Soooo anyway...first I'd like to mention I had a laugh today when someone emailed me asking "where is my PayPal payment?" Why would I be laughing about someone not receiving their PayPal payment? Because this person was using an exploit in the catalog to get Therebucks from There and then they turned around and tried to sell a bunch of those ill-gotten Therebucks to me. As soon as There found out, they yanked the Therebucks out of my account, banned that avatar and banned some other avatars that were found to be doing the same thing as well. This could have ended very badly for me, if I had actually sent payment to this person before There yanked out the Therebucks from my account, I would have been out a lot of money. So, not only were they screwing There, they were trying to screw me as well. Or maybe I'm giving them too much credit, perhaps they had no idea this could end up adversely affecting me, but it can, especially with There's new reseller policy...
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Okay, go now if you haven't and read these two things on the There site...
Official There announcement of Therebucks Reseller Policy Update
Fuze/Help Answer/Article with actual Therebucks Reseller Policy Update
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I guess this is There's answer to the chinese gold farmer scammers. There has always had a policy of not supporting third party Therebucks sales, without actually prohibiting it though, as they recognize it as an important part of a healthy economy. Now, however, they are simply making it clearer that you're on your own and There isn't going to protect buyers or sellers AND if you end up buying fraudulently obtained Therebucks, There will yank them out of your account and if it happens multiple times they will ban you, maybe even permanently.
Some people may argue this is harsh punishment for "victims" of chinese gold farmer/scammers, but hey, what is There supposed to do? The way the scammers get the Therebucks is by buying them from There with stolen credit cards so that in the end the transactions get reversed and There is out the money. If you buy let's say $50 worth of Therebucks for $25 from one of these sites, the gold farmers are actually creating a $50 transaction with There and getting $50 worth of Therebucks, so for every $25 you give to the chinese gold farmers, There is out $50 in the end. I'd be upset, too! As far as I know, the gold farmers haven't hit any resellers yet, but if There finds a way to prevent their transactions (they might look to IMVU for advice on that one) then I am sure they will eventually. And for the gold farmers, even just a FEW transactions are a profit for them. Even if the Therebucks get taken away from the buyer eventually, it's still a profit for the gold farmers.
So how do you make sure you don't buy from an illegitimate reseller? Well first off, their prices are ridiculously low. Some place in China that really has no legitimate source of Therebucks and is selling them at FAR below market value...why would you think it's legit? I really don't see how anyone can think this is a valid source of Therebucks, so IMO, until they come up with websites and prices that are more in-line with the real market, the only way someone is going to buy from one of these places is if 1.) they are 100% noob or 2.) they think they can get away with it. So it's really like There is saying "don't be stupid, you can't get away with it."
Meanwhile, I don't think anything has really changed with "regular" resellers. There never had a policy that officially supported them or protected either the buyer or the seller, and that is why some people simply buy only from There and others buy only from the resellers they trust the most or are recommended by their friends. I don't think this will affect resellers such as myself much because of the simple fact that there is still a greater demand for discounted Therebucks than there is a supply. No reseller is in stock 100% of the time (which is also why Therebucks being sold at 50% off face value is so ridiculously illegitimate looking.)
Since one of the gold farmer sites is actually paying for Google ad placement when you do a search for "Therebucks", I do wonder if perhaps There should do the same thing. Sure it would cost them a little money, but maybe if they advertised with a link to the policy about the risks of buying from resellers, the money they spent on that would prevent them losing more money to fraud. Right? I mean, I'm tempted to do this myself for a month or two. As long as the scammers are making ANY money doing this, they aren't going to go away.
I thought this was funny...when you search for "Therebucks", check out the two highlighted (in a lovely salmon pink) results...me talking about a "cheap therebucks scam site" and then the site in question right below it. Wow, we must have all just RUN to that site to check it out, to get it so high in the rankings so fast!
Okay that's all I have to say about that for now. My one final thought is that if you are one of my buyers/sellers you should leave a testimonial for me if you haven't already so I can increase my er....legitimacy ranking or something: http://jinx.tv/feedback.php
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