Their Terms Of Service explicitly states that you cannot sell non-physical goods using their service. So basically all those gmail invitations on eBay violate their TOS, but I guess they just cannot be bothered to remove all those auctions.
I guess this is why we see auctions with TINY fine print like "This is not an auction for Star Wars Galaxies Credits, you are simply bidding on a Word Document With Hints, tips, suggestions, and macros. You will get detailed explinations of how to make this money and much more Thanks"
Yeah, ebay is serious about their TOS-----> serious TOStockmarket. And protection for the buyer? Yeah, right..........
1. PayPal Buyer Protection -
2. Standard Purchase Protection -
When am I covered under these programs?
Both programs offer protection when you pay for an item that you don't receive, or receive an item that is substantially different than what was described in the listing. In addition, the following eligibility rules apply:
Only TANGIBLE items (physical goods that are shipped) are covered. Services and intangible items such as emailed recipes, e-books, etc. are not covered.
No, thanx. I still like CDBaby.com. Plus, CDBaby makes it easier for me to not run into the RIAA-tainted "artists."
Any company only has so many resources. If you want better service, you have to pay for that privilege one way or another. I used to bank (couldn't stand the fees and service so switched to a credit union) at a regular bank and there would be one line for business people depositing their company's money and another line for individuals. This makes sense. Companies have more money than most individuals and so will get better service. I resented that individuals like me would get charged all the fees and so moved to a credit union. But i don't think the bank is despicable for treating their customers differently. If i had a business, I just might bank there, too.
You see it in restaurants. You'll see a restaurant become popular and everyone tries to get seats, but when the restaurant sees its regular customers(who came everyday since the restaurant first opened) wanting seats, they MAKE SURE TO HAVE SEATS OPEN OR BUMP THEM TO THE FRONT OF THE LINE.
My sister makes peanuts for a salary, BUT SHE SAVES LIKE A BEAVER. After 4 years at the same small bank with her high savings, they rewarded her with 2 credit cards DARNED NEAR INTEREST FREE and they treat her like Queen Elizabeth anytime she enters their bank.
My brother's bank just finished laying off a lot of CSR's(customer service representatives). There are only a few CSR's left and they're the ones who've survived the Layoff Era. Do you think they're going to waste their CSR time continuously on "simple" minor stuff? My brother once commented on a customer with a high account who got thrown out by his bank as a client because this customer would WHINE constantly taking up CSR time and getting them to research for hours a check that was maybe $10!!!!!!! The bank execs got so mad at him and threw him out to be last in the queue and instead would serve the other high accounts first and eventually he got the message and closed his account.
Airlines: Yeah, there's the first class vs other classes. but on this one airline, they opened up a "special class" in coach where if you racked up millions of miles with them, they'd put you in the "special coach class." What did you get? You got roomier space than even the business class with your own line alongside the first class customers so you'd be able to get yourself as well as your cargo on first!! There was also better food.
Basically what i'm saying is you have to give as good as you get. As far as what you said about cell phone service, there are always TRADE-OFFS. I don't want to pay $40+/month for broadband. I like paying cheap at $9.95/month at an ISP since i don't use the internet that much. My ISP is a pain in the butt and is slow with service and yeah, i could go to MSN and just pay the $26/month or another isp, but i also know I don't want to pay more and i know what a pain it is switching and i know how my bread is buttered and unless it gets worse, I'm staying and i won't be a WHINING customer calling them up every darned minute bothering them.
Cell phone service itself in the US vs. Europe or Asia is crappy. If you want good phone service, you better be willing to open up the wallet.
I'm never one to pass up a turn to criticize a bad company, e.g. RIAA music record labels or fry's "new" refurbished junk or ebay
But,,,,,,
I've never had problems with Best Buy. They've always given me good CSR.. I guess since i don't take up every minute of a CSR's(customer service representative) time and i'm not a scam artist customer!! hehehehe
In fact, i remember an Airline episode (god I hate that show--just too many whiners!!) where it was a holiday and a girl with her boyfriend got to the airport (after calling the airport up and told their tickets were good) and were told their ticket was no good, so she started yelling and whining at the CSR and then got an idea to plead with the other passengers in line try to switch tickets with someone in the line. Nobody wanted to switch tickets with her except this one guy who wanted to see her i.d. and the ticket. She accused him of being a scammer while he accused her of being the one who was first accosting him for the ticket.
Then there's my brother who was a CSR in a major US bank who says some of the clients with the highest accounts use up the MOST CSR time and about stupid things like "how do you download the latest anti-viral patch?" and "what's a URL?"
You know, i kind of hate the way the threads are on slashdot. you can't tell which post another post is responding to. i couldn't tell which post you were responding to so it's hard to tell what the meaning of your post is about.:-(
sorry! (wry face). you understand very well and i misunderstood your post.
i'll take 2 aspirins and call you in the morning.:-)
Let's be honest. It's not googles principles that made them successful. THey came along, took a week internet tool (the search) and did it better than anyone else. It's the fact that they did it better than everyone else and got the press for that which caused them to be the big name.
Not, their great principles against spyware.
I used to use metacrawler because it gave me what i wanted-- the most relevant data bundled in only a few links. i dumped them years ago. why? 'cause they started putting big large banner and pop up ads and i was afraid they'd start to put spyware on my computer, too.
i used to search thru yahoo until they started spamming my email and spamming my house mail box with ad mail after snooping in my yahoo email, all without telling me, unless you think their scummy "legalese--I agree" contract is telling you. i don't search yahoo anymore and won't be coming back.
for me, it's google and a list of a few other ethical search engines and search methods(arrowsearch isn't the best search engine but doesn't give you yucky spyware or popupads) all the way.
in both cases of metacrawler and yahoo, i changed my homepages in a heartbeat!! They lost a customer, actually more than one customer since I changed the search links on my family members' browsers, too:-) hehehe
when you're on the internet, great principles help!
Google does data mining. It is most obviously visible in their search engine, but also applies equally to blogs, news, Word and PDF documents, email, catalogs, and social networking. They are in the business of cataloging, sorting, and hashing data.
True. but i think you misunderstand. Unethical yahoo does the same thing but yahoo doesn't tell you upfront in the public media they're going to mine your data. i don't do searches on yahoo anymore (and have switched to other search engines and google) because i get my email spammed and get my house mailbox spammed with ad literature based on what the contents are in the letters in my yahoo email. All of this done without them warning me.
i don't mind data mining as long as the company is honest with me and lets me decide if i want to give them my data which google is. Google has a set of ethical principles which they live by. You can't find that with a lot of the companies you deal with on the web.
By chance are they keeping it out of Google's cache?
if it's rare to begin with and no one really talks about it and you don't really know what to look for in Google, especially when ebay always deletes threads with the threads being critical about ebay to be deleted almost instantly, do you think it would really show up in Google's cache which only searches 1% of the web?
one thread i saw had an ebayer post that a seller had used their software (which is a common auction software to list auctions which a lot of ebay sellers use) to delete their negative feedback and so the buyers had complained and when ebay found out, ebay NARU'd (suspended) the seller, so yeah, ebay knows about it.
5. It's rare and not talked about but some sellers have software that can yes DELETE NEGATIVE FEEDBACK. So how are you supposed to know the person you're dealing with is honest if he's deleted all his negative feedback?
Do you have any further information on this? What proof that such a tool exists? Does eBay know this (supposedly) happens?
oh yes, ebay knows but keeps it off everyone's radar. i don't have any url's i can point you to since it's rarely discussed but i have myself seen it posted on ebay threads, once when i first joined and a second time this year.
Everything else you've posted on on Tuesday May 11, @12:01AM is excellent detailed advice and i commend you on your reply.
Providing career guidance and counselling to RIAA victims/spyware victims/scammed ebay victims since 2002.
ebay doesn't police. the "community" of mainly sellers and some buyers police and report them to ebay but because ebay doesn't limit how many auctions a seller can list, a scammer can list thousands of auctions and so lots of people can get scammed. So how is the "community" supposed to police all those auctions that a few scammers are listing?
the only ebay does to verify a seller is to ask them to enter a credit card number. well, how does ebay know if the user is the actual user and not just a scammer using a stolen credit card number which is what's happening now and in the past? face it, there is NO REAL PROTECTION ON EBAY.
bstone
Actually, with feedback and eBay policing both the buyers and sellers, it's a whole lot better buying on eBay than at a flea market, but the general business model is similar.
i guess you don't know that there are many ways feedback can be skewed.
1. People selling feedback to each other with penny auctions.
2. Seller sells a whole bunch of $.01 stuff, gets a whole bunch of good feedback, waits for a period when those auctions have disappeared from ebay's database, then starts selling $$$$thousand laptop computers and scams everybody for $$$$thousands.
3. Buyer buys a whole bunch of $.01 stuff, gets a whole bunch of good feedback, waits for a period when those auctions have disappeared from ebay's database, then starts selling $$$$thousand laptop computers and scams everybody for $$$$thousands.
4. You'll see people regularly getting different user i.d.'s to give themselves feedback or even better since it's not that obvious, they'll get their friends and family to give them feedback.
5. It's rare and not talked about but some sellers have software that can yes DELETE NEGATIVE FEEDBACK. So how are you supposed to know the person you're dealing with is honest if he's deleted all his negative feedback?
6. Account hijacking--Every ebayer has got a spoof email from scammers pretending to be ebay and telling them to type in their ebay password and SOME PEOPLE FALL FOR IT. The scammer takes over or shares that seller's account. So that 5000 feedback honest seller who you've always dealt with that was great sells you a $5,000 and you lose your money because it was really a scammer you dealt with. HOW IS LOOKING AT FEEDBACK GOING TO HELP???
I've been burned a couple of times on eBay, and both of those sellers are now banned......
they may have been banned but they can have dozens or more user names and they come back and ebay does nothing about them. Gee, i wonder why? could it be the bank interest they collect from charging the credit card number that the scammer stole in order to register on ebay?
.....and eBay does provide lots of help if there is a problem.
they coopt the sellers(for the seller's own good since selling is their livelihood) on the site to give links to the police to go after the seller and depending on how honest and industrius the police are in that area and how much work, time, and money you're willing to spend to go after the scammer or bad seller, you will have a hell of a time trying to collect lost funds to that scammer. And if it's international, you're chances are virtually zip, nil, ZERO!!
The incentive is that the big record company provides marketing. People here love to write them off as completely useless, but without marketing and radio payola, your fanbase remains small and local. You have to take a day job to get by, even if you are supremely talented as a musician. This is the one and only useful service record companies provide (or will be, as internet distribution starts to really take off). If they charged a reasonable fee for this and let the market set prices, they would be cool. Instead, they are evil incarnate, but not TOTALLY useless.
sorry to say but the major record labels and the RIAA are TOTALLY useless. here's an example:
unknown musician earns prifits
The RIAA likes the way it used to be with radio payola and marketing and retail distribution because THEY controlled what the prices were and they were always needed. Now, with internet distribution, any musician can put themselves on the web and by low cost means ( p2p, word of mouth, internet pages,blogs, etc), unknown musicians can get themselves known while earning decent money from their fans thru playing live, selling cd's and t-shirts and fan memorabilia.
The old way of distribution is not working anymore.
radio stations and fans with eclectic tastes
Fans are not willing to listen to the same old pop-trash "madonna" "michael jackson" "nirvana" songs. Since the internet, people's tastes in music has opened up to include a lot more musicians even on the extreme ends. In the metropolis areas, radio stations playing the same old pop-trash are declining in popularity and the stations getting popular are the ones who include the "left field out there" bands. In a way, i kind of worry that when the "left field out there" bands get popular, the major record labels starts recruiting them, too which is what they want AGAIN ----->>CONTROL OVER DISTRIBUTION & HYPING in order to make more money for themselves.
but to your statement, no, the big record companies ARE USELESS. The major record labels thrived on putting a half dozen bands out there who had the looks and had the one hit which they'd HYPE all over the place so that they could get the CLUELESS masses to buy just those few bands and profit by the millions$$$. If you are "extremely talented as a musician," you still are earning loads of money. In the rollingstone article i listed, notice the new bands that are earning the loads of money?? The big bands may not be earning billions as before but they sure aren't among the working stiff di*ks like us out there. A lot of the bands being helped now are the middle tier bands and musicians who in the pre-p2p days wouldn't be able to get the major record label backing for HYPE and payola anyway. ( Thank you Courtney!!! )
companies only hold you in their monopoly or cartel if you with those high $$ prices because you're submitting to the materialistic advertising-infested "ain't i sexy--pop trash" culture we live in.
i bring my nephews to Fresh Choice for fresh and healthy and we buy ingredients at the market and we all cook our own fresh, hygenic, healthy, and bargain-busting burgers and pizza.
McD's is crap unless it's breakfast. What do i wanna feed them a $2.99 big mac made of month old bread with who knows what kind of very thin patty with old wilted lettuce and onions and no tomatoes and then to top it off fatty fries (which accidentally fell on the McD's kitchen floor which are picked up again coated with roach spray) with a fatty coke drink (and there's no difference if you call the coke "light").
i told them i wanted to show them what money was worth and wouldn't buy any videogame over $25. we went to the bargain bin and got "Gradius" which became a hit a year later and you couldn't find it anywhere for under $60. they play old final fantasy games and love it.
same thing with music. i told them i wouldn't buy them any RIAA-infested music (since 1) you'll be paying $20+ for 1 hit song and rest is filler and 2) i hate RIAA pop trash) so they had to search like squirrels for independent music they liked. they may be 2 of the only kids in their class who've got other artists on their Christmas lists instead of just Nirvana and Eminem
Can someone tell me what's up with these west african countries?
I can't speak for Nigeria or any African countries, but i traveled in the philippines, a 3rd world country like Nigeria. There is no such thing as ethics in these countries unless it's to other "poor" people like themselves. You'll see very educated internet-savvy people there with no hope for a future and so crime is rampant. Scamming somebody out of their money is real low on the totem pole of crimes in 3rd world countries. You would be crazy walking down the street there wearing a gold watch or any kind of jewelry since they'll just cut off your arm, hand or whatever to steal them. the police and government officials (equivalent to the Mafia) are scam artists themselves and regularly force the population to bribe them in order to get routine things done (like a citizen just wanting to get a simple driver's license.) Why it happens particularly in Nigeria so frequently I don't know unless it's because their government is so corrupt they're also involved with the scam artists.
No, these EULAs (spyware, microsoft's, and many others) are more the equivilant of, "You agree to let us fuck you in the ass repeatedly" or, "You agree that we can sell your personal information without your explicit permission," or "You agree that you don't mind these goddamned popups every several seconds." It's like someone saying, "Let us use your lawn to watch the fireworks" and they bulldoze your house to put in bleachers.
Too true. Most people are not lawyers and wouldn't be able to even understrand legalese without their lawyer sitting next to them. Let's take some examples in one of their 30-page EULA's:
1. XI -User hereby understands and gives permission for application and/or any associated components to alter applications, files, and/or data so as to display information and/or marketing messages.....
Translations:
-We can force any number of ads on you anytime you're on your computer even if you're not on the internet.
-We have the right to falsely scare you by showing you an ad shouting in BIG letters that you have spyware and that you can buy our grand-spanking fabulous anti-spyware program for only $50 (until our next version update in which time we'll charge you again) and our anti-spyware will clean out all your spyware on your computer (except our own ads and spyware).
2.To further enhance your media viewing experience, we reserve the right to run advertisements and promotions based on URLs and/or search terms users enter when navigating the Internet. Our software license requires that users browser start page be set to XYZ.com everytime in order to continue use of the said toolbar, from time to time we verify that users start page url is set to XYZ.com, if it is not we reserve the right to alter it back.
Translation:
We can force you to go to www.pay_us_or_else_we_will_forever_pester_you_with _our_ads.com everytime you start up your browser or type any URL address into your browser's URL address bar.
3.
During the process of installing the Software, you may be offered the possibility to download or install software from third party software vendors pursuant to licences or other arrangements between such vendors and yourself ("Third Party Software"). In the event you do not wish to download this THIRD PARTY SOFTWARE you should uncheck the appropriate boxes. Please note that the THIRD PARTY SOFTWARE is subject to different licences or other arrangements, which you should read carefully. By downloading and using this THIRD PARTY SOFTWARE you accept these THIRD PARTY SOFTWARE licences or other arrangements and acknowledge that you have read them and understand them
Translations:
-We have the right to install between 3 to 1 billion adware and/or spyware and the right to take up any amount of your CPU resources and bandwidth (such that you are crawling at a sloooooow 1 webpage per 3 hours and can't even type up a simple letter on your word processing program).
- We can make almost every word you click on no matter what website you're viewing such that you'll be spending your money at our profiteering sponsors even though your browser is actually on a rival sponsor's website.
- We have the right to force you to dial 1-87-RIP-ME-OFF everytime you start up your computer so that we can bill you $10,000 on your monthly phone bill.
4. VIII -The user understands, acknowledges, and gives express permission for the application and/or associated components to collect information and data regarding Internet activity, including web sites visited, search queries conducted, applications installed and used, files present on user's hard drive or system, transactions conducted, and any other behavioral data deemed necessary by Odysseus marketing, Inc in its sole discretion.
Translation:
-We have the right to track and record your keylog strokes to ob
Re:Rip off Overpriced CD's is right!! (Score:2)
by Ryosen (234440) on Friday April 23, @10:55AM (#8949956)
This parent is marked as a Troll?
Since when does the RIAA get mod points here?
Sorry. i'm having trouble keeping track of how to reply on these threads. My response of:
Re:CD's are cheaper - and unnessecary. (Score:1)
by spyware+scams_suck (764195) on Friday April 23, @05:51AM (#8947811)
i don't know why i'm answering [i guess just to be moderated as "troll" again (sigh)] but yeah, i don't like the RIAA. The RIAA will go sue kids who can't afford music on the p2p services, while at the same time they'll rip them off with overpriced CD's. (Go do a Google search for the RIAA having lost the case against consumers for ripping them off with overpriced CD's and being forced by the judge to give back "some" of the money, average is $13 per person as well as music to be donated to libraries.)
was in response to:
Re:CD's are cheaper - and unnessecary. (Score:2)
by lvdrproject (626577) on Friday April 23, @12:53AM (#8946863)
Oh no! The RIAA got him!:(
and I was talking about the slashdot mods modding my post (response to parent post) below(long entry not included--you'll have to go back to that specific post) as troll which i admit was a bit off topic but not completely:
Rip off Overpriced CD's is right!! (Score:1, Troll)
by spyware+scams_suck (764195) on Friday April 23, @02:29AM (#8947244)
i don't know why i'm answering [i guess just to be moderated as "troll" again (sigh)] but yeah, i don't like the RIAA. The RIAA will go sue kids who can't afford music on the p2p services, while at the same time they'll rip them off with overpriced CD's. (Go do a Google search for the RIAA having lost the case against consumers for ripping them off with overpriced CD's and being forced by the judge to give back "some" of the money, average is $13 per person as well as music to be donated to libraries.)
i AGEE 110%!!`
It's the fans who have suffered forking over $$$ for overpriced CD's. The major record labels "promote" their Britney Queers song and people fall for the advertizing and the music labels make their money off these same fans. When they were threatening the p2p services, i deleted my p2p service, but did I go back to buying music in the retail shops or buying it "legally" at i-tunes or elsewhere? No!! Instead, I listened to knowledgeable people on the net who said that the music promoted by the music labels is a VERY TINY portion of the music in the world and that the rest could be found elsewhere if you look. Go to:
mutopiaproject.org,
www.weedshare.com where 50% of the profits go to the artists
www.webjay.org--lots of mp3 lists from individuals
ArtistGigs.com - Free MP3 Music Downloads featuring Independent and Unsigned Artists.
OutofObscure.com - free electronic mp3 music download and community
GarageBand.com - Discovering the Best Independent Music
FairforShare.com - All authorized by the artist. The RIAA has no jurisdiction over this music.
www.iuma.com --The Internet Underground Music Archives - discover unsigned artists, independent bands, local talent
CDBaby.com - a little CD store with the best new independent music
Epitonic.com - source for cutting edge music
ampcast.com,
or a hundred other independent music sites and you can get FREE music from ARTISTS WHO ARE ACTUALLY MUSICIANS AND NOT JUST POP TRASH. I hadn't realized how addicted I was to listening to stuff like Pink and Beyonce and Madonna that I had ignored all the beautiful music out there made by ordinary people like you and me and fun independent musicians.
The music world is a brighter world if people would just experiment and open their ears. Don't get me wrong, I still want to pay legally with most of the money going to the artist, so I will and already have paid for CD's from independent musicians. FOR CHRISTMAS PRESENTS, I BOUGHT CD'S FROM UNKNOWN AND INDEPENDENT MUSICIANS. At least I know THEY won't rip me off and jack up the price to $20-$30 per album!!
I refuse to pay one more red cent to any major music label connected to the RIAA who are "the drug dealers" using us as "the addicts" shoveling their "payola," attorney-suing, executive/middle men top-heavy, pop trash-creating industry down our throats. The media likes to say that fewer artists will be able to fund their livelihood and tours? Au contraire, mon frere, as I post, local bands singing and playing live across the country are selling their CD's to their fans in local musical places and nightclubs right after they perform for them. Would I rather see a world with just a few big one hit wonder bands making all the money and the rest of the bands losing? No!! I'd rather see what I'm seeing now--lots of local and independent bands able to make decent money where they actually WORK for a living like the rest of us mortals getting the money they deserve without overinflated executives and middle men taking most of the money and leaving the
artists with nothing.
I do disagree that things like movies and software programs should be legal to copy. Movies and software programs require long programming labor, research and development and undesired but necessary bureaucracies. The programmers and actors have to be repaid for their efforts.
However, music is another matter. I, or anybody in my family with a computer program can make a 2-minute song from our own lips or musical instruments or computers. So I'm supposed to hand over $20 every time for this?? Forget it!!
I hate Real. What kind of user-friendly program takes over every media file you've reserved for another application? I couldn't stand their ad "channels" in the beginning and now it's just impossible looking at how it takes over nearly 100% of your desktop with all it's ad "channels" and media advertising. Pretty much every program I've seen(except WinMx which is a well-made program) that "updates" (which is supposed to mean "make it better") just makes it worst and Real is the worst offender. My computer just gets slower each time I have to "update" Real. I just want to listen to a radio program on the web, but it has to take up nearly 100% of my desktop, take up a van full of cpu resources, then open up one thing when i want to tell it to open just the radio part. Then if you reset the media defaults, it tries to take over the media files again. It's so heavy with 14 MB? What kind of program where i just want to play audio files takes up 14 MB???!!
F*** Real!! I got rid of it after a while and if i miss the radio program on the radio, i miss it. i don't go back to it again on the web 'cause i know they'll just be leading me to download Real. F*** its adware/spyware c**p!!
These days i'll only use Winamp with only 1 MB to play my mp3 files and that's the old version 1.9 at www.oldversion.com and it doesn't give me half the trouble of Real.
Real is the last place I'd go to get info about or buy an i-pod. Apple is right on the money and real neads to "get real." hehehe
WOOHOO!! now it's costing the spyware companies $$$$ to put their carp on people's computers!!
I am SOOO sick of the spyware companies putting carp on my computer. First it was imesh with their crappy spyware messing my computer. now it's these scumballs foisting adware on spyware on people if they're sucker to land on one of their websites. i've got god knows how much anti-spyware software on my computer to block this carp. Yeah, i have to load my 3-year old computer with more software to stop other software from getting on and controlling my computer that I PAID FOR!!
WOOHOO!! the worm has turned!! the roosters have come home to roost!! Keep it up Utah fuzz!!
i totally agree ebay sucks bigtime! i had to buy a printer one time and no where on the auction does it say it doesn't work. in fact, i and the seller emailed each other back several times days before the auction ended to talk about the packaging. never once did she say it was just used junk. she had excellent feedback and never changed her user i.d.
even if you follow all the warning flags that they tell you about on the ebay forums, you can still get burned and you'll see some of them posting on ebay on rare occasions where they bid on an auction from an excellent feedback seller asking all the right questions beforehand and they still get burned. i won't list the scary ways of scamming on here (don't want alert the scammers), but yeah, you can get burned silly. i was lucky i was never burned for more than $100.
i couldn't care less if i get save money on ebay. how much have i and others really saved? do you count in the times the seller has misrepresented? are you mainly a seller or mainly a buyer? if you're mainly a buyer, ebay is not for you. ebay is definitely not for me nor for my family nor for my friends nor for all the people i care about.
i'd rather buy from craigslist than ebay. at least on craigslist, you can go visit the seller in your area and actually see the item. Also, on craigslist, they actually care and are what ebay used to be but no longer is----->>>community enforced. if there are scammers getting away from stuff on craigslist, they'll block the i.p.'s and also put red warnings on the pages themselves, (not like ebay where they hide the scam stories somewhere on the forum links instead of on the auction pages where they should be. Most bidders are casual buyers and if you gave them a 200 question quiz on all the scams on ebay, they'd miss either from a few to a lot. Ebay knows this and they know buyers don't have the money to fight them (unlike the VERO club for companies) and they want to keep on hooking the fish (naive buyers) to pocket more money. the only time ebay actually does something is when the case is a high profile case in the news. they're not ethical enough to self-regulate themselves. as long as they can point the fingers on the buyers and sellers, they can keep raking in all the money and disallow any responsibility.
now, ebay these days is a last resort for me. i give up on ebay except for cheap stuff under $10-$20. the only way ebay will ever change is if it's regulated to do so by governmental consumer laws. these days, i tell all my friends and family to stay away from ebay unless they want to lose all their $$.
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I guess this is why we see auctions with TINY fine print like "This is not an auction for Star Wars Galaxies Credits, you are simply bidding on a Word Document With Hints, tips, suggestions, and macros. You will get detailed explinations of how to make this money and much more Thanks"
Yeah, ebay is serious about their TOS-----> serious TOStockmarket. And protection for the buyer? Yeah, right..........
1. PayPal Buyer Protection -
2. Standard Purchase Protection -
When am I covered under these programs?
Both programs offer protection when you pay for an item that you don't receive, or receive an item that is substantially different than what was described in the listing. In addition, the following eligibility rules apply:
Only TANGIBLE items (physical goods that are shipped) are covered. Services and intangible items such as emailed recipes, e-books, etc. are not covered.
No, thanx. I still like CDBaby.com. Plus, CDBaby makes it easier for me to not run into the RIAA-tainted "artists."
You see it in restaurants. You'll see a restaurant become popular and everyone tries to get seats, but when the restaurant sees its regular customers(who came everyday since the restaurant first opened) wanting seats, they MAKE SURE TO HAVE SEATS OPEN OR BUMP THEM TO THE FRONT OF THE LINE.
My sister makes peanuts for a salary, BUT SHE SAVES LIKE A BEAVER. After 4 years at the same small bank with her high savings, they rewarded her with 2 credit cards DARNED NEAR INTEREST FREE and they treat her like Queen Elizabeth anytime she enters their bank.
My brother's bank just finished laying off a lot of CSR's(customer service representatives). There are only a few CSR's left and they're the ones who've survived the Layoff Era. Do you think they're going to waste their CSR time continuously on "simple" minor stuff? My brother once commented on a customer with a high account who got thrown out by his bank as a client because this customer would WHINE constantly taking up CSR time and getting them to research for hours a check that was maybe $10!!!!!!! The bank execs got so mad at him and threw him out to be last in the queue and instead would serve the other high accounts first and eventually he got the message and closed his account.
Airlines: Yeah, there's the first class vs other classes. but on this one airline, they opened up a "special class" in coach where if you racked up millions of miles with them, they'd put you in the "special coach class." What did you get? You got roomier space than even the business class with your own line alongside the first class customers so you'd be able to get yourself as well as your cargo on first!! There was also better food.
Basically what i'm saying is you have to give as good as you get. As far as what you said about cell phone service, there are always TRADE-OFFS. I don't want to pay $40+/month for broadband. I like paying cheap at $9.95/month at an ISP since i don't use the internet that much. My ISP is a pain in the butt and is slow with service and yeah, i could go to MSN and just pay the $26/month or another isp, but i also know I don't want to pay more and i know what a pain it is switching and i know how my bread is buttered and unless it gets worse, I'm staying and i won't be a WHINING customer calling them up every darned minute bothering them.
Cell phone service itself in the US vs. Europe or Asia is crappy. If you want good phone service, you better be willing to open up the wallet.
But ,,,,,,
I've never had problems with Best Buy. They've always given me good CSR.. I guess since i don't take up every minute of a CSR's(customer service representative) time and i'm not a scam artist customer!! hehehehe
In fact, i remember an Airline episode (god I hate that show--just too many whiners!!) where it was a holiday and a girl with her boyfriend got to the airport (after calling the airport up and told their tickets were good) and were told their ticket was no good, so she started yelling and whining at the CSR and then got an idea to plead with the other passengers in line try to switch tickets with someone in the line. Nobody wanted to switch tickets with her except this one guy who wanted to see her i.d. and the ticket. She accused him of being a scammer while he accused her of being the one who was first accosting him for the ticket.
Then there's my brother who was a CSR in a major US bank who says some of the clients with the highest accounts use up the MOST CSR time and about stupid things like "how do you download the latest anti-viral patch?" and "what's a URL?"
sorry! (wry face). you understand very well and i misunderstood your post.
i'll take 2 aspirins and call you in the morning. :-)
Not, their great principles against spyware.
I used to use metacrawler because it gave me what i wanted-- the most relevant data bundled in only a few links. i dumped them years ago. why? 'cause they started putting big large banner and pop up ads and i was afraid they'd start to put spyware on my computer, too.
i used to search thru yahoo until they started spamming my email and spamming my house mail box with ad mail after snooping in my yahoo email, all without telling me, unless you think their scummy "legalese--I agree" contract is telling you. i don't search yahoo anymore and won't be coming back.
for me, it's google and a list of a few other ethical search engines and search methods(arrowsearch isn't the best search engine but doesn't give you yucky spyware or popupads) all the way.
in both cases of metacrawler and yahoo, i changed my homepages in a heartbeat!! They lost a customer, actually more than one customer since I changed the search links on my family members' browsers, too:-) hehehe
when you're on the internet, great principles help!
Google does data mining. It is most obviously visible in their search engine, but also applies equally to blogs, news, Word and PDF documents, email, catalogs, and social networking. They are in the business of cataloging, sorting, and hashing data.
True. but i think you misunderstand. Unethical yahoo does the same thing but yahoo doesn't tell you upfront in the public media they're going to mine your data. i don't do searches on yahoo anymore (and have switched to other search engines and google) because i get my email spammed and get my house mailbox spammed with ad literature based on what the contents are in the letters in my yahoo email. All of this done without them warning me.
i don't mind data mining as long as the company is honest with me and lets me decide if i want to give them my data which google is. Google has a set of ethical principles which they live by. You can't find that with a lot of the companies you deal with on the web.
if it's rare to begin with and no one really talks about it and you don't really know what to look for in Google, especially when ebay always deletes threads with the threads being critical about ebay to be deleted almost instantly, do you think it would really show up in Google's cache which only searches 1% of the web?
one thread i saw had an ebayer post that a seller had used their software (which is a common auction software to list auctions which a lot of ebay sellers use) to delete their negative feedback and so the buyers had complained and when ebay found out, ebay NARU'd (suspended) the seller, so yeah, ebay knows about it.
Do you have any further information on this? What proof that such a tool exists? Does eBay know this (supposedly) happens?
oh yes, ebay knows but keeps it off everyone's radar. i don't have any url's i can point you to since it's rarely discussed but i have myself seen it posted on ebay threads, once when i first joined and a second time this year.
Everything else you've posted on on Tuesday May 11, @12:01AM is excellent detailed advice and i commend you on your reply.
Providing career guidance and counselling to RIAA victims/spyware victims/scammed ebay victims since 2002.
ebay doesn't police. the "community" of mainly sellers and some buyers police and report them to ebay but because ebay doesn't limit how many auctions a seller can list, a scammer can list thousands of auctions and so lots of people can get scammed. So how is the "community" supposed to police all those auctions that a few scammers are listing?
the only ebay does to verify a seller is to ask them to enter a credit card number. well, how does ebay know if the user is the actual user and not just a scammer using a stolen credit card number which is what's happening now and in the past? face it, there is NO REAL PROTECTION ON EBAY.
i guess you don't know that there are many ways feedback can be skewed.
1. People selling feedback to each other with penny auctions.
2. Seller sells a whole bunch of $.01 stuff, gets a whole bunch of good feedback, waits for a period when those auctions have disappeared from ebay's database, then starts selling $$$$thousand laptop computers and scams everybody for $$$$thousands.
3. Buyer buys a whole bunch of $.01 stuff, gets a whole bunch of good feedback, waits for a period when those auctions have disappeared from ebay's database, then starts selling $$$$thousand laptop computers and scams everybody for $$$$thousands.
4. You'll see people regularly getting different user i.d.'s to give themselves feedback or even better since it's not that obvious, they'll get their friends and family to give them feedback.
5. It's rare and not talked about but some sellers have software that can yes DELETE NEGATIVE FEEDBACK. So how are you supposed to know the person you're dealing with is honest if he's deleted all his negative feedback?
6. Account hijacking--Every ebayer has got a spoof email from scammers pretending to be ebay and telling them to type in their ebay password and SOME PEOPLE FALL FOR IT. The scammer takes over or shares that seller's account. So that 5000 feedback honest seller who you've always dealt with that was great sells you a $5,000 and you lose your money because it was really a scammer you dealt with. HOW IS LOOKING AT FEEDBACK GOING TO HELP???
I've been burned a couple of times on eBay, and both of those sellers are now banned......
they may have been banned but they can have dozens or more user names and they come back and ebay does nothing about them. Gee, i wonder why? could it be the bank interest they collect from charging the credit card number that the scammer stole in order to register on ebay?
they coopt the sellers(for the seller's own good since selling is their livelihood) on the site to give links to the police to go after the seller and depending on how honest and industrius the police are in that area and how much work, time, and money you're willing to spend to go after the scammer or bad seller, you will have a hell of a time trying to collect lost funds to that scammer. And if it's international, you're chances are virtually zip, nil, ZERO!!
sorry to say but the major record labels and the RIAA are TOTALLY useless. here's an example: unknown musician earns prifits The RIAA likes the way it used to be with radio payola and marketing and retail distribution because THEY controlled what the prices were and they were always needed. Now, with internet distribution, any musician can put themselves on the web and by low cost means ( p2p, word of mouth, internet pages,blogs, etc), unknown musicians can get themselves known while earning decent money from their fans thru playing live, selling cd's and t-shirts and fan memorabilia.
The old way of distribution is not working anymore. radio stations and fans with eclectic tastes Fans are not willing to listen to the same old pop-trash "madonna" "michael jackson" "nirvana" songs. Since the internet, people's tastes in music has opened up to include a lot more musicians even on the extreme ends. In the metropolis areas, radio stations playing the same old pop-trash are declining in popularity and the stations getting popular are the ones who include the "left field out there" bands. In a way, i kind of worry that when the "left field out there" bands get popular, the major record labels starts recruiting them, too which is what they want AGAIN ----->>CONTROL OVER DISTRIBUTION & HYPING in order to make more money for themselves.
but to your statement, no, the big record companies ARE USELESS. The major record labels thrived on putting a half dozen bands out there who had the looks and had the one hit which they'd HYPE all over the place so that they could get the CLUELESS masses to buy just those few bands and profit by the millions$$$. If you are "extremely talented as a musician," you still are earning loads of money. In the rollingstone article i listed, notice the new bands that are earning the loads of money?? The big bands may not be earning billions as before but they sure aren't among the working stiff di*ks like us out there. A lot of the bands being helped now are the middle tier bands and musicians who in the pre-p2p days wouldn't be able to get the major record label backing for HYPE and payola anyway. ( Thank you Courtney!!! )
companies only hold you in their monopoly or cartel if you with those high $$ prices because you're submitting to the materialistic advertising-infested "ain't i sexy--pop trash" culture we live in.
McD's is crap unless it's breakfast. What do i wanna feed them a $2.99 big mac made of month old bread with who knows what kind of very thin patty with old wilted lettuce and onions and no tomatoes and then to top it off fatty fries (which accidentally fell on the McD's kitchen floor which are picked up again coated with roach spray) with a fatty coke drink (and there's no difference if you call the coke "light").
i told them i wanted to show them what money was worth and wouldn't buy any videogame over $25. we went to the bargain bin and got "Gradius" which became a hit a year later and you couldn't find it anywhere for under $60. they play old final fantasy games and love it.
same thing with music. i told them i wouldn't buy them any RIAA-infested music (since 1) you'll be paying $20+ for 1 hit song and rest is filler and 2) i hate RIAA pop trash) so they had to search like squirrels for independent music they liked. they may be 2 of the only kids in their class who've got other artists on their Christmas lists instead of just Nirvana and Eminem
companies only hold you if you
I can't speak for Nigeria or any African countries, but i traveled in the philippines, a 3rd world country like Nigeria. There is no such thing as ethics in these countries unless it's to other "poor" people like themselves. You'll see very educated internet-savvy people there with no hope for a future and so crime is rampant. Scamming somebody out of their money is real low on the totem pole of crimes in 3rd world countries. You would be crazy walking down the street there wearing a gold watch or any kind of jewelry since they'll just cut off your arm, hand or whatever to steal them. the police and government officials (equivalent to the Mafia) are scam artists themselves and regularly force the population to bribe them in order to get routine things done (like a citizen just wanting to get a simple driver's license.) Why it happens particularly in Nigeria so frequently I don't know unless it's because their government is so corrupt they're also involved with the scam artists.
Too true. Most people are not lawyers and wouldn't be able to even understrand legalese without their lawyer sitting next to them. Let's take some examples in one of their 30-page EULA's:
1. XI -User hereby understands and gives permission for application and/or any associated components to alter applications, files, and/or data so as to display information and/or marketing messages.....
Translations:
-We can force any number of ads on you anytime you're on your computer even if you're not on the internet.
-We have the right to falsely scare you by showing you an ad shouting in BIG letters that you have spyware and that you can buy our grand-spanking fabulous anti-spyware program for only $50 (until our next version update in which time we'll charge you again) and our anti-spyware will clean out all your spyware on your computer (except our own ads and spyware).
2.To further enhance your media viewing experience, we reserve the right to run advertisements and promotions based on URLs and/or search terms users enter when navigating the Internet. Our software license requires that users browser start page be set to XYZ.com everytime in order to continue use of the said toolbar, from time to time we verify that users start page url is set to XYZ.com, if it is not we reserve the right to alter it back.
Translation:
We can force you to go to www.pay_us_or_else_we_will_forever_pester_you_with _our_ads.com everytime you start up your browser or type any URL address into your browser's URL address bar.
3. During the process of installing the Software, you may be offered the possibility to download or install software from third party software vendors pursuant to licences or other arrangements between such vendors and yourself ("Third Party Software"). In the event you do not wish to download this THIRD PARTY SOFTWARE you should uncheck the appropriate boxes. Please note that the THIRD PARTY SOFTWARE is subject to different licences or other arrangements, which you should read carefully. By downloading and using this THIRD PARTY SOFTWARE you accept these THIRD PARTY SOFTWARE licences or other arrangements and acknowledge that you have read them and understand them
Translations:
-We have the right to install between 3 to 1 billion adware and/or spyware and the right to take up any amount of your CPU resources and bandwidth (such that you are crawling at a sloooooow 1 webpage per 3 hours and can't even type up a simple letter on your word processing program).
- We can make almost every word you click on no matter what website you're viewing such that you'll be spending your money at our profiteering sponsors even though your browser is actually on a rival sponsor's website.
- We have the right to force you to dial 1-87-RIP-ME-OFF everytime you start up your computer so that we can bill you $10,000 on your monthly phone bill.
4. VIII -The user understands, acknowledges, and gives express permission for the application and/or associated components to collect information and data regarding Internet activity, including web sites visited, search queries conducted, applications installed and used, files present on user's hard drive or system, transactions conducted, and any other behavioral data deemed necessary by Odysseus marketing, Inc in its sole discretion.
Translation:
-We have the right to track and record your keylog strokes to ob
by Ryosen (234440) on Friday April 23, @10:55AM (#8949956)
This parent is marked as a Troll?
Since when does the RIAA get mod points here?
Sorry. i'm having trouble keeping track of how to reply on these threads.
My response of:
Re:CD's are cheaper - and unnessecary. (Score:1)
by spyware+scams_suck (764195) on Friday April 23, @05:51AM (#8947811)
i don't know why i'm answering [i guess just to be moderated as "troll" again (sigh)] but yeah, i don't like the RIAA. The RIAA will go sue kids who can't afford music on the p2p services, while at the same time they'll rip them off with overpriced CD's. (Go do a Google search for the RIAA having lost the case against consumers for ripping them off with overpriced CD's and being forced by the judge to give back "some" of the money, average is $13 per person as well as music to be donated to libraries.)
was in response to:
Re:CD's are cheaper - and unnessecary. (Score:2)
by lvdrproject (626577) on Friday April 23, @12:53AM (#8946863)
Oh no! The RIAA got him! :(
and I was talking about the slashdot mods modding my post (response to parent post) below(long entry not included--you'll have to go back to that specific post) as troll which i admit was a bit off topic but not completely:
Rip off Overpriced CD's is right!! (Score:1, Troll)
by spyware+scams_suck (764195) on Friday April 23, @02:29AM (#8947244)
i don't know why i'm answering [i guess just to be moderated as "troll" again (sigh)] but yeah, i don't like the RIAA. The RIAA will go sue kids who can't afford music on the p2p services, while at the same time they'll rip them off with overpriced CD's. (Go do a Google search for the RIAA having lost the case against consumers for ripping them off with overpriced CD's and being forced by the judge to give back "some" of the money, average is $13 per person as well as music to be donated to libraries.)
The music world is a brighter world if people would just experiment and open their ears. Don't get me wrong, I still want to pay legally with most of the money going to the artist, so I will and already have paid for CD's from independent musicians. FOR CHRISTMAS PRESENTS, I BOUGHT CD'S FROM UNKNOWN AND INDEPENDENT MUSICIANS. At least I know THEY won't rip me off and jack up the price to $20-$30 per album!!
I refuse to pay one more red cent to any major music label connected to the RIAA who are "the drug dealers" using us as "the addicts" shoveling their "payola," attorney-suing, executive/middle men top-heavy, pop trash-creating industry down our throats. The media likes to say that fewer artists will be able to fund their livelihood and tours? Au contraire, mon frere, as I post, local bands singing and playing live across the country are selling their CD's to their fans in local musical places and nightclubs right after they perform for them. Would I rather see a world with just a few big one hit wonder bands making all the money and the rest of the bands losing? No!! I'd rather see what I'm seeing now--lots of local and independent bands able to make decent money where they actually WORK for a living like the rest of us mortals getting the money they deserve without overinflated executives and middle men taking most of the money and leaving the artists with nothing.
I do disagree that things like movies and software programs should be legal to copy. Movies and software programs require long programming labor, research and development and undesired but necessary bureaucracies. The programmers and actors have to be repaid for their efforts.
However, music is another matter. I, or anybody in my family with a computer program can make a 2-minute song from our own lips or musical instruments or computers. So I'm supposed to hand over $20 every time for this?? Forget it!!
don't remind me. (sigh)
F*** Real!! I got rid of it after a while and if i miss the radio program on the radio, i miss it. i don't go back to it again on the web 'cause i know they'll just be leading me to download Real. F*** its adware/spyware c**p!!
These days i'll only use Winamp with only 1 MB to play my mp3 files and that's the old version 1.9 at www.oldversion.com and it doesn't give me half the trouble of Real.
Real is the last place I'd go to get info about or buy an i-pod. Apple is right on the money and real neads to "get real." hehehe
OH YES!!! OH YES!! HALLELLUJAH!!
WOOHOO!! now it's costing the spyware companies $$$$ to put their carp on people's computers!!
I am SOOO sick of the spyware companies putting carp on my computer. First it was imesh with their crappy spyware messing my computer. now it's these scumballs foisting adware on spyware on people if they're sucker to land on one of their websites. i've got god knows how much anti-spyware software on my computer to block this carp. Yeah, i have to load my 3-year old computer with more software to stop other software from getting on and controlling my computer that I PAID FOR!!
WOOHOO!! the worm has turned!! the roosters have come home to roost!! Keep it up Utah fuzz!!
even if you follow all the warning flags that they tell you about on the ebay forums, you can still get burned and you'll see some of them posting on ebay on rare occasions where they bid on an auction from an excellent feedback seller asking all the right questions beforehand and they still get burned. i won't list the scary ways of scamming on here (don't want alert the scammers), but yeah, you can get burned silly. i was lucky i was never burned for more than $100.
i couldn't care less if i get save money on ebay. how much have i and others really saved? do you count in the times the seller has misrepresented? are you mainly a seller or mainly a buyer? if you're mainly a buyer, ebay is not for you. ebay is definitely not for me nor for my family nor for my friends nor for all the people i care about.
i'd rather buy from craigslist than ebay. at least on craigslist, you can go visit the seller in your area and actually see the item. Also, on craigslist, they actually care and are what ebay used to be but no longer is----->>>community enforced. if there are scammers getting away from stuff on craigslist, they'll block the i.p.'s and also put red warnings on the pages themselves, (not like ebay where they hide the scam stories somewhere on the forum links instead of on the auction pages where they should be. Most bidders are casual buyers and if you gave them a 200 question quiz on all the scams on ebay, they'd miss either from a few to a lot. Ebay knows this and they know buyers don't have the money to fight them (unlike the VERO club for companies) and they want to keep on hooking the fish (naive buyers) to pocket more money. the only time ebay actually does something is when the case is a high profile case in the news. they're not ethical enough to self-regulate themselves. as long as they can point the fingers on the buyers and sellers, they can keep raking in all the money and disallow any responsibility.
now, ebay these days is a last resort for me. i give up on ebay except for cheap stuff under $10-$20. the only way ebay will ever change is if it's regulated to do so by governmental consumer laws. these days, i tell all my friends and family to stay away from ebay unless they want to lose all their $$.