¶ What is Vine Helper?
Vine Helper (abbreviated as 'VH') is a browser extension which aims to improve the experience of members of the Amazon Vine Voices ("Amazon Vine") program. Our objective is to do so while remaining within the confines of the Terms and Conditions for the program.
As a tool, Vine Helper not only assists with what you are browsing, but it also shares useful information with other Vine Helper users of the same country.
¶ What does Vine Helper hope to achieve?
¶ Improving the user experience
It's true that Amazon Vine is an awesome program, but it's also true that the interface we are forced to use is very basic in term of features, and it is plagued with issues that has impacted user experience since its inception:
- Displaying items in Vine that cannot be ordered (e.g. items that require international shipping, items that are no longer enrolled in the Vine program, etc.);
- Allowing products with unspecified variants to remain which in turn causes an infinite loading window and triggers an error report to Amazon;
- Withholding a way for Vine users to sort, filter, or pin items that may or may not be of interest from a sizeable inventory;
...among others.
This extension aims to alleviate those issues by relying on the community's help to identify problematic products, and in cases where fixes not available, to mark and/or discard those problematic items from the browsing experience.
¶ Incorporating a community experience
In each country where Vine is available, vibrant communities of dedicated Viners have emerged. Within this dynamic, users of Vine Helper are empowered with the ability to share valuable insights, in turn enriching the browsing experience for all. These include:
- Providing estimated ETV ranges observed by fellow users
- Offering live statistics on successful orders or error encounters, contributing to a clearer picture for potential requesters
- Documenting the initial appearance of items in the listing
By fostering the exchange of such fundamental data among users, Vine Helper has continued to evolve with enhanced user-friendliness in mind - laying the groundwork for further advancements.
¶ Is Vine Helper a bot?
Vine Helper is not a bot, as:
- It does not query Amazon directly
- It does not automate membership actions
- It cannot request products for you
- It does not auto-refresh data from Amazon
Furthermore, Vine Helper does not:
- Access your Amazon account, Amazon profile, or access the personal information associated with your Amazon account
- Store identifying data (a UUID system is being used in its place)
- Use or access cookies
¶ Self-Declared Data Collection
Under the Privacy Practices section of the Chrome Web Store page for Amazon Vine Helper, you may notice the following items which were declared on a voluntary basis. In our efforts to be evermore transparent with our users, we are clairfying our intentions with the self-declared privacy practices.
Vine Helper handles the following:
Financial and Payment Information
For example: transactions, credit card numbers, credit ratings, financial statements, or payment history
Everything we do on Amazon Vine is free, and so is the use of Vine Helper. We do not collect payments, store any credit card or other financial information, however, what the Vine Helper does do is keep track of your orders with Amazon Vine, which qualify as transactions (even if the value of the order is $0.00). Out of an abundance of caution, and transparency, we have chosen to declare the collection financial and payment information.
Web History
The list of web pages a user has visited, as well as associated data such as page title and time of visit
Vine Helper does not track pages you've consulted per se, but it does collect information about the items on these pages, and when they are viewed. This information, however, is not linked to your identity as Vine Helper uses a UUID system that does not associate itself with any of your personal information.
User Activity
For example: network monitoring, clicks, mouse position, scroll, or keystroke logging
Vine Helper does monitor the network traffic between the Amazon Vine webpage and Amazon Vine's server. This is to enable the storing of ETV values, order attempts, as well as fixing the 'Infinite Spinner' errors. Note that in the case of orders attempts, it is linked to your UUID, not your personal Amazon account. The traffic itself is not stored. Vine Helper also does not record user inputs.
Website Content
For example: text, images, sounds, videos, or hyperlinks
Vine Helper definitely collects information regarding content of the webpage - more specifically, the text and URL, as you are browsing. Once again, that information is not linked to your identity or personal information as we rely on the UUID system to auto-assign random ID to you, as the user.
I hope this clarifies how Vine Helper collects data! 