Attendees at New York Comic-Con were required to register their new, RFID-bugged badges online, in a process that encouraged them to link them to their Twitter accounts. Little did they suspect that NYCC would use their signups to send tweets from attendees’ Twitter accounts, in a loose, conversational style (“So much pop culture to digest! Can’t. handle. the. awesome.”), linking back to NYCC’s website, without any indication that they were spam. I’m reasonably certain that the fine-print on the NYCC signup gave them permission to do this stupid thing, and I’m also certain that almost no one read the fine-print, and that rather a large number of attendees objected strenuously to having their Twitter accounts used to shill for a service that they were already paying a large sum to enjoy.
1 <3 #NYCC http://t.co/ykhDvP1SLj
— Chelsea Stark (@chelseabot) October 10, 2013
So much pop culture to digest! Can’t. handle. the. awesome. #NYCC http://t.co/KWGNcKPdJd
— Brian Crecente (@crecenteb) October 10, 2013
#NYCC is the Best Four Days of my Year! http://t.co/r0mjC7v87b
— Harry Knowles (@headgeek666) October 10, 2013
Pop culture overload! Just checked into #NYCC! http://t.co/RLBoRBiWYe
— Greg Miller (@GameOverGreggy) October 10, 2013
Hey, @NY_Comic_Con. I did not Tweet this. What the hell? Your wifi? Your app? pic.twitter.com/GqMgsi712B
— Greg Miller (@GameOverGreggy) October 11, 2013
New York Comic Con Tweets From Attendees’ Accounts Without Permission
(via Wil Wheaton)