TechTalk

I have been doing some research lately for a future project and I came across a plethora of information, and just as many products and ebooks on the subject, but some of the sites where real dodgy looking, and I started to wonder how I could tell if it was a scam or not…

To tell if something is a legit is becoming more and more difficult, especially in the technology age we live, where it is so easy to whip up a semi-professional looking website, and make up some wonder products. I am still not sure if the technology I want to base my project on is legit. For every single believer there is a non-believer, for every evangelist of the tech there is a, uhm opposite of evangelist…

In my experience it all boils down to, well experience.

What I mean by experience is; I consider myself to be an IT specialist, I hold two degrees in IT, I am a self proclaimed geek and I do most of my non-fiction reading on sites like slashdot and theinquirer so I know I can trust my gut feel when it comes to IT related stuff, I can usually tell if something is legit with regards to IT, just by looking at it for a few seconds and reading the first few lines, not always but most of the time.

But now I am venturing into yet unexplored territory, well at least for me. I however can still use some of my gut. General rule of thumb, if something is too good to be true, it most likely is, a scam….

There are different types of scams;

Fly by nights, These are fast and quick and usually consists of blatant illegal activity, like stealing, they con you out of your money, you don’t get anything for the money, the trick here is to get as much people as possible as quickly as possible, because it is likely that it will be shut down as soon as the majority of people have discovered they lost their money. Some investment, or wonder product, which quickly appears on the scene, and before Google can index any negative PR, it is gone and people are without their hard earned cash. This means there is nothing about it on the web, positive or negative, you can’t find out if it is a scam by using Google, because, this is one of the rare times google knows nothing about it… To identify these types of schemes I usually try and get as much info as possible, but as I mentioned it is significantly harder to find info because it has just appeared. So I do a whois on the domain name, to see when the domain was first registered, this gives me an idea of the reputation, if it smells fishy, but you are unsure and you believe this is the best thing since sliced bread, and the domain was registered last night, you are advised to leave it the hell alone! Obviously all sites start somewhere they need to get registered there was a time when amazon.com was newly registered, but they built up a positive rep over the years and is now one of the most trusted on-line shopping brands. Next you can lookout for common signs, like lots of generic recommendations and testimonials form people usually named Pam or John, this is a new product, the domain was registered not so long ago, how can it be that there are people who are saying things like “..I have been using it for ages it has never let me down!…”.

Then I tend to look at the site’s design if it looks crappy the product is most probably also not that good…

Then you get long hauls, where it can run for months or years even, this type of scam is, generally something legitimate in terms of what you get, nothing illegal per se, but just useless and not worth it, you get what you pay for but, it was not what you wanted… Ebooks, Ebooks and more Ebooks, this is the major use of the long haul in online scams. All the sites are usually in a generic form, I don’t know why this is, but it seams as if there is some guide or template theses guys use, maybe they got it from an online ebook about internet marketing, with the tag line: “Hey, I got you so why won’t I be able to get someone else…”. They are smeared with testimonials on how good product xxx was, they almost always have act now and we will include this added bonuses, and lines like “….for limited time only…” are positioned towards the end of the site, prices with strikeout font and with a new lower price feature all over the site.

Now some of these ebooks might actually hold valuable information in them, they maybe worth the money you spent on them, but I am yet to find an ebook with something worthwhile distributed only as an ebook. I usually ask myself why oh why, if it is so good, would it only be an ebook? Why not get a publisher and get it published, hmm maybe because of the use of plagiarised information, maybe the grammar and spelling mistakes which would take an editor over a year to correct, or maybe the worst reason of all, it is a load of CRAP and with too many unfounded claims and no respectable publisher would touch it with a stick…

When I once asked a guy why his book/guide is only available as an online ebook, he said so that we, his customers can save money. I thought about it and realised that, yes publishing costs money, you need editors, books printed and loads of other things, it is not easy, but then I realised something else, why do you charge $100 for the thing if you want the customer to save… I suppose that some ebook only guides are great, I have just not found one, well actually I have but the difference is the good ones where all free! If it is good enough, just , get it published!

if it’s too good to be true, most likely it is, a scam….

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