is smelling of shit; however, it also smells of vinegar.
shelia watkins
· 1 year ago
I believe i am going to like this. Thanks
Ambassador
· 1 year ago
Aquired or partner? Which one? I want to know who is responsible for e-mails being sent out using pulse@mx.plaxo.com name? I received an invitation by email, who I thought was my sister, to learn more about Pulse. It read I'd like to keep in touch with you on Plaxo Pulse. Click here to learn more: http://pulse.plaxo.com/pulse/invite?i=xxxx&xxxx... Thanks, sandi My sister said she didn't send it, but had accepted the invitation from a friend. She said it ended up copying her whole address book and she couldn't stop it. First, it said to click "to learn" not "click so we can copy your address book and send out invitations to everyone you have in your address book." You know, if I had such a program, I could find out every e-mail address and phone number (whatever is in the address book) to every employer that has an Internet connection. This information gathering technique should be illegal if done without full disclosure.
KJ
· 1 year ago
I started using LinkedIn (for business) and Orkut (for personal) years ago. LinkedIn seems OK; although, it really wasn't very useful when I was trying to make contacts with a local company for employment prospects. I never really got into Orkut; not many of my friends are active on it.
Recently, I've got a few web sites (like Naymz and RatePoint) hijacking my name on search engines and trying to get me to join them. It's like black-mail: subscribe to our system or no one will be able to find you.
Now there's Plaxo... Like Orkut, Facebook, MySpace, Friendster, hi5, Twitter, Xanga, etc., Plaxo seems to be another social networking site.
What's different? How does it compare?? What is Plaxo's community think??? I guess there should really be a review site that reviews sites like these... Oh wait, there is...
Dee Wynd
· 1 year ago
Would like v. much to get started in this, but it is all so vague.....for instance it cut me off when I was registering. Any explanation as to how to proceed would help. Thanks, Dee
Carole Wilson
· 1 year ago
Make sense since I use Comcast
Denise
· 1 year ago
Where do you go to get your plaxo data you had stored ??
Dale Lundquist
· 1 year ago
I just joined Plaxo and the very first thing I read is that it has merged with Comcast which, in competition with Microsoft, is a shining example of how to succeed by never allowing moral or ethical considerations to enter into your decisionmaking process, bully tactics and using obscene amounts of cash to compensate for an almost complete lack of vision or competence.
This NOT an auspicious beginning but on the other hand, it's always nice to have someone in the family to complain about.
Guy Hoogewerf
· 1 year ago
Another sell out - web users don't want to be part of the likes of Com Crap
Michael
· 1 year ago
I rec'd a message from a colleague to join. I thought I was already a member as I had a password. Your system could not locate same. There is no way to send you an email other than via blog! Can we spell SERVICE. And now conglomerate Comcast is sucking you up. Your companies should fit well together. Comcast has horrible service too! Good luck.. You'll need it.
S. SAKOFF
· 1 year ago
DON'T UNDERSTAND WHAT IT DOES/DID ON MY PC- REMOVED PULSE PLAXO OPTION 10/26/08
Karen
· 1 year ago
You sneaky s.o.b.'s. How dare you add this CRAP to my computer, hide it all over the place making it a real pain to get rid of - like warts. I HATE Plaxo and I HATE comcast. You have hogged up memory with this useless piece of garbage. I also lost half of my addresses, you changed the format from first name first, to last name first ,in the address book which incidently ,I can't use because when you click on the address bookto add the person you want to send your email to-, the email disappears. I hate the way Microsoft looks now - It is not easy on the eye anymore and I can't believe that good ole "TRUST US Comcast" pulled such a fast one. You better remove any of my personal information. Y'all really outdid yourselves this time. If I didn't have a contract with Comcast it would be Adios amigos. Comcast - you just plain suck.
Ed
· 10 months ago
Tried to get Plaxo service through comcast and abended with endless loop...created 45 internet explorer sessions before I re-booted....UGLY
club penguin
· 7 months ago
Bravo in terms of corporate development, but as a paying, "premium" customer since you introduced the option, I see a future without Plaxo. I wouldn't trust Comcast any further than I could dead-lift and shotput their corporate headquarters.
tiffany363
· 2 months ago
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· 1 year ago
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All Comments
Man, I hope that McCrae and Joseph Smarr have positions of authority in the future Plaxo. They're the only folks I know from Plaxo, and the only ones I might at all trust.
Comcast, I don't.
I think the consensus is "what a shame." How is this positive at all? Plaxo is getting absorbed by a big comms player. Imagine how people feel if Microsoft subsumed Facebook. Social-oriented sites cultivate customers who start to trust them When one gets acquired by a big comms player, the initial reaction is "I don't want that company's paws on my data." And now you can't guarantee that. All the work -- Pulse -- to free up siloed e-mail contacts is for naught, no?
We will continue to operate independently and protect users' data with a super-strong privacy policy.
Yes, it is a smart move for the owners/investors of Plaxo: they're probably going to be making a ton of money off of the deal. The "what a shame" consensus comes from the users of Plaxo. Comcast is not the type of people you want to be associated with. It's just a smart move they'll be making with at least one fewer user: I deleted my account as soon as I heard the news.
It's a shame, and not because I don't like Comcast. I have never been their customer primarily because they don't offer service in my area of the country. I have no reason to like or dislike them as I have no experience with them.
And although I have been evangelizing Plaxo to all my friends and family, the new Pulse service just isn't gaining enough traction. If it was, they wouldn't have sold the company.
Congrats for the crew of Plaxo as every company hopes to grow and get bigger backing.
But considering that I've had a decade of experience in dealing with Comcast as a customer and on behalf of a municipality.. I can easily say I WILL NOT SIGN UP! !
Why?
1) Comcast has had my personal information stolen in the past.
2) Comcast has a lack of technology competent people working for them, (from my 20 years experience) at EVERY level of the organization.
3) I hope that the Plaxo people can stay in charge of things or else their service will become the joke that @Home with Comcast has become. (for those who don't have comcast high-speed.. advertised speeds keep going up hand in hand with rising down-time and slower and slower real-world data rates.)
I think this is a great move financially, and it makes sense on paper. However, I think it's a huge PR mistake, and it will ruin the trust people have placed in Plaxo. People tend to trust institutions that not only serve them but are independent and won't mix its interests with that of something else. I don't want Plaxo to make decisions because it would benefit Comcast, I want to see Plaxo make decisions because it will benefit ME.
That, and the whole fiasco with Comcast paying people to fill up seats at its FCC hearing.
So I'm very excited for your investors, but sorry Plaxo, I'm going to have to go somewhere else.
I guess I'm going back to manually doing what you do, since Comcast screwed me so many times I have permanent anal issues. And after working for one of their divisions that they bought, then dissected, and left us in the cold, owing me about $6,000 in commissions, I KNOW what they are all about. I've never paid a dime to that evil empire since that day when they lied to my face, and if Plaxo now comes to me for premium dollar signups, you can wave my account goodbye too.
I'm sure someone else will fill the void left by Plaxo's digression into the worthless "social networking" miasma. I just hope it's sooner rather than later. No offense to you, Bob, Cameron & Todd - you're businessmen looking to make a profit and cash in. I don't blame you for that, it's the American way. But you will find a mass exodus with this news like you'd never have expected. Best of luck in your next venture.
Now Comcast takes over. Seriously, I'm shaking in my boots. I'm going to stick it out to see what happens, but color me skeptical. Seriously, I can't think of a communications provider with whom I've had more bad experiences. I love Comcast's ads. I think their marketing department is brilliant. But operations, you know the people who actually deliver the service at Comcast, has been seriously lacking and underfunded for quite some time. I'm more than happy to relay my personal nightmare, but you don't want to hear that. Let's just say that it took 3 months to fix something that was ultimately fixed after only 18 hours when I finally got smart and copied all of my elected officials on the email I sent to the regional marketing VP. Amazing what the implied threat of re-regulation will do to a service provider.
Plaxo, I hope nothing but the best for you, but like I said, color me skeptical.
After they were acquired by Amazon it didn't take long before they were no longer there... :-(
But since I so far have no negative experiences at all with Plaxo and no experiences (positive/negative) with ComCast, I'll give you guys/gals the benefit of the doubt. 8-)
Sorry to see it happen.
If Plaxo becomes anything like the nonsense sites of Facebook or MySpace, I'll be canceling quickly. I like Plaxo for 2 reasons.
1. The universal support of Address Book and Calendar syncing across platforms
2. It is a place to store real connections with people.
To me it is like Linked In with good software integration. I don't want Facebook or MySpace type crap.
I really think this is a major mistake. There are more negative responses to your announcement than good ones.
As a business surely you must understand that, if you do not please your customers (readers) they will just end up going someplace else. Are you killing Plaxo or helping it ?
I have interviewed many comcast employee's , you would be very surprised to hear what they say about their company. I hope you have done your homework.
I wish you the best of luck,
LYNN
I really like Plaxo; it has grown over the past year. I hope you will be making the same great improvements now that you are part of a bigger company.
I don't know about Comcast, but I don't want that _any_ company in the media and information field has access to our data, since for them *validated* contacts are an extreme valuable good. How can Plaxo assure that there will be firewall around the content which prevents Comcast from accessing to our data?
For the time being we will stay with Plaxo, but as soon I see an alternative I will switch.
The allegation: Comcast in blocking (often legitimate) P2P traffic
[Quote:] US ISPs are generally perceived by users here to offer unlimited and fairly neutral connections to the 'Net for a monthly fee. Or they were, anyway, until Comcast admitted that it was "delaying" P2P traffic at peak times. [...] "Consumers have no reason left to trust their cable company. These Internet experts have also unequivocally demonstrated that blocking is not limited to times of supposed congestion. Their sophisticated testing shows that Comcast and Cox block BitTorrent applications at all times of the day—not just at times of peak traffic. [...] Of the nine ISPs in the US found to block BitTorrent, Comcast and Cox were far and away the most aggressive. Both blocked more than half of all attempted BitTorrent tests on their networks. [end qoute]
Comcast´s answer today (May 15, 08):
[Quote]"Comcast does not, has not, and will not block any websites or online applications, including peer-to-peer services like BitTorrent." [end qoute]
The quotes are published today:
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080515-u...
This company which obviously cannot be trusted at all will soon have access to our addresses?
The longer I think about the deal the sooner I will cancel our Premium account.
The trouble is that I see absolutely no fit whatsoever between Plaxo and Comcast. Comcast is a regional cable network operator in one country (yes you’re a big country, but still).
Plaxo is a global service provider, trying to capture a global service market. It will have to do this by working globally, but also bringing in national offerings to advertisers etc. There is no fit between Comcasts organization and all those national offices that Plaxo needs. Comcast doesn’t open any doors in Europe or Asia. It’s internal procedures are geared towards selling cable subscriptions, not to supporting advertising space in a very specific marktet.
Even a merger with Gigaom would have been a better strategic fit. Sounds like Endemol and Telefonica or AOL and Time Warner all over again.
By the way, I've never had very good experiences with ComCast in the past... I'm very pleased with Plaxo though!
May you reap the rewards you justly deserve.
It'd be nice if the Plaxo team could give us some guidance on what data will be shared between Plaxo and Comcast.
I dis-associated myself with anything less than 2 degrees of separation from Comcast about 10 years ago. I have used Plaxo for almost as long.
Those employed with Plaxo have little to woory about. Comcast will just throw some of the money they have extorted from their customers at you.
beijos
joana
I won't rush off to delete my account, but I certainly won't be actively adding new contacts here. I mostly use LinkedIn anyway.
May 29, 2008 | 7:44:07 PM
Comcast Hijackers Say They Warned the Company First
http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2008/05/comcas...
I'm a LinkedIn user who just received a Plaxo invite that just did a bit of clicking to check Plaxo out again (been a while since I visited or received an invite) before signing up. That sign up part will not be happening.
Robert R
Uh... Comcast better re-visit their "commitment" and CHANGE what users "have come to expect"
Comcast Hijackers Say They Warned the Company First - May 29th, 2008
http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2008/05/comcas...
I was using and loving Plaxo, but now I may look for an alternative.
Any suggestions?
So happy for the guys and gals who got the checks when you sold. As for the rest of you, get set to be dissed - or worse ignored.
I have worked for them and they scammed me out of over 100+ hours on my paycheck and they said I didnt work it.
Also when I had paid service with them they told me my 1st bill would be $55.98 and when I got my 1st bill boy was I shocked it was $458.00.
I usually don't complain about companies or people but the way they have treated me and my service has been beyond any good words.
Some friends invited me over here to sign up but now I will have to re-think it.
Wow, I just read some of the responses and am surprised at how many people feel the same way about bad-blood with comcast.
I hope it works out for you.
I hate Comcast...I just don't know how else to say it. I've never been a customer but I have had friends and family who deal with them and I've seen their service and how they treat their customers. And it's NOT GOOD!! I just hope that even though Comcast is acquiring Plaxo that Plaxo is allowed to do what they've been doing without any interference from Comcast. I'm sure financially this will help Plaxo but I really hope that nothing changes.
I really, really, really, really, really, really, really like Plaxo!
Plaxo is going to be used for SPAMvertising from now on. You can't put anything personal on plaxo anymore and trust comcast won't forward your info to the FBI.
I'd like to keep in touch with you on Plaxo Pulse.
Click here to learn more:
http://pulse.plaxo.com/pulse/invite?i=xxxx&xxxx...
Thanks,
sandi
My sister said she didn't send it, but had accepted the invitation from a friend. She said it ended up copying her whole address book and she couldn't stop it. First, it said to click "to learn" not "click so we can copy your address book and send out invitations to everyone you have in your address book."
You know, if I had such a program, I could find out every e-mail address and phone number (whatever is in the address book) to every employer that has an Internet connection. This information gathering technique should be illegal if done without full disclosure.
Recently, I've got a few web sites (like Naymz and RatePoint) hijacking my name on search engines and trying to get me to join them. It's like black-mail: subscribe to our system or no one will be able to find you.
Now there's Plaxo... Like Orkut, Facebook, MySpace, Friendster, hi5, Twitter, Xanga, etc., Plaxo seems to be another social networking site.
What's different?
How does it compare??
What is Plaxo's community think???
I guess there should really be a review site that reviews sites like these... Oh wait, there is...
Thanks,
Dee
This NOT an auspicious beginning but on the other hand, it's always nice to have someone in the family to complain about.
http://www.harbiortam.com