By that I mean sites where you have to register and then pay some sort of fee for “special access” or somesuch. [We’ll exclude the Dope from discussion BTW, just on general principles. ;)]
I suspect IMDb Pro falls into this category (tho I haven’t ever registered for it). It seems like they limit access to theatrical projects which lie in the mid-to-far future, leaving me with the impression that said pages on said projects alledgedly contain all sorts of special info you can’t get anywhere else. That I seriously doubt-if something substantive is released about say the putative 3rd Batman movie I should be able to easily get said info from a whole host of sites-it could hardly be contained by one single site at all really. Of course if someone who has actually registered for IMDb Pro wants to tell me I’m wrong go right ahead.
So which sites that you’ve paid for have proven to be much less than all that?
I like IMDB Pro. Mostly just because I find the layout and organization easier to deal with, though. Probably not worth it for most people, but I don’t think it’s up there with the biggest rip-offs on the Internet. I think Classmates is pretty bad – they get you to sign up to get more info about people, but so few people have actually provided good information that I found it pretty worthless.
IMDb Pro has one valuable resource for media people – the production company and talent agent/manager info for almost every film, show and star out there.
All that plus access to those illuminating message boards!
Classmates and its clones are all pretty much the same. I had a membership once when it started out, but I didn’t miss it at all when it lapsed.
Eons ago, my husband joined a site because it had something he wanted to see, so he decided to pay the $20. Some months later when I looked at my credit card bill, I saw he was being charged $20 per MONTH for a site he’d visited once. Needless to say, we killed that subscription immediately. I don’t recall specifically what it was, but we were both perplexed as to who’d pay $120/year to belong to that site. I’m guessing most folks were like us - thinking at first it was an annual charge.
A lot of internet sites just give you access to information you can get on the cheap if you look. Like the Chicago Tribune will charge for access to their records, but you can get that information for free if you have a Chicago Library Card, and you enter the Tribune database through the Library Website.
So a lot of things are like that.
A lot of vendors, sell things that you can get free. Like for instance, the best CD ripper for Windows is Exact Audio Copy. Since it’s a free program they’ll bundle it up and sell it to you.
Oddly enough the only thing I’ve not found a decent free version of is this vBulletin board, that this system uses. Yeah there are free BB systems but they aren’t as nice in my opinion
Or those vendors who are selling things, like electronics, for super cheap. You order, then get an email asking to call and confirm the order, then they press you to buy other things.
My vote is for Walk Fit Gel Insoles. My wife ordered a pair of insoles from their site that was supposed to help her plantar fasciitis. What she received was was the insoles, a bottle of “homeopathic” aromatherapy liquid, some sort of other insoles for an extra $19.95, and a $24 charge for rush shipping. The next month she received another bottle of aromatherapy fluid for $19.95, so what she originally received was a subscription to that crap billed every month.
When my wife called, they played the stalling game of putting her on hold for 30 minutes at a time, “accidentally” disconnecting her, and quoting her different prices for what she owed. Unfortunately, she put the purchase on our debit card, so she couldn’t stop the charge. Next will come a letter from from her son, an attorney.
So their business model is to charge for a bunch of stuff she didn’t order and hope to wear you down. And we’ve been getting a bunch of telemarketing calls, so they’ve also sold her contact information.
And she found out that you can buy those stupid insoles at any Walgreens.
Definitely penny auction sites, such as Swoopo. Gambling dressed up as shopping. These articles explain exactly what is going on, and how they can make $900 from selling an iPod:
As the name implies, it’s a site aimed at people in the profession. If you are in the business it has info you might find useful. If you’re just a movie nerd, may or may not be worth it.
Thirded. I suppose it’s technically true that there’s nothing truly scammish about them but they have all the marks of it. I called to cancel with them today.
Me: “So, I have an account with you?”
CSR: “Yes.”
Me: “Good. Cancel it.”
CSR: “I see. Why would you like to cancel your account?”
Me: “I don’t want it anymore. Just go ahead and cancel it.”
CSR: “But you are aware that we keep monitoring your credit for you.”
Me: “Yes, I know what you do. Cancel it.”
[Like, a minute of that before he starts bartering]
CSR: “How about if I discount you to $lower a month?”
Me: “I’ve decided to live off the grid. Did you know that the new legislation allows the government to take your credit cards and use them to pay off the national debt? If you use a credit card, president Obama can see your information and take it from you. It isn’t surprising to me, after I learned a few things about our government. You know the reptilian aliens supported him, right?”
CSR: “So, let me cancel your account, sir…”
Perhaps I should’ve started off with that. Poorly-disclosed charges + failing to differentiate between “service” and “retention” + not letting you cancel easily (you have to call, so far as I can tell)? Rip-off.
The website for the game Fighter Ops allows you to pay them some non-trivial amount of money for a yearly subscription to extra content. Like, screenshots. Of a game that has not been released yet. And has been in development for five years now. It’s kind of like expecting people to pay for new Duke Nukem Forever screenshots, except that people actually go along with it. Flight simmers don’t really seem to understand money all that well.
I find that this seems to be the standard SOP for a lot of Internet services: Default renewal and difficult cancellation. The only way you could cancel the History Book Club was to write them an honest-to-God real paper letter to an address found in tiny print in some dark corner of their web site. No, they’re not actually *cheating *you, it’s just cheesy. It reminds me of a lot of games in carnival midways where you try to figure out what the catch is.
