Just HOW Stupid Are People? And That Includes Advertisers!
Sometimes, I just end up sitting here, scratching my head.
I wonder about humanity, and I wonder about how we have managed to survive, thus far.
Advertising, Advertising, Advertising...
What the HELL are they selling?
Anyone who spends a lot of time online gets exposed to lots and lots of advertising. Sure, you can install and blockers and all that good stuff... I honor that, but I just don't have the personal bandwidth to make my computer an unassailable fortress.
Anyway, because we have so-called "smart" advertising these days, the-powers-that-be know that I visit cryptocurrency sites like Poloniex, Bittrex, Coinbase and others... and so, I get served up a hefty dose of ads for all manners of crypto related scams and schemes.
These things just make me wonder just how stupid people are. Or whether they simply have never inhabited the same slice of the "real world" I have spent 57 years wandering through.
Now, I'm not all that skeptical... I believe a lot of things are possible... but seriously?
As you can see, I have peppered a sampling of REAL ads through this post. No, don't worry, they don't "lead" anywhere... it's up to you to figure out where you want to burn your money.
But these things are REAL.
Let's Do the Math, for a Moment...
Does anybody even ever do the math on any of this? Any kind of checking whether this makes sense?
Seriously, this is a real ad...
Let's just take this one. "80,000% after 3 days."
Pardon my language but what the everloving fucking fuck???
Let's do the math here... if I hand you $100, I'm going to get back $80,000 in three days? That doesn't work with playing on the ponies... let alone "investing." That's-- maybe-- playing the lottery.
Let me just toss this question out there: Does anyone sincerely think there would be a single human being on the planet who'd hold a job and be going to work right now, if you could actually turn $100 into $80,000 in three days?
Answers please, on the back of a $100 bill, mailed to P.O.Box 234, Port Townsend, WA 98368, USA!
(That was a JOKE! Don't start mailing me $100 bills...)
But Let's Take it a Step Further!
Let's just assume I don't take the money out after three days, but instead keep reinvesting.
This is also a "real" investment...
So I take my $80,000 and in three more days, I will have $64 million! Wow! That's some serious ching!
But lets keep going, shall we?
It will only take me 18 days to have more money than has ever been minted by every country on planet Earth in the entire history of humanity.
Just sit your ass down and contemplate that statement for a moment...
Am I the only one for whom it is painfully obvious that ads like this have no bearing on reality... and that they are-- at best-- a waste of time, and at worst, a massive scam designed to liberate desperately poor idiots of money they already can't afford to give up?
Magical Thinking and Your Disability Check
Just look at this young woman here. CLEARLY she is contemplating cashing in the change she can find in her couch cushions, because she'd like a new Mercedes when her investment matures in 105 days.
"Where's my new Mercedes?"
Now, apologists for these HYIP's (short for "High Yield Investment Program") are always quick to point out that some "Fred Bob Snodgrass" (who's NEVER available for comment...) made millions with some program. At some time. In some place.
Which may actually be TRUE, but is as misleading as saying that you'll get rich sweeping the corridors at Microsoft because Bill Gates' net worth is $89 billion.
Sorry... but Bill's net worth has zero bearing on your life.
Many, many moons ago-- back in the days of printed paper periodicals-- I used to write for the "Income Opportunity" press, and things haven't changed much. Tall tales abound... now we have cryptocurrencies rather than chain letters and pyramid schemes, but it's still all the same thing.
The Real Losers In This Equation...
The thing that makes me sad, though, is that the demographic likely to lose out are typically the ones who are most desperate and least able to afford a loss... trying to scrape by on their disability check and eating canned cat food for dinner and they have zero business falling for this kind of garbage.
And that is why I consider those who dream up "schemes" like these to be complete low-lifes. They are not trying to take advantage of the well-informed who can afford it... they prey on the least fortunate.
Well, that's enough fun for the moment!
If you think this post is worthy, why not give it a resteem... so more people can see it, rather than fall victim to this garbage.
How about YOU? Have you seen any insane looking ads in your travels through the crypto landscape? Have you ever been tempted by them? Have you heard of "High Yield Investment Plans" before? Did you ever try one? What happened? Do you think advertising-- and programs-- like this are designed to scam the naive and innocent? Leave a comment-- share your experiences-- be part of the conversation!
(As usual, all text and images by the author, unless otherwise credited. The ads are taken from ACTUAL screen shots; not doctored in any way. This is original content, created expressly for Steemit)
Created at 171118 22:54 PDT
Yea I've seen plenty of superfluous poppycock dealing with cryptos. Sadly there will be people who buy into this stuff. As a matter of fact one of my friends told me that this company has a deal where you can buy a bitcoin for half of what It's worth on the market. So they get people to sign up and buy discounted bitcoin while using the newer investors money to pay for that discounted bitcoin.
Now that company won't flat out tell you that's what they're doing, but that's what they're doing. P-o-n-z-i.
And therein lies the heart of many of these... a few people-- "early adopters"-- are actually allowed to succeed, and then become shills for the program, because they can genuinely show that it worked. Even things like Bitconnect have shades of that... and shades of being a somewhat shady invention.
A lot of not as outrageous "schemes" and "plans" work with half-truths to deceive... and they can always point at their claims as factual... because at least 200-300 people authentically made money, which totally glosses over the fact that 20,000 people lost pretty much their entire investment.
Man, I don't know which to do first, write down my answer on a $100 bill and mail it to you (which could take three days to get there) or turn that same $100 into $80,000 over the course of those same three days.
I could build a house in no time and then become the biggest whale on steemit in a week or two!
I know, right?
We could solve world hunger, poverty AND fund a trip to Mars, all within a few weeks. All from investing $100 in Bitcoin... the mind boggles....
ahahah
Good post, yes some people are stupid enough to go for scams, usually either deperate ones or the greedy. You may like this little story, perportedly penned by Somerset Maugham, but I can't verify.
A young man sits on a deckchair on the beach in Cannes, in the South of France. In the next chair sits an old man, very well dressed and smoking a cigar. The young man speaks to him and they chat gently in the early morning sunshine. The old man asks the younger what he does for a living. The younger man tells him he's a waiter. The younger man asks him in return what he does for a living. "I make money" says the elder. Intrigued, the younger man asks him how. "I put an advert in The Times newspaper saying that if you want to learn how to become a millionaire, then send £1 to this address". He paused. the young man was all ears. "So what happens next?" he asks. Th old man smiles and replies: "I send them a postcard saying "Do as I do."
Does that ring any bells for you? Thanks for the post.
Thanks for sharing the story... and yes, it's a perfect representation of how 90% of "schemes" run. "Send us $39.95 to receive the ultimate secret to making money online!" Of course, the "ultimate secret" consists precisely of getting others to send you $39.95 in order to receive the same "ultimate secret," which (I suppose) ultimately consists of separating the greedy/naive from their money.
Of course, these things will continue for as long as there are people in the world who believe there's such a thing as "easy money" to be had out there. Or "Money for nothing," you might say... right down to people here on Steemit who create botnets to harvest rewards in place of actually creating and posting content.
“Nobody ever lost a nickel betting against the intelligence of the American public.” –P.T. Barnum
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“Just think of how stupid the average person is, and then realize that half of them are even stupider.” –George Carlin
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Consider that the denizens of marketing and advertising are self selected.
math is hard
"The Lottery is a tax on people who are bad at math"
Don't remember who said it, but seems appropriate.
true too.
There are suckers born every minute and as long as these ads are running someone will fall for it. Usually as you say, some one who can least afford it and is in desperate straights. It is like spam in your e-mails. If they send out 10,000 e-mails, they may get 1% replying to the scam. That's enough to keep the boat afloat and they are laughing all the way to the bank. (They're not investing in bitcoin yet)
The thing that sort of gives me pause for thought is that it seems like the broader idea that there is such a thing as "easy money" is becoming more widespread; more people have this expectation... which, in turn, fuels more scams and becomes a participating factor in there being more and more "have nots" and this tiny handful of people who are becoming a sort of uber-class. And so, more people are "poor and desperate" as a result of which, more scams are born... and it fuels itself... in a direction I really don't care for.
My favorite such scam was a website promising a slightly more realistic return if you "invested" in their "blockchain exploit system" that "found a loophole in the Bitcoin algorithm" to generate huge returns of free money. They even had a chat full of shills promising it worked for them and berating anyone who said anything skeptical.
Ah yes, I remember that one... it used to pop up on my screen every now and then.
"Our miners have now extracted 0.87 BTC on your behalf. Please send us the miner's fees of 0.087 BTC to release the funds. Oh, and two Big Macs. With extra fries..."
In my few months of starting online investment, such like this and I never know how it works but I try, yes I got scammed and I learned and in such I consider it a lesson and will not go that pain in the ass scam! Although I know some technique in the hyip risky investment, still I loss sometime but I gain more than I loss as I learned!
And this is the reason I have stop investing in hyip program until I meet steemit!,
Cryptocurrency is a fairly new industry, so there will be a large number of "shady" offers until people gain a thorough understanding of how things work.
But once that happens, the opportunity to make instant riches will also decline. Yes, HYIPs can work for some people, if you get in at the very start and bail out before it gets any significant traction. But it's still a super risky proposition... and (to me) much more like "gambling" than "investing."
The truth is people are so blinded by the get rich syndrome,that they fail to see the lies hidden in the advert.
For me it often leaves the question of WHY we have gotten to the place where "rich" is suddenly so important? When I was a kid, "rich" didn't matter that much... people were generally pretty happy just to be "comfortable" and "happy."
Well the trend is changing, its really not changing positively
Wow, so far the ads I've seen haven't that bad. Usually lots of "buy my program that will teach you to make bank in crypto" guru kind of stuff.
Ah yes, I see a few of those... and the real "secret" to making money with crypto is selling the promise of that program to other people.
"No Bitcoin was actually harmed in the production of this program..."
Those ads look amazing. Where do I send my money lol sadly some do fall for it
I figure that unless some people were actually falling for these now and then, they wouldn't still be running them. And it seems like there are dozens of schemes like this.... sadly.
They must be making money from somewhere.