[Robin_Message]

Getting the customer to say "Yes" repeatedly [1], and relying on their own internal consistency to make them less likely to change their mind [2], is a well known sales technique.

So this would still be a dark pattern even with an opt-in, since people will mentally start rationalising ("It's a good service for smart entrepreneurs like me to learn from each other") instead of assessing it from scratch ("It's an online startup community I pay to belong to. Is that worth $30 a month? Hacker News is free...").

It's a shame, because if the thing people had paid for had been delivered this would have probably been okay, but as it is, it seems pretty unethical.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foot-in-the-door_technique [2] Can't find a good reference, but basically avoiding http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance