Have you Ever Been Scammed?

Hi,

Today I was scammed out of L$25,000. Unfortunately I can't reveal who did this because it seems that -I- may get into trouble for warning YOU not do to business with someone who swindled me. At any rate, what this guy did was sell me a Fairplay poker table, representing it to be the L$50,000 version that he needed to get rid of. When the price finally got down to L$25,000 and I bought it, I discovered that what he had sold me was in fact the L$15,000 version of this table, which sends 50% of the table's profits to the person who created it (please note the creator was NOT the person who sold me this table, the table was simply the instrument of the scam).

I have logs of this guy telling me both that this was the L$50,000 table, and that he'd buy it back if there was any problem. Neither of these things turned out to be true.

His margin on this scam was L$10,000. This converts to about $40 USD. If someone were to run this same scam 10 times per day they would net $12,000.00 USD, cash, every month. That's not a bad RL living.

So finally, my question is, why are scammers like this allowed to operate without concequence? Is there anything that we, as a community, could do to prevent these types of actions? Let's discuss. But please, let's just discuss. No flames.



-Shaun

Naming Names and the Names who Name them are perfectly acceptable at www.SLuniverse.com

I don't want to do anything that could potentially get me in hot water with Linden Lab.



-Shaun

Darko says the word "douchebag" there at least 41 times a day

Ack! What timing.

I'm sorry about this happening to you. That truly sucks.

Reason I'm posting is that I recently sold my Hold'em Table, and I got nervous seeing this thread, as quite a few people had seen my offer via SLExchange. The table sold, and that person knows they were getting the 15k dollar version. And lastly, that the buyer of my table was not you (Shaun Altman).

I'd hate to think that people that may have seen my ad up on the exchange, then see it disappear (after the sale), might assume this would be me. So I had to clarify.

This naming names thing sucks ass. Leads to too much speculation. And while it protects the guilty, it can end up hurting the innocent in reverse.

Anyway.

Shaun, this blows. Have you tried contacting Mr Fairplay and telling him what happened? He was very friendly and helpful when I bought my table from him. Maybe he might be able to help you out somehow? Or if nothing else, let him know who this prick is, so that he can prevent him from buying further tables from him and rerunning this scam.

Good luck.

-Omen

PS- Might as well answer the general question while I'm at it.

Scammed on here? No.

But I'm currently being screwed over by a German money exchange outfit for game currency in another game. Wonderful! Said they couldn't call to verify me (which was never mentioned at the time of setting up the transfer). They said go ahead and give THEM a call to verify. Well... Calling Germany from the United States is bound to end up costing me more than the money I was trading into game currency in the first place.

Unfortunately, this was a Paypal transfer, and their claim disputes regarding virtual commodities seems to suck. So I'm likely gonna eat it on this one.

Exactly! Haven't seen this brought up too much. Kudos Omen!

Hi all,

The person who scammed me with the poker table was NOT Omen Torgeson. Hope I'm allowed to say who DIDN'T do it.



-Shaun

Thanks Shaun I appreciate that.

-Omen

I too am sorry this happend to you Shaun. I would bring this up with Mr Fairplay as I know he would not like any negative behavior or actions associated with his fine quailty products. He is a reasonable man and Im sure would listen. Keep me up-to-date on how it goes. For the scammer I do hope they are dealt with.

I hope so too. I am currently writing up a basic plan for an agency with a mixed in-world and out-world (web) presense to catalog these types of things and offer mediation in the event that someone accused of scamming would like to respond to a lodged complaint and/or resolve it. I may submit it to the forums for comment before I create and activate it.



-Shaun

Let the buyer beware...Sorry this happened to you but it could have easily been prevented by having him rez the table for you to check out before you purchased it. Trust no one and check out your purchases before spending your hard earned money.

The table was rezed. I didn't know it was the cheaper version that gave away 1/2 of it's profits until I owned it and tested it.



-Shaun

On a related note, Mr. Fairplay, the creator of the Fairplay Texas Hold-Em table, has made this blow a little easier to take. He has generously provided me with a copy of the table I thought I was buying from the scammer, for L$10,000. 1/5 of the normal price. THANK YOU Mr. Fairplay!



-Shaun

It happens to be my humble opinion that if you're going to spend a good bit of L$'s on a scripted item, you should probably buy it from the creator directly. It's possible there might be "licensed distributors" of certain products, and certainly if you know and/or trust a seller then it's probably not going to be a problem to buy something from him that he didn't make. When it comes to expensive scripted stuff, though, it's good to be able to go back to the creator for help if you have any problems with it. Some scripters also offer free or cheap upgrades to newer versions of their products, as well.

I'm sorry for your plight and glad the creator was amenable to making some amends, Shaun.

(Good quote, Panda, I've grabbed it for a .sig line. )

Yes I have learned my lesson about trusting ANYONE in SL, ever again, period. If it can't be done in a way that keeps me 100% safe, I'm not doing it.



-Shaun


Edit:
I would think someone's reputation would be more valuable to them than $100 USD. I mean really, what are you going to do with that that's worth giving up the only credibility you have in SL? Well, I guess it's really a non-issue though since I can't even post the guy's name here for anyone to know who he is. He can just do this over, and over, and over. I'm rambling. I'll go now. Will check the thread again in a bit.

Shaun, it really would be okay to post this person's name at SLUniverse.com. Lindens don't police what is posted at third-party sites; actually I think they welcome having sites like this that offer some plausible deniability to them, especially in cases like this. I can totally understand being angry about this and wanting to let people know what happened. Post his/her name if it will make you feel better.

And on the trust thing, definitely be careful who you trust with what in SL. If you spend some time in-world and get to know people well enough, I think (hope) you will find people you can trust. I know I have a lot of people I trust in SL. We're not *all* out to scam everybody, honest.

Dumb question, but you DID report abuse on him, right? That's fraud, plain and simple.

Yes I did. It is the weekend so I have yet to see what if anything comes of it.



-Shaun

Good luck to you. Just remember when you get the notice of receipt of the abuse report, to reply with the logs ... may help your case.

I did it via my email to them, not via the inworld abuse report thing. I did send logs. I am not sure if they will take an abuse report that way or not.



-Shaun

HAHAHAHA!! Great idea Beryl...I'm going to use this for my sig line too.

Back to topic..

Shaun, if you have a copy of the conversation, then you should be able to get resolution from the lindens. I personally have not been scammed in this way, however have had friends that experienced similar situations and were able to get it resolved with the Lindens help.

Hope all works out for ya,
MJ

Omen,

<<I'd hate to think that people that may have seen my ad up on the exchange, then see it disappear (after the sale), might assume this would be me. So I had to clarify.

This naming names thing sucks ass. Leads to too much speculation. And while it protects the guilty, it can end up hurting the innocent in reverse.>>

For this and for other reasons, I feel it is a very bad policy. Like other actions that have been injudiciously taken, it protects the wrongdoer and has the potential for harming the innocent.

Well, I can certinally understand that having it the other way around ALSO has the potential to harm the innocent. There really needs to be a system where a (potentially) scammed user can lodge a complaint against an (alledged) scammer ONCE, and then said scammer could respond ONCE or there can be some sort of mediation. All of this of course being made public record in a database for anyone thinking of doing a big business deal to query against.

I am working on a draft for just such a system now, and will send it to Linden Lab. I may also post it on the forum for comment, although I fear that would just lead to the usual flaming. If LL informs me that the in-world part of my system won't violate TOS, I'll create it and open it ASAP so that hopefully we can stop this from happening to anyone else.



-Shaun