CMP/United Business Media owns Byte magazine. Back when Byte was actually published on paper, I used to have a subscription. Then it disappeared from the shelf and eventually became an online only publication. I subscribed to the new version so I could read the famed Chaos Manor column written by Dr. Jerry Pournelle.
But eventually CMP got rid of Dr. Pournelle. Perhaps the events are not connected, but it seems that around that time, I began to get all kinds of spam emails from one of CMP's other publications called Dr. Dobbs Journal. I especially got notices of seminars that Dr. Dobbs was involved in. Unfortunately, these emails were coded such that you could "unsubscribe" from _only_ the event that they were currently advertising. That is, there is no way to unsubscribe from ALL events. This essentially means you will ALWAYS get these spams. This is very clever. In some states, I wonder if it isn't also illegal because employing this method means you can never unsubscribe from future mailings.
Even using their CMP Feedback Page, which leads to an "Unsubscribe" page doesn't work. The unsubscribe page seems to be set to never allow you to actually submit the page (it endlessly requires you to enter your email address, which you already entered and a CAPTCHA, which is never accepted)(yes, javascript was enabled).
In addition, their "Privacy" page is a model of errors. Now, I'll be the first to admit that even I make mistakes. But I'm just a private citizen with no money to hire an editor. But if you look at the number of errors on the page, you have to wonder if CMP spent any time/money on proofing what they have. For example, they have a link to its corporate website: http://www.cmp.com.com/. Internet savvy users will note that there is an extra ".com" in the link. Hence, clicking on the link gets you nowhere.
In total, given the inability to unsubscribe, even when they give you the illusion that you can, a rational person could easily come to the conclusion that CMP was being less than honest. I hope these are just inadvertent errors, but you have to wonder when a supposedly high tech company can't even get its own URL right.
YMMV. Insert disclaimer here.
Aloha!
