[vaksel]

I think every big company has done "unethical" things like this in their past.

Then once they get big, they clean up their image.

It's like Google first few years of adwords they pretty much let anything go, then once they became a big player they cleaned up their image and banned all those ads.

[Psyonic]

Also, an interesting question: Are you citing the fact that nearly ever big company has done it to basically give it an ethical pass? i.e. It's the cost of doing business?

[vaksel]

no I mean that there is a lot of unethical things for most companies, early in their history.

Whether it's using scrapers to steal content and spam competitor's users, or using high monetizing scammy offers to cash in.

Early on, when starting out, a lot of the companies we admire today, have resorted to doing anything in order to survive.

[Psyonic]

Right, but what is the lesson here? Do whatever it takes to succeed? I'm not picking on you, just wondering what to take from that fact.

[Psyonic]

If you think Google has really banned "all those ads," you're not looking close enough. They've made some effort, but plenty gets through.

[aaronblohowiak]

Facebook did this as well, as did Zynga.