Making the customer jump through hoops

Yesterday my brother sent me a file through YouSendIt. As the person receiving the file, all I wanted to do was click the link in the email and have the download start. Instead, I was made to jump through hoops by YouSendIt's website before I could finally download the file I'd been sent. The email I received looked promising: it told me I could click on the link to receive the file Christian had sent me. So I did. I then got a screen asking me to sign up for an account at YouSendIt. Due to the wording, it wasn't immediately obvious that this was a requirement for receiving a file - it just looked like upselling - but having looked in vain for a 'skip signup' link, I had to sign up. Form filled out, I'm then told I need to validate my email address (so I'm basically back to square one - clicking a link in my email). That done, I can finally log in. I'm a little irritated (why should I have to sign up just to receive a file?), but it looks like I'm getting there. Nope. On login, I'm shown a page inviting me to send a file. That's not why I'm here and a minimum of session tracking could have told them that. So I click to go to my inbox and finally, there it is: a row showing Christian's name and the filename as a link. Click the link and download the file, non? Non. Another page, declaring " Here is your file named xxx" and a linked URL. A step too many, but they seem to want to show me some more ads as a non-paying customer. I click the new link. By this point, I shouldn't have been surprised, but there was still another page, promising once again "Your file is available for download". This time there's an orange 'Download now securely' button which does at last start the file download. So let's recap on what I, the receiver of the file, had to do to get that file: Click link in email; sign up; click another link in another email; log in; click to inbox; click file; click file; click file - 8 steps where I was expecting one, maybe two at most from the email that was sent to me. The basis of this seems to be two things YouSendIt want me to do: sign up (so that I might then use their service to send my own files and perhaps become a paying customer) and view adverts to help them make some money on people who aren't paying for these file transfers and storage. I can't believe they have much success on either front. I signed up yes, but now have no intention of ever using their service again (and I've even gone as far as writing this unhappy post for others to see) because of the stupid number of steps they made me go through (all unnecessary in the eyes of someone receiving a file). I also didn't even notice the ads first time through - it's only doing it a second time to count the steps that I noticed them and the blocked pop-ups. People have trained themselves to instantly ignore anything resembling an advert on websites. There's a clear reason for the person sending the file having to sign up, but why the person on the receiving end has to do anything other than click a link and download the file is beyond me.