too good to be true

tech4free

i've been getting a fair amount of email as well as friendster bulletin-board posts about getting "free stuff" from a site called tech4free.com. trust me, it's a scam. if those posters actually bothered to read the terms and conditions and faq from the site, they'll find out that the gadgets there are anything but "free."

the offer is only applicable to US residents (which rules out almost everyone on my friendster/email network). even if you are a US resident, the terms and conditions states that, in order to qualify for the free gadget, you would not only need to complete one of the offers on the site but have the required number of friends to complete the offers also.

pyramid-scam disguised as a free gadget site.

true.com

ok, so online dating services are, in my opinion, for the pathetically desperate. it was thus a bewilderment why i actually bothered to subscribe to true.com (well, the model was cute and i was bored that time, so i clicked the ad).

recently, i tried to unsubscribe myself though from their newsletters. but a few days after, i got this rather surprising email from someone named "jen3583" who "wants to know more" about me. so i click on the message, gave her "wink" and waited for the reply (also cute, too cute, looking at her profile - which made me suspect whether she's actually a "real" person).

almost immediately, i get a reply:

Hey, thanks for the wink. Would you like to chat sometime on one of the TRUE chat rooms? They are pretty neat and I feel a little more comfortable starting there, let me know if your interested.

now, that's really suspicious. the fact that i recently unsubscribed coincided with the i-want-to-know-you-better email which eventually was an invitation to chat on their chatrooms.

so, i reply again to her mail (sent to her email alias on true.com, which uses @truebeginnings.com):

are you real? or just an email autoresponder?

her reply:

The Postfix program<jen3583@truebeginnings.com>:
host 10.0.2.40[10.0.2.40] said: 550 Unable to relay for jen3583@truebeginnings.com> (in reply to RCPT TO command)

just as i suspected. it's a fake account, used by true.com to entice unsubscribing members to get back to using their service. the fact that true.com actually had to lie to keep their members around has given me even more reason to leave their service.