Chain Letter
With all the shortcuts and scams going around on Steemit, it’s a wonder that someone hasn’t tried one of the old pyramid schemes.
Back in the day—and yes, I’m old enough to remember when there was no Internet—one of the ways people tried to make easy money was the chain letter*. Each target would receive a letter with 10 names on it with addresses. As the instructions stated, you were to send $2.00 to each name on the list. This of course would cost you $20 out of your pocket.
You were told to remove the name at the top of the list and add yours to the bottom, moving the other names up one spot. You then mailed out copies of this letter to as many persons as you wanted. Back then you could buy mailing lists which is the way most people acquired the addresses to mail to. Then they would all do the same, moving your name up the list one spot until if fell off. Of course, you would receive $2 from all these people.
If you only mailed the list to one person and they only mailed it to one person and so on, you would get $2 dollars each time your name moved up the list and you would at least break even. Now imagine if you were to send it to 100 people and they sent it to 75 or 100 and so on. Imagine the amount of money that could be made on that small $20 investment (not counting cost of the mailing list and stamps of course.) The profits could be unreal.
Sound great? Ready to start your own chain letter? Hold on, not so fast…
This was a great idea as long as everyone played by the rules. But as we know there always has to be “those” people. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that you could just add your name to the list without sending the $2 to the other participants. There are always “those” people who won’t play by the rules and can ruin a perfectly good con game.
Geez, people. Can’t we just go along to get conned along?
Now I’ll sit back and wait for all the comments from people telling me about just such a scam they saw on Steemit last week….
*For all you young folks, back in the dark ages letters were actually the way people communicated with each other over long distances. Hard to believe isn’t it? It could take weeks or even a month for a reply. Imagine waiting three weeks to find out if your BFF was ROFL at your last letter. OMG, it might be your Bday before you find out if Bobby has a BOCY which would make you CRZ to meet him F2F. (Or however you guys abbreviate :-).
Posted from my blog with SteemPress : http://www.cooltrix.com/chain-letter-works-fine/
When I started to work in my early 20's this kind of thing always made the office rounds two or three times a year. I was smart enough not to buy in. There were guys walking around desperate to get you on board because they weren't making their 20 people quota. BTW its called a Ponsi Scheme.
Joe
@joe.nobel
science fiction, fantasy, erotica
When I was about 15 or so, I tried one. Don't remember if it was this one or one of the many others that were around back then. Learned my lesson, no such thing as easy money (unless your a crook).
I remember chain letters, too. I never actually fell for it, but I received my share of them. LOL
The other big problem with these schemes is the idea of exponential growth. If everyone participated for just five iterations of the scheme, it would generate 3.2 million letters (20^5) - approximately the population of the united states. A few more generations and the world would literally be buried under mountains of paper.
Clearly unsustainable.
Exactly, and with the mailing lists getting reused the same people would be receiving multiple letters. Clearly not going to work.
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I didn't encounter those letters, but I was part of some referral programs that worked just like that. They're too tempting to try! I mean, what do you lose?