I’m quite upset with these SMS subscription services.
My one aunt, which is totally not TECH-literate, saw this cool baby singing on the TV and sent an SMS to receive a ringtone. After that she received a ringtone each day, costing her R10 per week. But she says that the advertisements did not say that it’s a subscription. Then she tried to STOP the service by sending STOP to the number to no avail. She then phoned me and I had to track down the company which runs the campaign. And when I tried to cancelled, it took them 2 weeks to cancel.
I personally never use/or am interested in any type of shortcode competition, subscription services or ringtones like this as I just know it’s a massive money making venture for doing nothing. These guys send you some low quality “content”and charge you an arm and a leg for it.
I found this website, which also makes one think about this industry. This example, uses the “You’ve won the world” method to get you to interact with their website, “Find the 3 differences”…. and afterwards it says enter your number and subscribe to win (which in small letter at the bottom of the screen indicates it is R30 / week).
I really thought that some type of legislation has already been implemented to protect the consumer with this type of advertising.