Consumer Conspiracy: Difference between revisions

See also [[The Man Is Sticking It to The Man]].

 

 

== Advertising ==

 

* A local law firm that specializes in disability rights literally starts with "I'm going to tell you a government secret."

* Matthew Lesko, AKA "That guy in a suit borrowed from The Riddler" claims his book's full of money the US government's giving away and how to get it. There's only two problems with this: First, most of the information he's selling is in publications you can get for free from the government, and those documents are not secret in the slightest. Second, the reason most people don't know about these programs is that most people can't use them; they're meant for corporations, small businesses, and other organizations seeking grant money or startup capital. If you were looking to start a business, it ''might'' be useful, but you'd probably be better off going directly to the SBA for assistance.

** ''Uncle John's Bathroom Reader'' makes a very cogent point about those '1,000 Mile' filter claims: why would a car company sit quietly, for years, on a technology that adds ''hundreds of miles'' to an automobile's performance? It would make them a ''fortune'' on the open market, and since they could have a patent in a matter of months, it would give ''any'' of them a ''massive'' advantage over their competition.

** Likewise, if your friend brags about the amazing gas mileage his car will soon get and shows you the copper-coil-in-a-Mason jar rigging he just installed under the hood, hold onto your monocle for this one: your friend is an idiot.

* Credit Counseling/Debt Consolidation services "the credit card companies don't want you to know about". Ironic because a number of these services are operated by the credit card companies themselves: If you declare bankruptcy, credit card debt is most likely to get discharged, so they'd rather help you cut a deal and at least get something.

** A variant in the UK is ads for debt write-off services. These claim to be able to write off all debts taken out before 2007, either "thanks to a recent law change" or due to a "government scheme". All of this is lies; the worst that could be done is the debts are found unenforceable on a technicality, which is substantially different from a write off (the debt not being enforceable just means they can't take you to court over it, however you still owe the money and the bank can still mark you as having defaulted). Worse still, judges in cases that have gone to court have seen right through the intentions of people trying these technicalities and turned them down. Oh yeah, and ''this service costs money''.

* Especially during bleak economic times, this shows up in commercials attempting to sell "investors' kits" for the purchasing of stable commodities, particularly gold (at least in the United States). The pitch is that you're part of a wise secret club that's using information that those Wall Street fatcats don't want you to know about in order to make yourself recession-proof.

* Questionable beauty secrets (tooth whitening, flat belly, etc.) advertised in Web banners and, always and always, "discovered by a mom." Practically all of these are hard sells (often with sneaky "free trials" that become expensive subscription plans without your permission) for products that you can find much cheaper at the drugstore or megamart. The weight-loss products in particular are pretty much just bulk laxatives, and they won't actually help you lose weight.

* A constant stream of ads, TV specials, shows, and movies about how you can beat the casinos. The casinos fund or support most of them.