I see a lot of people that keep joining these groups on facebook hoping to get things like free ipod touches and crap like that, and honestly, i’m rather appalled that anyone could actually believe this stuff.

Your odds of actually getting any of the free stuff: Virtually DICK.

See, look, they just wanted an ipod and now they're homeless. I think.

Why? Because most of them are nothing more than just simple fishing schemes. First, look at who made the page. It’s in the “creator” thing off to one side. Was it made by an organization? No? Was it made by just a girl with like 50-100 friends? Yes? Okay, well, here’s the deal with that:

Most likely it’s just a random person who made a random account, stole a picture off google images, and then made the giveaway group for their fishing scheme. Why is it a girl? Because people are more likely to trust an unknown girl than an unknown guy. Ever notice that its always a hot, young, innocent/sexy girl with a picture that looks like it’s straight out of a teen vogue article on the internet habits of hot young innocent/sexy girls? Rrrrright.

But wait, they have friends!

Seriously, when has a hot girl on the internet NOT had like 60 people run up to her and try to be her friend? Just make the account, wait about 24 hours, then get crackin with the promotion.

People enter for the giveaway. Their information is taken, and sold in a mailing/email list. Nobody is terribly surprised when they never get a notification later on that says they won something. Reason they never got a notification though, is because there was never actually anything to win. Go figure. But, because nobody puts up a stink about (because they figure they just didn’t win) it makes these little giveaways a perfect way of harvesting your information.

On the bright side, you won't have to buy firewood for years.

What do they do with your information? They keep in on file, then sell it. Over… and over… and over again.

Okay, right. Now onto the tricky stuff.

Sometimes these giveaways are real. …Sometimes. I know a few people that seriously did get PS3s or Ipods with these things. My mom, for instance, actually got a $500 gift card for Macy’s from one of these things. But none of them were on facebook.

Doesn’t mean that the facebooks ones are just straight out bubkis, but think about it. There’s not a company in it’s right mind that would buy “tens of thousands” of ipods then just turn around and give them away. That’s about like burning hundreds of thousands of dollars. Even when Apple gives away ipods, they only give away about 500 at a time.

And, the people i know that won stuff, they didn’t get away unscathed: all of them got deluged with spam when their information was sold.

But, we all go: Hell, if all i have to deal with is spam to get a new PS3, then i’m in!

But… it’s not just spam. If somebody… shady… buys that list, and they have your mailing address and your email, well, it’s not to hard to figure out everything else from there. Anybody who has googled themselves probably knows how easy it is to get the rest of the information about themselves.

It happened to my mom in particular. So, she got a $500 gift card, but she also got somebody in Alabama buying a computer with her address and name on the bill.

But this is kinda dragging on, so my point here is:
1. It’s goddamned facebook, people.
2. Check out the person who’s supposedly offering it.
3. What is that person getting out of it?
4. How easy would it be for you to scam somebody else on the internet?
5. Now, what? Do you think everyone else is just too goddamned retarded to figure out how to do it too?
6. It’s goddamned facebook.