#general rantings

[whathannahdidnext]

I hit the century! I have 100 followers, all from my little rantings, photos and other such rubbish. I thank you, for putting up with me. Some of you although we've never met but followed one another for a while I feel are distant friends..."chums" which I believe is a ridiculously underused british word. Thank you for sticking by me and being interested in what I like to look at and rant about, I truely appreciate you all.

[whathannahdidnext]

I have nothing relevant to say about life at the moment. I am exisiting and trying to live each day as if it is its own entity. I'm starting to bob in the sea of dissertation joy on a little raft of books heading towards my irish literary goal. Life is just doing its little thing and I'm not enjoying certain aspects of it at the moment but shit happens and it's all part of growing up. I'm getting back into riding properly and we're jumping on wednesday and I'm really excited but also shitting a brick because I've not jumped for 4 years? And most of the time when I had jumping lessons it would result in a matrimony between me and the ground but none the less I love it dearly. I'm going home in about 10 days and I'm really excited to see everyone again because I feel a bit lonely up here really...But yeah this is me at the moment, felt like writing and saying hiii and also that even though I seem a bit mift with life at the moment it really is okay, you have to go down to come back up again. :)

Sending you all some love if you are feeling low

x

[i-am-the-lord]

Me clicking on the SAO tag when my brother's behind me: Please don't be porn, please don't be porn...

[i-am-the-lord]

ooc:

Sometimes I snoop around other people's blogs too see what they posted whilst I was asleep and find the weirdest shit ever.

[i-am-the-lord]

ooc:

What is this shit?

They can't even get the Kertia Bros' names the right way round. And who the hell is Sera? They also seem to have forgotten completely that Seira is a clan leader aswell.

Jesus Christ why can't you read the series before you post this crap?

[stevenrmcgregor]

Beware Of The Scam Reporters

This is an article that I posted on another one of my blogs. It provoked quite a reaction from the dodgy people that I mention in it so I decided to put it here. Since I posted it I have been getting hate mail and phone calls from people that have been spammed with emails containing my name and phone number. These emails contained adverts for all sorts of pharmaceutical enhancement products and worse. Needless to say, I have absorbed a lot of bad language and handed out a fair bit of my own. People are really dumb. If I was to send out spam, it wouldn't have my contact details in it especially if it came from a very strange email address. I have a feeling that some of the calls were from the dodgy people themselves. Scum! Well I have opened cases with the South Africa Police but I doubt anything will ever happen. Anyway, here it is...

Scam Reporting Background

Scam reporting websites (forums and blogs mainly) are dedicated to exploiting other websites and businesses for their own gain. They say that they are there to expose scams, which you would think is a noble service… but think again. You will recognise them by the word “scam” in the titles of most of their posts or threads and a whole lot of advertising (Google and other).

Scam Reporter’s Modus Operandi

They connect to well know internet marketers or join mailing lists and wait for them to send out a marketing e-mail. Then the trouble starts. They create a thread in their forum, using all the right search engine keywords in the header like, “scam”, the marketers name and the business name. That way they can get maximum hits to their site. Of course, that’s what they want. Some ignorant people will even post a question about whether a company is legitimate and no matter how legal it is, they will turn it into a scam. The reason is that they make money from advertising revenue, so the more people that find their site… the more money they make. Of course nothing that they post about most of the companies is factual. But the truth is not what they want. What they want is controversy and traffic so that they can get money. In some cases they even pay people to unreasonably argue with people that try and defend the targeted business. What they do is act completely unreasonably and continue repeating questions and not accepting answers until the defendant finally gives up and then they can say that they have won. But they go even further than that. In many cases they do not even allow comments or they close a thread that just sits in the search engines and leeches traffic. They have even been known to send threatening letters to the suppliers and service providers of the company telling them that they are involved in a scam and their name is being sent to the FBI. Obviously, the suppliers that do not know this tactic are scared and want to cut ties and the business gets shut down or has to move. This provokes a response from the business which then keeps their thread alive for a little longer. The longer it is alive the more money they make on advertising. Sometimes they even send out mails (not directly) offering assistance to fix your broken reputation, for a cost. Then they make more. As soon as someone responds to one of these bogus articles and asks for the articles to be removed the articles are duplicated and only the one that you ask to be deleted disappears, but it will always show on Google. When you go to those deleted articles all you get are adverts… and they can make more money.

Interesting Information

None of the people commenting or posting are willing to give their real names or contact details but I’m pretty sure that most of them have shady pasts and don’t want to be investigated. They get paid for sitting in front of their computers all day telling lies and frustrating legitimate businesses. Real scam companies will not bother to try and respond to them, so they target legal companies with lots to lose. Many people have failed in Network Marketing (MLM) because they didn’t take the time to do it properly or put in the required effort. This is no fault of the legitimate Network Marketing companies. But this is the market that these unscrupulous people attack because it’s easy. People are more willing to believe a scam report because it makes it easier for them to do nothing. The scam reporters love these lazy people because they can count on their support and, of course, make money out of them.

In Conclusion

Don’t visit their site… that’s what they want.

If you do happen to stumble on the site (this is possible because the links do not always contain the scam reporting company’s name) don’t click on anything. Just leave.

Do not trust anything that you read from anyone on their site. Do your own investigation. There are real resources available online through the Federal Trade Commission and the Direct Selling Association.

Remember that there are as many scams out their as there are sites that operate like these scam reporting sites. You need to make sure for yourself.

If you have concerns that are not addressed by the company’s website ask them. Send a support ticket or e-mail. If you don’t get a response or the question is avoided, you may be dealing with a scam.

But whatever you do, don’t get your advice from scam reporting sites, they are the worst of the bad bunch and the biggest scammers around.

They destroy people’s dreams and the reputation of companies for their own personal gain. Parasites!!!

[stevenrmcgregor]

The End of Freedom is Nigh

On the 19th of November 1997 Nelson Mandela said, "Press freedom will never be under threat in South Africa as long as the ANC is the majority" (source: The Internet) 14 years later, almost to the day, the National Assembly (with an ANC majority) decided to pass the “Secrecy Bill”. The claim is that, when the bill is enacted, it will serve to protect state secrets from being leaked and published. What it really does is it gives the government the ability to block anything from being published simply by claiming that it is a state secret. We all know that people don’t read the news for the feel-good articles. Newspapers thrive on controversy and scandal and sometimes they do naughty things like bend the truth or illegally monitor other people’s conversations. There are always going to be people that break the rules, in any profession and they should be dealt with. However, the people of South Africa have had no say in this bill and the ANC politicians have rushed it through the process without considering any objections. They can and they are in the majority so they can do what they want. The bill is not law…yet. It still has to go through the Council of Provinces (which has and ANC majority) and then it must be signed by the President. Obviously the opposition will take the matter to the Constitutional Court. It does seem strange to me that, just recently, a less than favourable person was appointed, by the President, the head the Constitutional Court. It also seems convenient that this bill is being pushed through just at the time when the President was pressured into reopen the arms deal investigation. Coincidence? As far as I am aware, all government tenders are paid for by the taxpayers. That would mean the tenders and tender processes would to be open to the public. Any cases involving fraud and corruption relating to said tenders should therefore also be open to the public. After all, politicians are civil servants and should be open to public scrutiny. Ultimately we are entrusting them with the running of the country and we are paying them to do their jobs. When you pay someone to do a job for you, you have the right to any information related to that job. Well we have a problem, and it is not unique to South Africa. Politicians have too much power and act like they are above the people (until election time) as if we work for them. Something is wrong with this picture. They are making themselves untouchable and we cannot do a thing about it. If this so called “Secrecy Bill” is enacted, and I don’t see how anyone is going to stop it, we will be stepping back to the days of Apartheid and censorship. We will be one step closer to being Zimbabwe part 2. With all the talk of nationalisation and expropriation we are going to get there fast. So enjoy the freedom you have now because it will soon be gone and the politicians will have free reign to be as corrupt as they want to be without fear of prosecution. All that can save this country now is a miracle.