I began using various PTC and Reward/points based programs to earn a little extra income online, shortly after signing up for a few of them I began being bombarded with spam mail. My inbox fills up multiple times a day with these useless emails and I spend an enormous amount of time unsubscribing to them.
I sat and thought about why I was suddenly receiving them and it dawned on me that the only thing new was that I had opted to receive correspondeces from these sites affiliates. It is not mandatory that you check that little box next to the fine print that offers you mailings of discounts and news, but each time I clicked it and went on with the sign-up process. They are clever in their placements and how the byline is worded to increase the chance that you will say yes to their offers of freebies and coupons and all "the new exciting products or services our affiliates offer". We all want to stay up-to-date and possible receive something for free so we all check that little box and go along our merry way hoping to be the next big winner.
Since realizing this mistake I no longer checked the affiliate boxes when I sign-up for a program or newsletter and my spam has greatly decreased since. Be especially vigilant when taking the hundreds of various quizes online, although they are free most of them have this little box just waiting for you to check it so they can explode your inbox with anything from "Free Personal Friend Finders" to "you just won a new laptop, click here to redeem". If you don't have the time to check your emails daily these spam mailings can eat up your free space and cause your account to be shut-down until you clean it out. Do what I have done and "Just Say No" to the affiliate question and save yourself the time and headaches before they ever become a nuisance.
