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I gave up credit cards 8 years ago. Prior to that, I had a mound of debt, high interest rates, and a bitter taste in my mouth from the entire order. Once out of debt, I vowed never to go back. And I haven’t. Yet credit card companies are still out there, and more predatory than ever. President Obama just signed the new credit card reform bill. While it is a welcomed start, there is a huge hole right in the center of it.

Lenders generate most of their profits from interest and fees, so this bill will be taken by them as a direct dip into their pocketbooks. Since the law won’t take effect until February of 2010, I expect them to ‘make the most’ of the next 8 months somehow. Just watch and see what they do.

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For those of you not familiar with Albertson’s, it is a relatively well-known grocery store here in the Western US. Last week they announced their “Big Relief Price Cut” to all shoppers. They advertised some examples of markdowns, showing significant savings. The flier I saw listed 7 products on the cover, all of them with pretty good prices. From the looks of it, almost everything in the store would be marked down with deep cuts. “We’ve cut prices on thousands of items, up to 20% less every day,” the circular boasts.

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Got a call today from 866-945-4973. As the phone rang and I saw the 866 prefix, I quickly Googled the number and saw it listed on some websites, so figured I should allow my voicemail to pick up. A few moments later, I received the following voicemail (X’s represent personal information I’ve left off for obvious reasons):

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A real-life move has kept me away from this site more than I would like, and I hope to get back to more regular updates soon. Thanks to all who have visited and commented, especially “Not Kevin” who has really made a solid contribution to this site.

Regarding the advertising on this site, I have said what I have to say and will not argue the point any longer. The subject of advertising on this site closed and I will no longer entertain, consider, approve, respond to, or comment on any comments on this topic.

Finally, I hope to not only get back to my normal consumer-based posts, but the old fashioned (aka random subject) blog posts upon which this site was originally built.

Thanks again to everyone who has visited.

If you want to get an idea where some ideas for scams are hatched, look no further than the nightly news. The biggest stories are the best fodder for scammers. Last year when gas prices soared to over $4 a gallon, it was a huge story. Soon thereafter, ads for water for gas started to appearing everywhere. Despite independent claims that these products didn’t work, the ads overwhelmed the voices of dissent.

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Ah, Google. Can’t live without ‘em, but it’s hard to defend ‘em, too. Scams are rampant online, and Google is the biggest ad delivery system online. They take a lot of heat for playing a part in the machine of online scams.

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Advertising is an age-old craft… almost as old as deception. And the two married together often create the modern sales pitch. Here is a list of some of the more commonly used, and most deceptive, advertising terms.

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“We need MacBook users. We’ll give you a MacBook to use/keep. Tell us what you think of it. Current free Mac is the green air.”

That’s how the ad goes. Of course there’s another identical ad on the same page that says the current free Mac is the blue one. But it sounds great, doesn’t it? And it’s so generous of these people to pour advertising dollars into Facebook so they can simply give away computers.

Right?

Well… clicking the ad immediately starts to burst that bubble. On this particular ad today, I was taken to chooseyourcolor.com, and on the home page I now see that the computer is “free with Reward Offer Purchases.” Well, that still sounds easy.

Right?

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Click here to take a simple IQ test!

Your friend has an IQ of 127, can you do better?

You’ve seen the ads. Hopefully you haven’t taken the tests. It’s the IQ test scam, and they hope your ego will force you to take this test while breezing past the small details such as the “terms” on the page. Not a good idea. There are “affiliates” all over the world casting that hook into the ocean, hoping you’ll nibble.

This isn’t as new as some of the other scams out there, but its prevalence and tenacity continue.

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Facebook has taken a lot of heat lately. First it was the “change of terms” controversy, and lately the focus has moved to the flood of ads for dubious sites selling government grant kits, make cash on Google offers, and teeth whitening blogs.

They said they removed the ads weeks ago.

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