Sharing registration info/email with Instructure "partners"

[chriscas]

Did I miss an opt-out of email sharing option when I registered for InstructureCon?  In the last 24 hours, I've probably gotten 10 emails from Instructure "partners" advertising their services and instructureCon session details.  While I appreciate partner services and everything they can do (heck, we've subscribed to EvaluationKit because of an InstCon session), I'd really prefer at least an option for Instructure not to share our name/emails automatically with these partners.  Some of these emails I've been receiving don't even give an out-out link for the future, so I'm a bit of an annoyed Panda about that for sure...

[kmeeusen]

Hi chriscas‌

There was an opt-out button, and I opted out in my registration, but have had a similar distressing experience.

On the bright side, I did get a couple nice lunch offers.

Agent K

[kona]

I clicked the "opt out" button, but have also gotten more than a few partner emails. 😞

[chriscas]

OK, so I'm not crazy here!  I always opt-out when the option is available, and thought I did when I registered for InstructureCon.  Now it's just a question of why our info was shared if we opted out.

[tdelillo]

Maybe they're just searching the Community for discussions like these and seeing who's going to be there. A great deal of it is publicly accessible, but if you're a partner and logged in...

[James]

I think you're being overly generous,  @tdelillo  .  At least three of mine say they are from "Instructure Partners", have an noreply@instructure.com address, and have a web-bug from info.instructure.com.

Of the ones that didn't come from Instructure directly, one said "I see you are presenting at InstructureCon". Another said they were excited to see I was joining them at Hack Night, but that was from one of the Hack Night cosponsors after Kona signed me up. I don't know if if there was an opt-out there for Hack Night or not since she filled it out.

Chris' Jive login doesn't have his email as his login, it just has /people/chriscas, although when you go there, you can get it. So, if they are getting it off the web, they're doing an extra bit of scraping -- either that or someone is and then selling the lists.

All of the ones except for the "I see you are presenting" had an unsubscribe for me.

So, while it may be public information gathered from the forums here, it definitely reflects badly on Instructure -- if for nothing else than choosing to partner with these companies that send the unsolicited commercial email.

[chriscas]

I can somewhat confirm these emails aren't coming from community "scraping" because a person that works with me is also getting the same emails, and he doesn't really use the community, and has no indication on here that he's going to InstructureCon.

I know for sure one of the emails that didn't have an unsubscribe had a subject of "Special session at InstructureCon". 

I don't know whether to call specific companies out on here or not, since I don't know for sure how they're getting our email addresses.  It's definitely a turn-off to receive unsolicited emails though, and counts as a "strike" against all of these companies in my book.  Not having an unsubscribe included in the email basically goes from "strike one" directly to "strike three" and on to a list of companies to not do business with in the future.

Instructure, I hope you look into this for next year, since it's really too late to do anything about these for 2017..

[ltscal2]

Yes I am sure I opted out as well and have gotten numerous emails under more than one of my aliases. Not to mention its against regulations where we are to add people to mailing lists without prior consent. At least there is an option to opt out but hopefully Instructure fixes the bug soon.

[jburrell]

Hi Everyone!

First I want to sincerely apologize that you are receiving emails if you chose the "opt-out" box on our registration site.  We have had some challenges with our system and it seems it did not pull part of the correct list that we give to our Partners.  By no means is this their fault so please don't be angry with them .  We are working on fixing this for the future but as you noted we are a little late for this year.  Some of you mentioned you are getting emails from noreply@instructure.com- all of those should be from me about the conference.  We do not send out any mass emails for our Partners.  Again I am truly sorry for this little glitch and hope you can all forgive me as well as hold no grudges against our Partners.  We are so close and counting down the days for an amazing event!  Looking forward to seeing you all there!

[awilliams]

jburrell‌, today you reaffirmed my belief in Instructure's commitment to Open in all its forms. (Recommended reading on Canvas and Open from e-Literate).

Thank you for this transparency. Accidents happen to all of us and if someone is honest enough to be open about it they deserve our support (and maybe a digital panda hug). A group of pandas is called an "embarrassment" after all (not kidding, Google it). We can't expect ourselves to be perfect

[tammy_yasrobi]

Thanks, Jackie for confirming. It is a bit frustrating for sure, but mistakes do happen. I am finding though that I have unsubscribed from several lists after receiving the initial vendor email and then received another email from the same vendor the next day...which is...more frustrating. Is there any way for Instructure to make sure that the list is fixed and the emails stop for those of us that opted out?

[JACOBSEN_C]

Moles.  We've been compromised.  Remember your training. And somebody call Kenny Loggins...

[scottdennis]

Clint, are you going to take a ride into the danger zone?

[JACOBSEN_C]

archer - danger zone [hq] - YouTube 

[kmeeusen]

via GIPHY

Remember, when you find Bb moles, feed them to the pandas!