And don’t get me started on that fake balance and stretch test the promoters attempted to do on me. I know how that works. It’s a placebo effect.
Don’t buy this EFX Band. It’s only value lies in the fact that it can make you appear a tad tougher. If you want some health product that really works, get some vitamin pills. And perhaps some passive orgonite cubes.

EFX bands. Bah humbug

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One thing I noticed prior to purchase was that the five different vendors had similar ad copy. They sold what looked like the same item from the way they ripped their pictures off from each other. They sold diamonds for the same price regardless of carat size. Plus they all charged astronomically ($87 for UPS, but they’ll ship it via untrackable registered mail). Nonetheless I gave them the benefit of he doubt, after all Aliexpress.com operated via escrow and Paypal offered buyer protection.

So guess what happened when I received the goods?

These chinese mainland suppliers sent me utter fakes. Totally different from what they advertised too. They should have had the decency to send at least cubic zircon so I would be fooled. But they assumed I was an utter moron by sending me glass. (yep, I ran them through the battery of diamond testers). They were so fragile that even glass scratched them.

Tsk tsk. And so I tried to get a refund. Aliexpress.com appeared to side with the vendors so I went through paypal. Got a partial refund. Lousy deal, but at least some of the money came back.

Be wary when you buy at Aliexpress.com Most of their electronic items and apparel are good. But not so with these gem traders. Most are scammers.

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Without varying my extant dieting and workout regimen, I applied the tubes for a few weeks as per schedule. The scent was nice. Like tea. Relaxing too. Felt a mild heat. But beyond this, nothing happened. On the contrary, I feel like I got extra water weight in the area! Instead of burning fat, the cream drew water into the area.

What the #!@#!!

I’m not that miffed on the economic side since they’re cheap. But Im pissed that I wasted all that time on it. I could have spent the hours rubbing on doing situps.

Ugh. Nivea get back to the drawing board. And be honest.

Michelle Andrea

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“Discover how to extort $34,612 on automatic pilot!!”

I certainly like 34,612. And considering I’m a lazy shit, automatic pilot is nice. The thing is, is this another richjerk wannabee that offer a moderate amount of general ideas and little hardcore tactic?

Dirty CPA is a simple media course that Steve Iser And John Hostler has come out with to teach you how they made over $30,000 using CPA Methods month after month. I don’t know how true is the fact that they made that much (or in what time frame). But the selling page’s promise is that you will learn how to drive insane amounts of targeted traffic to CPA offers using their techniques

Inside the members area, you will have access to 13 modules of training content, including:

1. An overview of CPA offers and CPA networks
2. How to build killer-converting landing pages
3. How to take advantage of social media sites to drive traffic to offers
4. A guide to PPC strategies that work incredibly well for CPA
5. You also get access to tons of useful tools and special members bonuses

So what’s the bottomline?

Dirty CPA is a not-so-novel course that educates individuals with regards to creating cash using cost per action marketing. The system, like many other make money online products promises huge revenues.

To begin with, CPA stands for Cost Per Action. Rephrasing, it is an online advertising model by which advertisers pay you for funneling visitors that perform certain actions whether that is in the form of a sign up or a purchase.

Dirty CPA includes several tips and information on how to make money using CPA marketing. There are several free resources that you can read and get you started with CPA but if you acquire the guide then you will be getting a few goodies. For instance, there is a good list of superb CPA offers and networks. From there are guides to build webpages that convert traffic into sales. Then you deploy social media sites to drive traffic to offers. Finally you find how to use advertising to promote offers and profit.

All that sounds familiar?

It is. Almost every other system out there costing $49 to $99 offers the same content. In fact, after reading the book, I discovered that I’ve been using the same techniques the past 5 years.

Did I make $34,000? Yep I did. But not merely from the methods they exposed. I got it from a huge aggregation of methodologies.

If you’re an intermediate online entrepreneur,this system may save you a lot of time and money by eliminating guessork. However, if you’re like me and have been frequenting SEO boards like Digital Point or Warrior Forum, much of what’s in here may be old hat.

I give DirtyCPA 4 out of 5 stars

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Cool tool Krab Crawler looks at all posts that appears on Twitter. The posts are parsed for hyperlinks which, if stealthed, are analyzed as to origin. (Yes- even shortened URLs are recognized.) The destination URL is then checked for any nasty things, such as the Koobface virus, that might make your day less tweety.

According to developers, the software scans over 2 million posts per hour and ensures a healthier surfing experience for you. That’s one less nigerian scammer who’ll get his grubby hands on your credit card!

Krab Krawler synchronizes with Twitter’s proprietary ring system. With extra layers of protection between you and the bad guys, you can rest assured that your bank remains intact.

But do make sure you have a standard virus scanner running!

Check out Krab Crawler here.

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It used to be that the Palm Pilot had the most downloadable apps.  Now, it’s different. Palm is dead and the iPhonereigns supreme. When it comes to applications, the iPhone has it all. Even the Windows Mobile phones can’t compete. Don’t believe me? Check out the Apple Store. Or Cydia. Or Installer

Want to control yourDVD? There’s an app for that. Want to find the nearest German bistro? There’s an app for that. Want to record your nosepicking  habits and post them on facebook? Yep, there’s an app for that, too. There’s even a shit program called Poop the World that pooped  its way into Apple’s iPhone App Store. For a dollar, the app combines the iPhone’s GPS power with your own notes to create a public diary of your private business. How sick is that??!

Insane? Def. Pointless? Of course. But delightful? For some sickos- yeah!. I hate to be a party pooper, but let’s face it: Shit apps are becoming commonplace on the iPhone. Wanna know which iphone apps really burp this month? Check it out!

1. FatBurner2k

You want to shed poounds without running the treadmill? Perhaps you want instant weightloss while stuffing that burger down your throat.  FatBurner2K is just the perfect  app for you–you just have to lack the brain neurons in order to believe it.

FatBurner 2K claims to “turn your iPhone into the gym that works on your terms.”  I guess what that means is that you can reach for your iphone while watching Fast Food Nation on TV with a tub of  popcorn by your side.  FatBurner’s power ingredient: The app makes your iPhone vibrate. Now you don’t have to spend $79 on Hydroxycut Hardcore (which was banned) anymore. So cool isn’t it?

2. Passion

There were a few apps that rated how well you can kiss. Then there were those that scored how good your farts blasted away. Now we have an app that checks out how masterful your coitus goes. So… pump away. Grind at your GF and await the score. You’ll know just how cool a lover you are. I don’t know how this works, but I’m guessing the accelerometer measures just how many times she vibrates in orgasm.

3. Sexy Girl Talk: Sexy Alphabet Deluxe

Some nerd guys just can’t get it off unless they hear some sexy whispers in their ear. For those with a fetish for vocal cords, this is the app for you. A sexy voice reads the alphabet to you in what appears to be a cross between Nicole Kidman and Angelina Jolie from a director’s nightmare of a movie.

If you’d ask me, I’d rather pay my girlfriend to whisper in my ear!

There are a lot more dumb iphone apps out there. I’d post them but you’d accuse me of insulting your intelligence.

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• Never reply to (or click on links ) within email purportedly from ebay. 98% of all the wild email from paypal, ebay, Bank of America , etc are phising schemes designed to wrest critical information from you. Succumb- and you’re giving thieves access to your account.  Instead, login directly to your ebay account where the real messages are stored. This ensures that monsters are not stealing your information
• Never click on user-created links in auction listings. My buddy did and ended up having to cancel a credit card.
• Never allow your browser to automatically log you in. Instead, enter your passwords manually. Automatic login may leave vulnerable cookies on your PC that miscreants can steal!
• Ask lots of questions. Never bid till you know the answers. Assume nothing. Implications are just guesses and can lead to disappointments!
• Leave feedback only after you are satisfied. Leaving it before disempowers you. You lose your bargaining chip!

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And you guys think that your credit cards are secure.

I don’t care if it’s Gold or Silver, Platinum or unlimited credit. Magnetic stripe or smart chip. Whether Citibank or Chase issued it- you’re in heavy risk of being defrauded.   You can lose a great deal of money- and I don’t mean about getting robbed  on the street. You will bleed your money to the shady call center agent who has access to your entire credit record. Everything.

The other day, I had the pleasure of being toured by a ranking member of a top  call center which services a Fortune 100 bank. Both the call center and the bank have “C” as their starting letters and command a great deal of respect in their industries.  In terms of assets, both hold the top three positions. Naturally, people think they’re secure in their hands.

What I found out was ghastly.

For starters, I discovered that call center agents have full access to your credit card details. That means the digits on your credit card, the security number, expiry date, your transactions and your personal details. In just a few keystrokes, they can call up multiple screens with names, numbers and figures. Except for extremely wealthy clients like Oprah that is. Heavy rollers have a separate division handling their accounts. Sucks to the rest of us.

Now this cool manager told me how agents are ‘forbidden’ from lugging around camera phones while at work. The measure prevents taking snapshots of critical data that can be used for making unauthorized purchases. Here’s the funny thing. Many agents take the mandate as a suggestion, not a rule. Virtually everyone was lugging around camera phones. And digital SLRs! Hmmm… what was the point of having all those team leaders, QAs and security guards milling around?

Breach of trust occurs often, according to the manager. Rogue agents  to amass card information and use them at internet cafes through proxy servers. In order to minimize getting caught, they spend $50 here, $100 there… preferably at the favorite stores of the defrauded clients. Goods are then shipped to multiple PO Box and picked up by accomplices. This minimal effort to eliminates  suspicion.

A few have been caught already- the stupid ones. These blokes get greedy and spend $4000 on a single card- perhaps for trinkets at sextoys.com. That raises red flags. But hell, who cares? The call center just terminates the rogue without filing cases because it’s tough to prove. Then the agent goes to another center and repeats the scam. Over and over and over.

From the manager’s tale of woe, I discovered how the typical rogue can net $10,000 or more in a month or two. That’s about a year of his salary. The fear of getting caught doesn’t matter, after all, the worst that can happen is getting fired. Who the crap cares? He’s already fleeced ten grand into the pocket.

 Burn your cards folks. Stick with debit cards.

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Yesiree! Here’s anothe fun and dandy little device that promises to shed my marbled fat while I watch TV with a tub of popcorn. Their ad tickled me pink!

By using Ston-O-Max you’ll be able to get the body you’ve always wanted. The Ston-O-Max is the first and only machine that utilizes the patented CBS (Centrifugal Body Stimulation) technology. Its elliptical motion causes muscles to contract and in turn build muscle and break down fat

Sure sure sure. It’s another Osim clone (remember the Uzap endorsed by those oh so sexy chinese girls?). If I wanted the same effect, I may as well pile my girlfriend’s ten vibrators on my stomach and vibrate away.

Last time I used a similar device was two years ago. All I got was a backache.

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Everyone lies: it’s just a question of how, when and why. From the relationship saving “yes, you do look thin in those pants” to the improbable “your table will be ready in 5 minutes”, manipulating the truth is part of the human condition. Accept it now.

I’m positive that given our irrational nature and difficultly accepting tough truths, we’re collectively better off with some of our deceptions. They buffer us from each other (and from ourselves), avoid unnecessary conflicts, and keep the wonderful confusion of our psychologies tucked away from those who don’t care. White lies are the spackle of civilization, tucked into the dirty corners and crevices our necessary, but pretentiously inflexible idealisms create. Small lies prop up and support our powerful truths, holding together the insanely half honest, half false chaos that spins the world.

But lies, serious lies, should not be encouraged as they destroy trust, the binding force in all relationships. One particularly troublesome kind of lie is known as Bullshit (BS). These are unnecessary deceptions, committed in the gray area between polite white lies and complete malicious fabrications. BS is usually defined as inventions made in ignorance of the facts, where the primary goal is to protect oneself. The aim of BS isn’t to harm another person, although that often happens collaterally. For a variety of reasons BS can be hard to detect, which is why I’m offering this missive as a crash B.S. in BS detection. But be warned: to keep you on your toes there are several bits of BS tucked inside this essay which you will have to find for yourself.

Why people BS: a primer

The first lie in the Western canon comes from the same joyful tome as the first murders, wars and plagues: the Old Testament. Despite my distaste for trips into religious texts, this one has supreme tragicomic value.

To recap from the book of Genesis, God tells Adam and Eve not to eat fruit from the tree of knowledge, as pretty as it is, for they’ll die. He wanders off to do some unexplained godlike things, as gods are prone to do, leaving the very tempting, and non pit-bull or electrified fence protected, tree out for all to see. Meanwhile Satan slinks by and convinces Eve apples are good: so she and Adam have an apple snack. God instantly returns, scolds Adam, who blames Eve; resulting in everyone, snakes, people and all, getting thrown out of Eden forever.

Please note that in this tale nearly everyone lied. God lied, or was deceptively ambiguous, about the apples (they weren’t fatal), Satan misrepresents the apple’s power, and Adam, approximates a lie in his wimpy finger pointing to Eve. It’s a litany of deception and a cautionary tale: in any book that makes everyone look bad in just a few pages, is it really a surprise how the rest plays out?

People lie for three reasons; the first is to protect themselves. They may wish to protect something they want or need, a concept they cherish, or to prevent something they fear, like confrontation. There is often a clear psychological need motivating every lie.

A well known fib, “the dog ate my homework”, fits the BS model. In the desperate fear driven attempt not to be caught, children’s imaginations conceive amazing improbabilities. Fires, plagues, revolutions, curses, illnesses and absurd reinventions of the laws of physics and space-time have all been summoned by children around the world on the fateful mornings when they find themselves at school, sans-homework. It’s an emotional experience, this need to BS: as logically speaking, the stress of inventing and maintaining a lie is rarely easier than accepting the consequences of the truth.

Which leads to the second reason people lie: sometimes it works. It’s a gamble, but when it works, wow. Did you lie to your parents about girls, boys, fireworks, drugs, grades, or where you were till 2am on a school night? I sure did and still do. My parents still think I’m a famous painter / doctor / professor in London (shhh), and my best friend still believes his high school girlfriend and I didn’t get it on every time I borrowed his car[2]. Even my ever faithful dog Butch used to lie, in his way, by liberating trash from a house-worth of garbage cans, then hiding in his bed, hoping his lack of proximity to the Jackson Pollock of refuse that was formerly my kitchen would be indistinguishable from innocence.

Which gives us the third reason people lie, a truth saints and sinners have known for ages: we want to be seen as better than we see ourselves. Sadly, comically, we also believe we’re alone in both having this temptation, as well as the shame it brings with it (e.g. “We’re not alone in feeling alone”). The secret truth is everyone has moments of weakness: times when fear and greed melt our brains and we’re tempted to say the lies we wish were true. And for that reason the deepest honesty is found in people willing to admit to their lies, or their barely resisted temptations, and own the consequences. Not the pretense of the saints, who pretend, incomprehensibly, inhumanly, to never even have those urges at all.

Ok, enough philosophy: lets get to detection.

BS detection

The first rule of BS is to expect it. Fire detectors are designed to expect a fire at any moment: they’re not optimists. They fixate on the possibility of fires and that’s why they save lives. If you want to detect BS you have to swallow some cynicism, and add some internal doubt to everything you hear. Socrates, the father of western wisdom, based his philosophy around the recognition, and expectation, of ignorance. It’s far more dangerous to assume people know what they’re talking about, than it is to assume they don’t and let them prove you wrong. Be like Socrates: assume people are unaware of their own ignorance (including yourself) and politely, warmly, probe to sort out the difference.

The first detection tool is a question: How do you know what you know?

Throw this phrase down when someone force feeds you an idea, an argument, a reference to a study or over-confidently suggests a course of action. People so rarely have their claims challenged, that asking someone to explain how they know sheds light on whatever ignorance they’re hiding. It instantly diminishes the force of a BS driven opinion. It works well in response to the following examples:

“The project will take 5 weeks”. How do you know this? What might go wrong that you haven’t accounted for? Would you bet $10k on this claim? $100k?

“Our design is groundbreaking.” Really? What ground is that? And who, besides the designers/investors, has this opinion?

“Studies show that liars’ pants are flame resistant..” What studies? Who ran them and why? Did you actually read the study or a two sentence press clipping (poorly) explaining the results? Are there any studies that claim the opposite?

When you ask a flavor of “how do you know what you know?” often they can’t answer quickly. Even credible thinkers need time to sort through their logic, separating assumptions from facts: an an exercise that works in everyone’s favor.

Of course it’s fine to hear: “This is purely my opinion” or “It’s a guess, as we have no data”, but those are far weaker claims that most people, especially if they’re making stuff up, typically make. Identifying someone’s opinion as speculation, rather than fact, disarms the threat of most kinds of BS.

The second tool is also a question: What is the counter argument?

Anyone who has seriously considered something will have seen enough facts
to fit their current argument as well as alternative position: ask for them. It’s a grade school assignment, intended to show there are many reasonable ways to interpret the same set of facts. However, someone who is bullshitting you won’t have researched or thought through anything: they’re making things up. Asking for the counter argument will force them to either back up their position, or to end the discussion until they’ve done due diligence. (If they claim there is no counter argument, end the discussion. They are not only BS’ing you, they think you’re a moron).

Similarly useful questions include: Who besides you shares this opinion? What are your biggest concerns, and what will you do to address them? What would need to change for you to have a different (opposite) opinion?

Time & Pressure

A good thought holds together. Its solid conceptual mass maintains its shape no matter how much you poke, probe, test and examine. But BS is all surface. Like a magician’s bouquet of flowers, it’s pretty as it flashes past your eyes, but its absence of integrity become obvious when you hold it in your hands. Anyone creating BS knows this, and will tend towards urgency. They’ll resist reviews, breaks, consultations or the suggestion of sleeping on decisions before they’re made.

Use time & pressure, the third tool of BS detection, in your favor: never allow big decisions to be mismanaged to the point where they must be made urgently. Ask to withhold judgment for a day, and watch the response. Invite people with expertise you need but don’t have to participate in decisions to add intellectual and domain pressure (Hiring them if necessary. The $500 you pay a lawyer, accountant or consultant to review something effectively becomes a well spent BS insurance fee).

Be a leader in creating an environment unpleasant for BS. If everyone knows the gauntlet of friendly, but rigorous, intellectual curiosity claims must run through, BS will be discouraged while still in the minds of the tempted.

Confidence in reduction

Especially in business and technology, jargon and obfuscation hide huge quantities of BS. Inflated language is a technique of intimidation. The bet is that if you don’t understand what they’re talking about, you’ll feel stupid, or distracted, and give in to the appearance of their superior knowledge. This is, of course, entirely bullshit. To withstand BS you have to have an inner core of self-reliance, holding on to your doubts longer than the BS’er holds onto their charade.

For example:

Our dynamic flow capacity matrix has unprecedented downtime resistance protocols.

If you don’t understand what the hell this means, err on your own side. Don’t assume you’re missing something: assume they are. They’re either hiding something, communicating poorly, or don’t themselves understand what they’re talking about. BS deflating responses include:

I refuse to accept this proposal until I, or someone I trust, fully understands it.
Explain this in simpler terms I can understand (repeat if necessary).
Break this into pieces you can verify, prove, compare, or demonstrate for me.
Are you trying to say “our network server has a backup power supply?” If so, can you speak plainly next time?
Assignment of trust
The fourth tool of BS detection (derived from the rule of expecting BS) is careful assignment of your trust. Never agree to more than your trust allows. Who cares how confident they are: the question is how confident are you in them? It’s rare that there isn’t
time for trust to be earned. Divide requests, projects or commitments into pieces. It’s not offensive to refuse to take someone’s word if they have no history of living up to it before (especially if they’re trying to sell you something).

And trust can be delegated. I don’t need to trust you, if you’ve earned the trust of people I trust. Anyone skilled in the BS arts has obtained that skill through practice, diminishing the odds that many BS-proof people have been successfully deceived by them in the past. Nothing defuses BS faster than a collective of people that help each other detect and eliminate BS. If a team of people witnesses the complete evisceration of someone’s BS few will attempt it again: they’ll know your world is a BS free zone. Great teams and families help each other detect bullshit, both in others and themselves, as sometimes the real BS we need to fear
is our own.

More info at Scottberkun.com

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