Ryan Hudson, Co-Founder of Honey, addressed accusations against his former company in a Reddit AMA last week.
The claims stem from a viral video by YouTuber MegaLag, which alleged that Honey manipulates discount codes and diverts affiliate commissions from content creators.
Hudson refuted MegaLag’s key points, stating outright, "Is Honey a scam? No."
He explained that Honey’s use of vanity codes was intended to support creator attribution rather than deceive users. "An equivalent code of equal value to the best ones publicly available was always a policy requirement when I managed Honey," he clarified.
He also dismissed accusations that Honey suppressed better codes in favour of lesser discounts dictated by retailers, calling MegaLag’s claims "bold" and "unsupported by evidence."
Addressing the second major allegation – that Honey was stealing affiliate commissions – Hudson argued that MegaLag had misunderstood how affiliate tracking works.
He cited the LinusTechTips and Newegg examples in the video.
He explained that in cases like this, Honey and creators like Linus Tech Tips were compensated under a multi-touch attribution model. "Newegg decided this was worth it to them and decided to pay BOTH the salesperson (creator) and the coupon distributor (PayPal Honey)," he stated.
Hudson also pointed out inconsistencies in MegaLag’s video, such as a black box covering a coupon code in one instance. "For some reason, he doesn’t want you to know what code he is using in this example… while making a video about Honey hiding publicly available coupon codes?" he questioned.
In the comment section, one user queried how Hudson might bolster stand-down approaches, to which he responded advocating for the afrsc=1 parameter.
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Ultimately, Hudson stood by Honey’s practices under his leadership, insisting it saved consumers billions and supported content creators. He challenged MegaLag to provide concrete proof of wrongdoing, stating, "If he has other data… it should be easy for him to come forward with receipts."
