Calling Video Professor a Scam

palmerj3 writes in to give some wider attention to a piece on Techcrunch today in which Michael Arrington reacts to Video Professor's desperate attempts to shut him up after he called Video Professor a scam in a piece syndicated by the Washington Post. As described by Arrington, the ways the company's site operates (differently depending on where a visitor comes from) are strongly reminiscent of the practices a Senate committee recently condemned. (Here is a detailed example of another, similar scam, from a not-naive victim. Video Professor's tactics sound even more deceptive.) Video Professor seems to react with belligerence, not to mention legal threats, towards any hint of criticism. Please share any direct experiences you have with this outfit.

Comments

Re:Bad Summary

[Brian Gordon]

It's not a minor point in the article, it's the entire article. This is the article, the other link in the summary was just an aside...

The article really takes video professor apart. It's a total scam and there's no more doubt about it.

Re:Who/What is Video Professor?

[Trebawa]

Video Professor is a company in the U.S. with ads that are very common on TV. They consist of an older man advertising his videos in which he shows how to use various software. He then assures the viewer that he is so sure you will like his product, he will send you one free. What actually happens is that you get the free video (plus shipping and handling), then a charge on your credit card for another video each month.

Re:Is this the guy

[Orion Blastar]

Yes it is, but there are other Video CDs sent to the person who tries the product including charges made to the credit card.

His business is like a "Book of the Month" or "CD of the Month" type club where the first one is free (for a limited time and if you don't send it back you get charged for it, hence the "try" part of "try my product") and if you don't like it you can call and cancel it and send the CD back to avoid being charged for it.

I'm the lucky one.

[bigdonthedj]

I tried out the Photoshop package. It actually has a lot of info and tutorials in there. However, from watching and reading ads, it seemed that it would be a reasonable price. I wasn't notified of the nearly $200 charge for it. I called theem and told them it was a rip-off and false advertising. They gave me my money back AND let me keep the course. That really surprised me.

Re:I'm the lucky one.

[Anonymous Coward]

They can happily refund the money of the x% who call in and make a fuss and it's no big loss to them.

You really missed the point on that. They are like Dell, in that they just keep the money for 30-60 days, since from what I can recall Dell convinced the hardware suppliers to paid monthly, or on even longer cycles (Not accusing Dell of wrongdoing here). You make your real money in a quasi-Ponzi scheme in which you make money in 3 ways:

1) You keep the money that people don't complain about (what you mention)
2) Interest on the money you are keeping. It's not unusual in telemarketing scams to have millions, to tens of millions of dollars at any one time in a bank account.
3) Flat out just playing risky by taking more and more money out though other service companies (more scams) till eventually:

      a) FTC comes in and shuts you down.
      b) You run out of money, burn your bridges, or can't keep coming up with new products and services that people have not caught on to yet.

By this time you have been smart enough to let other take the fall and liability and you move on to a new company, different name, different products, sometimes a different foreign call center group, and start the same fucking shit.

There is a saying, "The poor will always be with us". Well there should be another one, "The stupid/naive/foolish will continue to be take advantage of by the wolves".

They may well be acting within the limits of the law so as to avoid being shutdown

Heh. Just barely. Laws vary from state to state. What they do is push it as far as they can till the Attorney General's office of a particular state threatens them enough and they will have the call centers stop calling the area codes for that state. Of course they won't take any more orders for that state either.

Once enough states have blocked that product, they move on to another product in the works and repeat. If the Attorney General does try to actually ban the company, they form new companies. It never affects the products since their entire infrastructure is divided among holding companies, operating companies, service companies, foreign call center companies, and the companies that own the products being sold or are responsible for the marketing. You will usually find Mr. Big owning part of them, directly or indirectly, safely from foreign companies located in nice warm places where the bars sell you drinks with funny names and hats.

Trust Me. They are all of full of shit and know fully what they are doing.

Posting Anonymously for safety.

 

Video Professor is a "X of the Month Club"

[Orion Blastar]

type business. Now Video Professor sells a series of Tutorial Movies on CDs that show how to use a Windows software product or Windows itself or some Web Site like eBay. Like the "X of the Month Club"s the first one is free for X days and if not sent back and order is canceled new Video CDs are sent and the person's credit card is charged.

Calling it a "scam" is very strong words, and they have sued people who say that. It is a business and the terms on the TV commercials are in small print, and the EULA the user clicks on explains it is a membership in a club to purchase Video CDs for various software products.

The Average Slashdot member doesn't need Video Professor because we usually just use search engines like Google to figure out how software or web sites work. These Video Professor CDs are marketed towards the luddites and people with little to no computer skills and open up a video in Microsoft Media Player. The type of people who don't bother to read the EULA or know that it is a membership or trial offer. So you could say that Video Professor preys on the unskilled and the weak, but legally they have a legal contract with them via the EULA they click agree on via their web site or via the Phone Orders. If it is a legal agreement and legitimate business it is not necessarily a scam, it might be unethical or immoral or appear to be wrong in some way but it is still legal. It is as legal as those "Book of the Month" or "CD of the Month" businesses.

You'll actually find the Internet full of such offers and such companies. But Video Professor airs TV commercials targeted at people who don't seem to understand how a computer works much less how a trial membership works.

I hereby challenge the free and open source community to make a serials of software tutorials for various Windows operating systems, Windows software, web sites, etc and provide those videos free via downloads or web site streaming to engage and or challenge the Video Professor company, and provide free alternatives that people on Slashdot and other technical web sites can refer to our friends and relatives who might get taken in via Video Professor, and instead we can redirect them to the FOSS web site of software tutorial videos or download them and burn our own FOSS Software Professor CD-R disks and give them to them for free.

Re:Video Professor is a "X of the Month Club"

[Cyberllama]

It is, but it doesn't have the balls to tell you up front that it is. That's hidden away on an easy to miss corner of only one part of their webpage (and on none of the subsequent pages you have to click through to complete the transaction). They're not even doing a boiler plate type EULA thing "click here if you agree that its ok if we charge you every blah blah". They just "assume" you read the entirety of their front page and if not, then tough. Well actually, they're probably assuming you didn't -- because if you did, there's no way you continued on with the transaction.

Where Video Professor really crosses the line is in the amount charged. Most of the "x of the month" club type businesses thrive on *apathy*. People know full well that they're going to be charged 10 dollars every month unless they cancel, and they fully intend to cancel, but they just never get around to it.

This, on the other hand, is set up to thrive on *ignorance*. More than likely, you aren't going to know a thing about that 290 dollar charge on your credit card until it hits you. And then, what can you do? Cancel? You've already bought them *all* in one charge.

A business model based on consumer apathy is slimy, but tolerable. People are getting screwed, but they know it and they accepted it. Ignorance, on the other hand, is just not "ok". Grandma isn't reading the fine print on this web page and there's just no way she knows she's going to get billed for 290 dollars until it happens and then its too late.

If your business model is based around the idea that "People can't know your business model, or they won't buy your product" -- then it's a scam. It might comply with the letter of the law, IANAL -- but by the strict dictionary definition it is deception and therefore it is a scam.

Legal notice sent to Uncyclopedia

[lstarnes1024]

Apparently, this guy's lawyers can't take a joke (then again, no laywer can), Last year, Video Professor's legal department sent an email to Wikia, a wiki hosting company, concerning this article about John Scherer on Uncyclopedia, a satirical parody of WIkipedia. They requested removal of the article. However, the article in question and the pictures on it were used for the purposes of parody and humor and thus are likely protected under fair use. Instead of deleting the article, the community decided to take the opportunity to make fun of the lawsuit as well. The email sent to Wiki (and the associated drama) can be found here.

VP sues 100's in 2007

[binaryspiral]

Slashdot posted this story in 2007 about Video Professor sueing to get critical reviews off the internet.

http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/09/24/1619240

Yeah, that worked out well for them, didn't it?

Video Professor

[hedge49]

I ordered a 'free' Video Professor Access learning set about 10 years ago. The set came with 3 discs in a single package. 2 of the discs were free, but in order to keep the 3rd, the last lessons, I would have had to pay the $29.95 for the set. In other words, if you want the free part, it's only the introductory and intermediate lessons. Additionally, each disc installed several programs I would have to characterize as spyware. Not just the first, but each disc. Before they would run any lessons. So, I sent the 'free' software back. And then I got to struggle with their hands in my pocket through 3 more 'free' (unordered) sets, each of which showed up on my credit card statement before the (unordered) sets arrived. Each subsequent time I called to protest I was told to keep the discs. Of course, they were worth more as infections than as product. I finally canceled the credit card to stem the pilfering. 'Scam' is kind.

Re:Who/What is Video Professor?

[Attila Dimedici]

I hope you are joking about this being a "scam". This is a tactic used by many many legitimate companies that offer "free" trials. Even Blizzard does it with World of Warcraft free trials..*

Sorry, any company that offers a "free trial" and then automatically bills you is running a scam. Yes, there are many otherwise legitimate companies that run this scam. Yes, the Blizzard "free trials" are a scam. This tactic is a scam, any company that uses it should be considered suspect.

Re:Who/What is Video Professor?

[grahamwest]

The last time I did a WoW free trial I didn't have to give them any payment information at all. The account just went dormant after two weeks and they told me I could buy the game online to re-activate it if I wanted. I didn't and they never billed me in any way.

Lie after lie after lie

[Anonymous Coward]

I knew about the 10 day deadline to stop the extra charges and made it in time. I also called the customer service line to inform them that I had sent in the refusal notice. But they charged me anyway. So I called them to ask what was up and they said it would be taken care of in five days. So in seven days I called them again to ask where was my refund. Once again, they said it was a mix up or a clerical error and it would be processed in five days. This process repeated over and over. Each time they apologized and said it was a clerical error and would be taken care of within five days. But it never was. It was just one lie after another. It went on for months before I finally wrote to the Denver Better Business Bureau. Only then did they actually refund the money that they had no right to take from me in the first place. John Scherer (the video professor) is as dishonest as they come. They might not be breaking the law but if you have an ounce of sense in your head, you will never do business with this crook. (I called him much worse when I was fighting to get my money back.)

the BBB is worthlless

[garyrich]

you don't even have to reincorporate somewhere else to pull that scam off. The BBB makes money from businesses paying them for "accreditation" and they don't make money from consumers. Their bias is obvious.

Here in SoCal there is a construction fraud gang that seems to mostly be run by a Moroccan/Israeli family named Ben Shulsh. I tried to report their most recent front company (Erco Construction) to the BBB and they would even bother to even look at it. They publicly list the same front people, and they are at the same business address as their last front company (Highrise construction) and 2 miles from the front companies before that (BC Specialty Construction, Bashan and Allied). The BBB only changed the the rating on BC from A+ to F *after* they had robbed everybody, folded up shop and when into hiding for a few weeks. This despite complaints going back months.

I wouldn't put any stock in the BBB or its rating of anything. They are just there to collect the accreditation fees.