What are the biggest scams of all time?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I’m not looking for answers like “Life Insurance and Casinos are the biggest scams” but rather stories like this one.

You get bonus points for entertaining scams.

2

I’m gonna have to vote for the P-P-P-Powerbook.

3

I’m too annoyed by the fact that the writer uses an acronym without explaining what the fuck it means to go on.

4

Raisins.

They’re disgusting, and they’re nothing but dried up grapes that fell off the vine into the dirt. I think it’s the greatest (and longest running) marketing scam in history.

5

Massively Multiplayer Online Roleplaying Game

6

That’s the kind of scams I’m not looking for. And I like raisins.

7

Thank you! Now that I know what it means, I still cannot go on. But at least now I know why!

Anyhoo, back to the OP. Big scams? Prolly Amway. Isn’t that the first and only legitimate pyramid scheme?

8

The Ponzi scheme has been running for about a century (with variations) and it still works.

This one has to be the classic.

9

No, Social Security is still far and away the biggest Ponzi scheme ever run.

10

The Spanish Prisoner is a grift that has a 500 year history is still going on in the form of the Nigerian Money Transfer Fraud that fills everyone’s inboxes to this day. It’s hard to believe that anyone falls for it anymore, but I guess if you set it up right, any con can work.

11

For sheer size, the Albanian Pyramid Scheme surely deserves a mention.

12

Why did I spend the last 45 minutes of my life reading long winded stories of scamming the scammers? I feel like I was taken to the bank…

Shaking head. I’m such a sucker.

13

Bottled tap water?

14

Tino De Angelis and Ivar Kreuger deserve some note.

15

Scientology

Not only is the premise and practice a whole bunch of crap, but they’ve somehow managed to scam so many people into believing this cult.

16

It was government-sanctioned, but Abscam was brilliantly executed and had a lot of impact.

17

I don’t know if I’d call it a scam, but the Hunt brother’s cornering of the silver market in the late 70’s was pretty massive, link.

18

Opera?

Phishing frauds on bank customers are pretty huge and well organised at the moment, but they are not (yet) as vast as the Nigerian Scams or the Albanian Pyramid catastrophe mentioned above.

19

Three card Monty.

20

Amway, which is Quixtar, when people WITHOUT a lot of business and social acumen are recruited to work for it.
It’s only going to work if you know how to play the game, and reps KNOWINGLY recruit people who WILL fail.