I think this is a clever marketing scheme by Stripe. Now hundreds of HN readers will sign up just to check if they get an email from BlueSnap. I know I did.
People who signed up for anything other than to use the service are of no value to Stripe. As a marketing consultant and someone who used to work in a marketing agency, I think many people here over-estimate the cleverness of marketers.
We'd never betray the trust of our users by doing something crazy like that. We're as puzzled as the OP.
I wasn't entirely serious, but good to know! :)
Hmm, I know that when we bought an email list for our target demo we ended up with a couple of honeypot addresses and an e-mail from the source asking who got the list from, complete with legal threats if we didn't assist in their investigation. This is cheap enough that if you have concerns about insiders you might want to set something like that up.
This actually would be brilliant. But for a different reason! It creates contrast between stripe and a spammy competitor. Makes you hate the spammer and love the company you signed up with.
Why not a clever marketing scheme by BlueSnap? I never knew about BlueSnap before. After seeing this, spent a good 10 minutes on their website!