A discussion of where to draw the line restricting freedom of speech versus protecting the consumer from internet fraud.
Today more than ever both opportunities as well as pitfalls abound on the internet. Government agencies from all countries are scrambling to find solutions to both protecting their people from scams as well as protecting themselves from lost revenues which some obtain from net activities but don't claim as income come tax time. It is becoming more frequent for government agencies to single out individuals and try to make examples of them claiming they are promoting ponzi and pyramid schemes to scare others into not participating. And although many of these cases are being lost by the government in the end, reputation damage is needlessly done to the individuals involved who are just trying to share ways to get ahead with their friends. And of course there are those on the net simply setting up and promoting programs that are only designed to steal your money.
The big gray area is the untrodden ground that lies between investments and scams. I think ponzi and pyramid are obsolete non-applicable terms in this environment. It's a matter of separating real opportunity programs from outright fraudulent attempts to separate you from your money. The problem now is becoming that with big brother snooping and stepping on the single ant more frequently; the rest of the nest is going into hiding underground and instead of us being able to receive good information on programs to determine whether or not to participate we are now receiving more limited sketchy information and secure contact sources via hushmail and ziplip to attempt to communicate with. As our freedom of speech rights are removed; it isn't going to make the opportunities go away. It IS going to make the decision making process on whether or not to enter those harder however; and without guidance from someone; whether it be information based individual websites or government run scam information websites ; developing a program of consumer education has to be the key to slowing down entrapment in internet fraud schemes.
The
truth is; many good opportunities to add to one's cashflow DO exist on the net;
even programs that do not have long track records. Will they
last?? Will the stock you bought today be worth more a week or a
month from now?? Who knows?? But there are strategies for
determining and minimizing risks so we end up with black ink as an overall
average that need to reach the consumers; especially the newbies exposed to all
the hype and promises they will never see.
The first thing governing agencies need to determine regarding the mission of consumer net fraud protection is if they are out to win a battle or would they like to win the war? Proving their might in squashing one ant in a battle does not win the war of protecting the consumer from internet fraud. If they are true advocates of consumer fraud protection for internet scams, then sites like this one are on the same mission and should not be considered an adversary. A pooling of resources needs to be accomplished to be effective to the mission at large. And even though sites like this one that attempt to educate and warn as well as provide opportunity may be considered on the same mission; they are usually not on the same page with big brother agendas.
My
weapon of choice in this mission has been to build a a
website that informs people of all of their options and offers guidance in how
to spot the scams, warns of the risks involved, and offers rules in how to play
in the internet arena. Big brother normally chooses as his weapon of choice a
lawsuit to squash one ant that has been trying to accomplish what they to
accomplish because that ant provides opportunity information as well. Keep
that thought as you read through this.
I do
not charge people for the information I have spent hundreds and hundreds of
hours researching to bring to them to try to keep them from stepping on the
minefields awaiting us on the internet. I HAVE spent my own money to be privy to
the information in certain due diligence forums to try to scrape up dirt
on programs so I CAN warn others when risks become apparent.
Websites that promote 90% scam stuff THAT THEY KNOW IS A SCAM, use
Homestead, Tri-Pod, HotYellow and other free website domains with
webwizards to build them with and hushmail or ziplip addresses to remain
invisible. These guys are free to plunder the masses; and they WILL if we
don’t stop them and offer an alternative. This war will be won by educating
and offering alternative considerations, not by thwarting a few websites that
pop up in particular areas of the world promoting programs and opportunities.
About four years ago I
decided to take my brick and mortar business to the web and sell stuff over the
net. But I discovered webhosts wanted anywhere up to $5000 to build a website,
$50 to make a change to it, $10 to post a pic on it.
I could see that wasn’t going to work for me at all. I don’t make a
lot of money to throw it away on that.
I then set out to learn html and build a website; well, I boned up enough
on html to do that and then Microsoft Frontpage came out as well as Adobe
Pagemill. This is major trouble for
big brother, because now any moron with a hundred dollar bill can build a
good website to promote all the opportunities found on the web. It’s a little
harder than using the webwizards found on the freebie places; but not much. If
you haven’t noticed, websites promoting programs,
opportunities, and gifting clubs are popping up all over the place. If
states think they can control them by shutting down a website or two within
their state; they are sadly mistaken about how the web works.
As
soon as they shut down one person and news gets out , the rest will
get smart enough to go outside the state or offshore with their website, remain
invisible with hushmail and ziplip addresses and be free to promote
irresponsibly for that state's citizens
to get burned by also. This is
happening now; I’m seeing more of these surface all of the time.
And even more people are putting out on the web the same material we find
on websites but in the form of email. I get between 300 and 500 emails a day;
and a constant bombardment of new programs and offers via email big brother
could never track down.
Regarding
losing money on the web, there’s the moral issue of what’s the difference
between that and losing your money in the stock market
or lotteries or casino gambling that is now state legalized. What a
double standard. You see it's alright if our state runs a lottery where
99.999999% of the population throws their money away because the chances of
winning are millions to one. The probability of winning a 6 ball lottery folks is 99 x99 x99 x99
x99 x99 to 1. Are those good odds??? I have never bought a lottery
ticket. But if I try to show someone on my website how to earn 20% to
25% a month on their money in an offshore investment that IS paying ; I am
committing a crime of fraud or running a ponzi or pyramid scheme according to
big brother. If government thwarts this in the wrong manner they WILL
create a revolution here. This point is brought out constantly by people from all
over the world.
You have
to approach the problem from the angle of education of the consumer; not
spanking the .000001% of the websites big brother will be able to shut down; and
big brother certainly can’t stop the same programs from being distributed via
email that are also found on the proliferation of websites occurring.
What a lost cause and big brother must realize that.
The answer?? Give the people
a place to go that is well publicized to get the knowledge and advice they need
to make intelligent decisions. Quit
playing policeman and play friend and tutor for a change.
People are sick and tired of Government telling them what they can’t
do. Wouldn’t it be a refreshing change if big brother provided a site and
information that told them what they COULD do?? Perhaps a combination of a state
site with rules, regulations,
guidelines and required warnings, and
reference to a private responsible site tailored into a model people could pattern after that would
contain acceptable content. Think people might like that approach better than
someone always shoving something down their throat??
People like guidance. People despise being told what to do.
Tell someone he can’t put up an opportunity website and he will do it.
He might go underground to do it; but he WILL do it.
Give him some guidelines on how to do such and big brother might
see acceptable content surface on it. Require each site to have the
warnings and risks covered on it just like mine does. Don’t try to control the
programs; control the informational warnings required to go with the programs.
Just quit telling people NO. Instead of inciting the battle reflex, big brother
should promote the respect he could gain if he took the right positive approach.
How many
low income families that are so desperate to win spend 30 to 50 bucks a week on
lottery tickets? You know that’s true and I know that’s true. 30 to 50
bucks a week put into the right programs on the web could literally set
them totally free in a couple years.
The other
part of the answer is that we CAN develop guidelines people can use to greatly
improved their chances of not falling into the pits or stepping on the mines.
Like I have in my FAQ, and my introduction pages to the investment
section, gifting section, art ops section and the disclaimer page people
have to read before they ever enter my site.
All websites displaying programs and opportunities of risk should address these
issues up front; but not many do.
If you
spend enough time on the web to get this figured out like I have you will
realize that big brother is going to have to cut some slack in their
thinking if they want to be effective. Take
a site and work with the owner to produce a content acceptable site for this
arena. You can’t protect people from everything; but you can forwarn
them of the pitfalls of their decisions and provide sufficent education
to give them a better chance for succeeding. Just to call
everything that has referral money associated with it a ponzi or a pyramid is
1800’s thinking. Hey ; federal tax law says I can give or receive up to
$10,000 a year as a gift to any particular person before it becomes taxable.
With 60,000 people coming onto the web each day with a logarithmic progression
over the next five to ten years; gifting clubs will not run out of people to
join them. Many of the gifting
clubs are being run on straight line matrixes with NO recruiting requirements
whatsover. To just do a blanket banning of gifting clubs will be ineffective.
Websites from states breaking out their cannons would simply go to hushmail
addresses and email to promote them. A
better approach might be to limit initial dollar participation.
The truth is, gifting clubs do work for most people. Does big brother
want to see them all go underground and continue on; or set some rules to
control them most effectively. One gifting club out of southern hemisphere
country has been going three years now and has never had a loser. Why? Because
if someone got tired of waiting for his gift he sold his ticket to a
newbie coming in and walked away and the newbie made out because he got a
position higher on the board than he normally would have. What I’m
trying to tell you here is that we need to set guidelines the people will find
acceptable and will actually follow. Laws people will hold big brother in
disrespect for do no one any good; increase the enforcement burden, and create
defensive attitudes and behavior towards government.
Government is supposed to be working for the people; not against them. If
big brother wants to protect the people; establish policy they will accept,
feel a part of, and want to be protected with. Don’t keep establishing policy
that sends the message that big brother is just a bully and is taking more of
their rights away from them.
People are going to invest in these kinds of programs with or without big brother policing them, because he can’t police 99.9% of the sources that are outside jurisdiction; and soon most of them within jurisdictional boundaries also because they will come to the net with no face. Nothing states do to a few websites inside their state is really going to protect citizens of that state from the barrage of emails and websites that they are being exposed to and will continue to be exposed to. Taking one site down will just cause it to resurface offshore under another domain , with maybe even a different owner name and no face or means of real contact associated with it other than a hushmail address. Is that what big brother wants?? Sites like mine are looked at as protective devices; not ponzi machines. You see the truth is, word is out; people ARE getting ahead with these programs and opportunities if they apply the strategies. Big brother hasn't put enough time on the net to understand that.
Oftentimes
the difference between a suicide and living is $50 - $100 a month.
America is broke. Taxation and legalities are making slaves of the
people. They know this. They know that banks give them 4-5% on their money and
take it offshore and make 30% - 50% a month on it easy. Only a couple hundred
dollars a month can make the difference between a family environment which is
amicable as opposed to one which displays continuous anger and screaming at each
other because financial stress is crushing their foundation. Why do you think
the devil tries to keep us all broke? To
break our spirit and create turmoil within the family unit; and leave us no time
for the Lord.
I know
many women who instead of dropping their kid off at daycare and going to
McDonalds for 8 hours to pay the rent and buy a few groceries are now using
their computer and the net to make more than the $30 a day net after daycare
costs they were earning; and therefore are able to stay home and raise their
child properly. Some are doing
quite well, in fact. One just retired her husband from his carpenter job.
Starting into a low cost program can then give them enough to start
funding 20% a month investment that could blossom and buy them some real freedom
someday. That is one of the problems of doing what I do; you never run out of an
abundance of people that need help. It is one of the reasons I continue my
search; especially for the low entry cost programs in the 10-25% a month
increase category; as those are the real ones that continue to pay it appears.
How many
families could survive on $1500 - $2000 a month?? The answer is many . My friend doesn’t earn that working as
a janitor at a school. How much would it take to have vested in programs to
reach that level of income using just 20% a month ventures?? Ten thousand
dollars??? That’s not a lot
and that’s pretty scarry isn’t it? How much do we spend on welfare for a
woman and a couple kids each year? And that’s money spent once and isn’t
around for next year. Interesting.
What if it doesn’t work and we lose money on programs on the
net; then where are we?? Do
you buy one stock and hope it will bring home the bacon?? Or do you buy a whole
portfolio of twenty or thirty stocks so if one or two go down the rest will
still keep your finances intact? I got
news for you friends, the "illuminati" are hellbent on crashing the
stock markets so you lose all your money. Who are the "illuminati"???
The best definition comes from the David Icke site at http://www.davidicke.com/icke/visitor.html
"The Illuminati have been working towards a long planned and coordinated
agenda to create a world government, central bank, army, and a micro-chipped
population linked to a global computer. Anyone with an operational brain can see
that all these things are now emerging ever more rapidly." I have
many more sites to peruse if you are interested in this subject. It
is not a hoax and the mechanisms are in place to carry it all out, including
chemical spray testing, and over 130 concentration/labor camps already
established in the US.
Putting
money in programs and opportunities on the net is no different; you take your
$10,000 and put it in twenty different 20% a month programs at $500 each so if one or two go
gunnysack you aren’t crippled. This
is teaching the people that are going to do this anyway in spite of big brother
and his warnings, so they may
become winners instead of wards of the state.
To those of us that get by and have a little extra each month, we don’t
truly understand what it’s like to need to go down and buy milk and have NO
means with which to do so. And then
there are those of us that have enough money for basic living but have no free
time to go along with it because we are spending all our time to have enough
money. The devil loves us
also. No time for family, no time for God. What a novel idea to be able to have a little free time along
the way and not be stressed with panic finances all the time.
You see, here's the glitch. If you needed a $4000/month income to retire, at 5% annual bank or CD interest how much would you have to have in the bank to do that. Answer, a million big ones; which isn't reality for 99.9999% of us. We can never get there and government knows that which is why they do not want us investing in things outside the US - to keep us broke and in JOB slavery. However, at 20% a month interest how much would you have to have working for you to earn a $4000/month income??? Answer, $20,000! Now that's NOT unrealistic for most of us to come up with. Is that a problem?? Yes, for big brother. Money is power and if we don't need a job; big brother loses power over us. SEC and FED shutting down programs and freezing bank accounts and filing phony lawsuits against many of these programs has little to do with consumer net fraud protection and everything to do with keeping us blokes broke. Think about it.
When I
first started seriously considering ventures on the web to get involved with to
make money ; I did so with a sharing standpoint. I was
tired of going to different websites that didn’t explain things well and
didn’t give me enough information to make an intelligent decision. I felt that
if I was confused; what about the rest of the populace that might not be as
bright. So I decided to make a
website , which I called detailshere.com; and for the things I was willing to
vest my money in I would tell people what they needed to know about the
opportunity; both good and bad; so they could make a more intelligent
decision also, instead of hearing about it from some hype email or scammer’s
website that only told the good parts and not the whole story. Now
the state says I can't tell you ANYTHING if it's not a SEC approved program.
And the
issue of referral money??? Virtually everything on the web as well as in
business has commissions or referral money associated with it. I earned
commissions on oil when I worked at a gas station going to college. I earned
commissions or referral fees when I sold insurance and serviced policies. I
never put an item on my site based upon earning referral money alone. Because
referral money can be here today
and gone tomorrow; it’s an unstable income source. Referral money has to be
treated as icing on the cake. The goal as I saw it was to find enough things in
longer term category to get all of them vested with a total of 20-30 grand or
better to get a monthly income coming in from those participations of 5 to
6 grand; AND to put little bits in lots of things which is the only safe way I
felt it should happen. And I am
doing that. And others are doing that; successfully.
Am I there yet? Of course not. At
this point in time I have as much as a grand in some of them and as little as
$50 in others but the idea is to keep funding the ones that keep paying with
little bits each month; spreading out whatever I do have to invest with.
This does work, and pretty soon all those $20 to $50 a month payments add
up to the $2000 figure and eventually the 5 grand figure. That's how this has to
work.
Having worked both methods of getting ahead; stock market versus internet ventures; I would choose internet ventures any day as offering a greater chance for success, whether I had a site or not or referred anyone else or not. I lost my tail in the stock market and I continue to watch my friends that put in a lot of study time and think they are good at it continue to lose money in the stock market. I now have enough good things from the internet to choose from that I know work that I will not have to do my brick and mortar business any more if I chose not to in less than a year from now. How long would it take me to reach that point using CD’s or even the stock market with good picks? I probably couldn’t.
I think
everyone understands the unchartered waters of internet programs.
The use of the internet in this arena of participating financially
in programs and opportunities outside of the traditional stock market is
new. I am in contact with people
who do make their living using these programs and investments from the net; who
share with me and others what they
are doing. This sharing process from people all over the world also includes an
early warning system on any program going bad or not doing what they are
supposed to do so people don’t fund them with any more money. Some
programs are extremely careful to do everything right all the time because
they know that once the seeds of doubt are planted they aren’t going to get
more money to do trades with.
My site is
not designed to show people how to get
rich quick . It is designed to show people what I and others are doing to
gradually increase our residual incomes and with enough effort and determination
we will be able to quit the JOB and focus more
of our time on family as well as ministerial matters. Or just have that little
bit extra to make the difference in our attitudes and relationships with others.
I am in
contact with many others who also do what I do, either with websites or via
e-mail newsletters and share their input with me to share with others. The web
IS a people helping people community along with those looking for the fast buck.
The concept is that "many heads should be better than one" to
sort out the good stuff from the things we lose money in as there is a certain
potential for both making money on the net as well as for losing it.
Sites like mine that share this information from others all over the world CAN
make a difference in our success of avoiding the bombs as we walk through the
minefields found on the web.
It’s the
“how many can we save” that’s at issue here, folks. That IS the mission.
The battles don’t count if you can’t win the war; and to win the war we need
to reach the people and educate them; in a manner that they, the people, find
acceptable. Don’t forget that part. The message from the people in the
trenches using the web as a financial
tool is that squishing the ant is not the direction big brother should be
pursuing. Give guidance first; retain discipline for the blatant offenders that
won't conform to offered guidance.
If I look at my website today compared to several months ago there have been a lot of changes in what is offered and how it is presented. I'm not saying I never had stuff I would consider questionable on my site by my own standards today; or that I still haven't removed or changed all the items I plan to that may still be on my site today. My site undergoes continuous overhaul on a daily basis. I have no problem with bringing my site into reasonable content compliance with state's wishes. When material was put there it was considered sound by as much due diligence as could be performed at that point in time until proven otherwise. Some programs have proven otherwise and I lost money in them also. Other programs such as the ones retained in the most proven categories continue to do well and accomplish the mission. But the protection still lies in rule1, spreading oneself out wide enough in these with little bits of money, don't risk much in any particular program; and above all once the program pays you back a 2-1 or 3-1 play with their money - only respend after you get a payment.
A website
is like a house; my old home has been remodeled three times over the past 30
years and is ready for a next. With
each remodel it becomes more suitable, user friendly, and desirable - at least
to me and my family. So it is with a website. Changes are incorporated to
improve it’s function and it’s reason for existing. My website has escalated
way beyond existing soley for my benefit. Time
on the net, communication with other net people as well as receiving
constructive input from many people around the world has greatly improved
content of this website for all to share and the chances for us all to
succeed and make the difference that it takes for us to be mentally healthy
without the stress and anxiety of wondering where the money is coming from to
pay the next bill with.
Making an example out of one website by flogging the owner publicly and
humiliating him in the pillars for all to see as some governmental agencies are
doing to weowners all over the US and in Canada too, in hopes others will not follow in his path is not the righ
I feel we still have a right to free speech and choice. We can choose to be informed and we can choose to enter any program we want to as long as we are aware of the hazards and risks ahead.
If big brother truly
wanted to be effective in protecting the consumer from
internet fraud they should
develop their own site that
contains many of the same warnings and information that is displayed in my FAQ
and warnings pages to educate the consumer and warn him of the risks ahead but
make it informational and in the form of guidance; not KGB tactics.
Today it
is very easy for anyone to create their own website and by doing a little
copy and paste; post programs they plagiarize from other's sites as well as
those they receive via emails. Shutting
down websites and suing the owners in any particular state or province is not
the answer to consumer protection. It is an exercise in futility; like whizzing
against the wind.
States
will never have the manpower to police and prosecute the numbers of such
websites that will be coming to the surface as well as to control the
proliferation of email being sent with the same content in it.
States should work with websites and the owners they find content
questionable to revise the content displeasing to them, but concentrate their
efforts and manpower on reaching the people surfing the net looking for programs
even to the extent of having their own listserve at e-groups and a state
moderated delphi forum
a. Attempting to control the programs or websites that display those programs
that people will find out on the net would be a monumental task and
ineffective because many come and go within a week's period of time.
b. Use methods that don't
take away people’s freedom of choice; educate the people instead
of trying to control what they are exposed to.
c. DO give people
proper tools to analyze what's going on that they can use make an intelligent
decision with.
But, this will never happen - it is not how big brother wants to play the game.
Big brother cannot stop people from playing in this arena. We know what financial accomplishments can be obtained on the net if we learn the rules to play by. Big brother's job, as I have been trying to do, should be to establish the criteria to minimize the burn time and maximize the black ink for the people as a whole; unfortunately he is only interested in burning the people trying to help other people.
And that's how I see the big picture of internet fraud.
detailshere.com