SiNiK
07-06-2000, 12:15 AM
Excerpts from CNET's article <bold>"Glitches let Net shoppers grab free goods"</bold>
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1007-200-2210836.html?pt.ms..feed.ne_home
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>At Buy.com, a coupon meant to be worth $50 off any order of $500 or more actually gave people $50 off any purchase made over $50. Executives said the coupon was still in development and was not supposed to be released yet. But someone using a "crawler" to electronically monitor the site found the coupon and posted its code on a Web site.
About 4,500 orders were placed in the daylong binge. Among those, about 340 people actually followed the terms of the coupon, buying more than $500 worth of goods.
At AltaVista, members of the rewards program had a weeklong bonanza. The "instant rewards" program typically gives away $500 worth of shopping "points" to 20 participants a day just by signing up. But some participants discovered that refreshing the contest page repeatedly would eventually serve them a notice saying they had won.
All winners--legitimate and illegitimate alike--were sent an email informing them of the mistake. AltaVista spokesman Jim Shissler said the company will reward legitimate winners the $500 in credit as offered. He added that "winners" from the glitch will be given "something for their inconvenience for the false notification," but he did not elaborate what the prize would be.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
Too funny.
[This message has been edited by SiNiK (edited 07-06-2000).]
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1007-200-2210836.html?pt.ms..feed.ne_home
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>At Buy.com, a coupon meant to be worth $50 off any order of $500 or more actually gave people $50 off any purchase made over $50. Executives said the coupon was still in development and was not supposed to be released yet. But someone using a "crawler" to electronically monitor the site found the coupon and posted its code on a Web site.
About 4,500 orders were placed in the daylong binge. Among those, about 340 people actually followed the terms of the coupon, buying more than $500 worth of goods.
At AltaVista, members of the rewards program had a weeklong bonanza. The "instant rewards" program typically gives away $500 worth of shopping "points" to 20 participants a day just by signing up. But some participants discovered that refreshing the contest page repeatedly would eventually serve them a notice saying they had won.
All winners--legitimate and illegitimate alike--were sent an email informing them of the mistake. AltaVista spokesman Jim Shissler said the company will reward legitimate winners the $500 in credit as offered. He added that "winners" from the glitch will be given "something for their inconvenience for the false notification," but he did not elaborate what the prize would be.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
Too funny.
[This message has been edited by SiNiK (edited 07-06-2000).]