The EU is tackling spam and non-consensual exploitation of your data with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which comes into force on Friday the 25th of May. Hoorah! If you need help sleeping, I’d recommend reading up on it. If you’ve noticed a glut of “we want to keep in touch” emails, that’s GDPR. If, on Saturday 26th, you feel inexplicably zen, that’ll be GDPR. In the meantime, you will notice that we’ve started asking you to confirm what emails you want from us. That’s GDPR.
However, the implications are both exciting and frightening. Exciting because, in theory, you will only receive contact from businesses that you have explicitly given consent to. You will be granting those companies clear and well-defined reasons to communicate with you, and with a lot less distraction from those that you have not. Even if you’re not sure why you’re being contacted you will be able to see how and when you consented to it, and given a straightforward option to stop it or configure your contact preferences. If any company fails to provide this, they are at risk of fines of at least £1 million. Ouch! Companies outside the EU are not exempt, so long as you are in the EU (post Brexit too). If you’re actually looking for Viagra… you might just have to make your own enquiries from now on.
In theory, we’re delighted about GDPR. We have always behaved in the spirit of it. Since day one, we’ve been up-front about what we send you, and that has always been the daily reminder, and more recently, deactivation warnings, important updates and monthly newsletters. All of these have been easy to turn off, although some reactions we’ve had in the past suggest that it is easier to type obscene responses than to click on the “Unsubscribe” links at the bottom of ALL OUR EMAILS. We’ve always been up-front because we want you to enjoy your stay. The more often you come back, the more we grow, so the last thing we want to do it upset you. Crudely, being transparent is good business.
Keep an eye out for this ^
For now, we are all being deafened by messages requesting consent for this and that. Sorry, but we’re going to have to add to the volume. When you see your “pop up” notification from us please take a moment to read it and either select “Yes, that’s right”, or “No, customise” and select what emails you want to receive, if any. Before the 25th, we’ll also be updating your account page to give you more access to your data, so that you can see, update and remove it where you want to.
Coming soon ^
In practice though, it is sadly inevitable that many of you will either not notice it, or just dismiss it for another time, and come May 25th, that will be it – we can’t send you daily reminders anymore. We’re bracing ourselves for a big fall in daily PMPers, but we’re hoping that enough of you will take the time to read this and understand what this is all about. Maybe, once the dust has settled we’ll see an increase because you’re not distracted by other things, and even a bit of praise for doing things the right way. Fingers are very very crossed.
See you on the other side!
Chris & Team 🙂