Inside the Free iPod Offer

jonathanhowell writes "David Lazarus, The SF Chronicle's tech guy, has an article in today's paper with an interesting investigation into the work you have to do to get a "free" (as in beer) iPod. I'm trying not to call it a scam, because it appears completely legal, if ethically challenged." From the article: "What it doesn't say is that the offer terms will expose you to reams of spam and marketing solicitations, that the user survey is actually a lengthy marketing ploy, and that the sponsor offers needed to qualify for that free music player will almost certainly cost you money."

Comments

F u

[Anonymous Coward]

FP

Wes

Mods:

[Anonymous Coward]

Please waste a point to mod this down so I can have a turn.

Thnx

Re:Mods:

[RobertB-DC]

Please waste a point to mod this down so I can have a turn.

And me without mod points today! Darn!

Re:Mods:

[shadowlordseth]

Darn, I just posted. too bad. I LOVE modding people down. I AM ALMIGHTY, bow before me.

No such Thing

[superpulpsicle]

Apple is not known for bargains, nevermind free stuff. Look at the prices of the iPod accessories, they are a complete rip off.

I bought an iPod way back thinking it was revolutionary. I should have waited, cause the market is now flooded with equally good products, Dell DJ, Creative Zen etc.

Re:Obvious

[Anonymous Coward]

dmn't be ugly fikle mince sit ver der bun der snatch wqt me nw!

Get vit doewn vaby ves?

pu puken nar buken.

Nothing is free!

[Anonymous Coward]

And Sister Jean stole the files.

I DON'T LIKE SPAM!!!!

[avp0]

Spam spam spam spam
spam spam spam spam
Spaminy Spaaaaam Wonderful Spaaaam

Bloody vikings ...


(Like you didn't think of it)

Free Photo Ipod

[Anonymous Coward]

Here is a free photo ipod offer FREE PHOTO IPD

Free Mac Mini offer FREE MAC MINI

Whether you consider the Pyramid Scheme a scam

[Anonymous Coward]

It depends on when you retire. Current retirees love them. Those that are 30-40 will surely consider them a scam when they try to get their Social Security.

Re:Doesn't "free" have a meaning?

[Anonymous Coward]

Anything, even tangentially related to iPods is a good thing, even when it's a bad thing.

Worked for me

[cmstar]

As someone else said, I also got in on it early and it worked for me. Your personal info is important, and there are hundreds of scams, but some do not sell your info. And as for spam. How much productivity is lost in creating a free yahoo account and then never ever checking it again? I won't try to refute any other argument. But as far as the spam goes. Yes, $300 iPod is well worth the 5 min. to set up an account to receive spam.

obviously i'm an advocate....

[Moonlapse]

Because i did get a 20gig ipod AND a Nintendo DS. Have i gotten spam from it? No. At least as of recently ( a few months), there is a checkbox asking if you want emails sent to you, defaulted to no checks. Of course, i am talking about the Gratis Network. I'm certain other websites are less reputable and working off the success of freeipods.com, etc. Is it 'free'? No. You do need to participate in a pyramid scheme, and get a few friends to as well. In my case, it took 5 for the ipod, and 4 for the DS. Also in my case, i did a Real Rhapsody 14 day free trial for the ipod, and a $1 offer for the DS. The $1 offer actually got me a $20 gift card to Circuit city. All my friends i convinced also did $1 offers. The cancellation process was a 5 min 1800 call. So do i think it was worth it? Well duh. I got $299(ipod) + $149(DS) + $20 (gift card) for a total of $1. Of course, if you have friends who vehemently think its a scam you won't have much success. Of course, you can offer them $2 to sign up under you (which i did for 1 person) =] So no, its not 'free'. It takes up a little bit of your time. But you DO get your free* if you follow thru.

Re:One comment....

[Anonymous Coward]

Duh, anybody thinking anything is "free" today doesn't value their time, other people's time, or their sanity.

Damn those Gentoo users!

Re:Not *the* Free iPod people

[PxM]

You can also use a temporary credit card if you're really paranoid. These function as debit cards so you only risk the amount of money you put it. This might be useful if you're ultra paranoid and like to limit the number of people you give your credit card to. You still need a real credit card for WebCertificate but it is an extra layer of protection.

--
Want a free iPod?
Or try a free Nintendo DS, GC, PS2, Xbox. (you only need 4 referrals)
Wired article as proof

Re:TINSTAAFL, indeed

[Omega697]

But technically, I ain't making any major errors in this sentance.

Except for the misspelling of "sentence."
----
http://www.FreeMiniMacs.com/?r=16076424

Re:TINSTAAFL, indeed

[lukewarmfusion]

"However, their was a mistake"

Do you mean "there" was a mistake? I'm pretty sure you do.

Re:So it's finally exposed...

[Moonlapse]

Gratis is the mini mac, and it works. PWNT

Re:TINSTAAFL, indeed

[ack154]

"Do you mean "there" was a mistake? I'm pretty sure you do."

I'm sure that you meant to type "did you mean..." and "I'm pretty sure you did" because it was in the past that he was collecting the thought and actually constructed the post.

Re:TINSTAAFL, indeed

[Atzanteol]

STOP!!!!

What the hell's the matter with you people?!?! Get a FRIGGIN' LIFE!

Anal Retentive Moderator

[Quantum Fizz]

I surprised a moderator is modding down my posts about the conga, even though they're direclty related to BOTH the thread and article topics at hand. My posts are also descriptive and based on my actual experiences. But apparently some moderator has a bug up his/her ass because someone else is trying to get a mac mini.

If I was posting those same posts on a thread about anything else OR a /. article about anything else, than the 'overrated' mod would be justified.

But for crying out loud, it's directly relevent to the freaking discussion, and about what I went through, how I think it's similar/different to what the parent was talking about, etc.

Attention moderator - save your mod points for the real trolls, the real spammers, and the real off-topic posts.

Re:Anal Retentive Moderator

[Quantum Fizz]

But you're getting modded down for whining about your moderation like an idiot.

I actually don't care how my 'whining' about the moderation posts got moderated, it's the two original posts I was talking about. But anyway it's annoying that moderators implicitly assume that having a mac link implies spammer.

Ironically I kind of feel bad that the moderators are wasting their precious mod points on my mostly harmless posts instead of real trolls, flames, and actual insightful/informative posts.

And speaking of, it's amusing that your post was actually modded 'insightful' when it's just as off-topic as my previous posts were. You did make me laugh with the 'whaaambulance' line, though.

Anyway, I've had the mac mini links in my sig since i created this account, but I was never modded down for that. I guess it's okay to write a post about NASA or whatever and have the sig there, but apparently I cannot write about the actual mac mini offer for some reason.

oh well, peace out.

Re:Anal Retentive Moderator

[Quantum Fizz]

But your sig is spam.

Wrong. My sig is an ad, not spam.

From Marrion-Webster : SPAM - unsolicited usually commercial e-mail sent to a large number of addresses

From Wikipedia : Spamming is the use of any electronic communications medium to send unsolicited messages in bulk.

Wikipedia also mentions Blog Spam, which is basically for increasing hits for a higher search engine raiting. That's not my purpose, I don't give a crap about google ratings. My sig is absolutely no different than anybody else's sig that points to a webpage, whether commercial or not. And more specifically my sig points to the conga, which is itself a non-commercial page (although it refers to a commercial page).

Anyway, you cannot in any way claim I'm a spammer. Of all my posts can you find a single one that is unrelated to the thread or article topic? I could understand people being pissed if I butted into unrelated threads just to push the link, but I never once did that. And in fact the only time I ever talked about the offer other than in my sig and journal was in this specific /. article, which is directly related to the offer to begin with.

But more importantly - I'm not sending emails, I'm not invading any sort of space considered "yours" in any way (unlike spammers and telemarketers). Slashdot is a public forum, users have sigs that point to various webpages, mine points to a free mac page. You have come here to slashdot of your own will to join a discussion of which my posts are relevent. And even for non-mac related posts my 120 character sig is no different than any other sig with a link.

Moderators are REALLY anal

[Quantum Fizz]

Jeezuz, an actually on-topic post (on topic of the article AND the thread), about my actual experiences, and it's modded down to hell.

Apparently moderators cannot adequately distinguish between unsolicited spam and a relevent article that happens to have a link to the free mac site.

Moderators - get a clue. I'm responding to the parent about his experiences how easy people will sell their details for a free t-shirt, and how what I went through w/ the mac mini really wasn't so bad at all.

I don't know why these moderators are so freaking anal today.