Who Scams the Scammers?
No one; scammers are typically much smarter than you.
Fishing is a lazy mans sport. I don’t mean that in a negative way, and I’m obviously not talking about any kind of fishing you’d see on “Deadliest Catch”. I’m talking about hanging out on a lake in the summertime, drinking a beer and dozing off while you listen to the water against the side of your boat. Ice fishing takes this a step further.
Ice fishing (at least the kind I do with my grandfather), involves drilling a hole in a frozen lake and dropping in a baited line attached to a bell; thats it. The rest of ice fishing involves sitting on comfy beach chairs, bundled up with hand-warmers in your socks and underwear, aggressively drinking bourbon, smoking cigars, and generally bullshitting until the fish effectively catch themselves and then kindly let you know about it.
I’ve recently been messing around with a sort of reverse-safarisetup, which is essentially the ice fishing of Eve.
Basically, I recruit people to my “mission running/industrial/incursion corp”, ask them where they’re based out of, and then say that we’re based on literally the other side of New Eden from wherever they say. In related news, would they like help moving stuff?
If they say yes, I usually accept their courier contract, verify the contents, and then boot them, so that they don’t spread any lies and slander amongst the other victi…..er, corpmembers. If they decline my generous offer of free shipping on all their space-ly possessions, I instead invite them to tag along on a mission, warp them to a killzone, and typically explode them with extreme prejudice. So far, business has been pretty good.
Now the other day, I had what I thought was a new fish on the line. He was eager to join, radiated that perfectly enthusiastic naivete that screams “scam me”, and even had 3 Battleships and 2 Mackinaws that needed moving; basically our ideal candidate.
All appeared to be going normally until my new friend Rang went full aggro on me:
***** > I meant where is your own home base
***** > I fly a freighter and would be happy to move stuff to our HQ for you too if needed
***** > just did it earlier today for another new guy
RANG DIPKIN > hmmm really?
RANG DIPKIN > ive got a bunch of fitten ships though they dont fit in my itty
***** > yeah…I think its best to have all corp members at least relatively close to each other
RANG DIPKIN > how much can u move?
***** > hah, a lot
RANG DIPKIN > i have like 8 ships maybe
RANG DIPKIN > like 3 bs
RANG DIPKIN > 2 macks
RANG DIPKIN > iteron v
RANG DIPKIN > couple frigs
RANG DIPKIN > for poopoo
***** > I can move up to 882,000 m3 per run
when suddenly!
RANG DIPKIN > how much is ur game subscription worth to you?
***** > ?
***** > my game subscription? Probably right around $14 a month, yours? =p
RANG DIPKIN > its against the eula to post scams in recruitment
RANG DIPKIN > i’m reporting you
RANG DIPKIN > unless you pay me
***** > I’m just trying to recruit you to my corp dude
RANG DIPKIN > yes u just tried to do the smae to at least 2 others
RANG DIPKIN > i knwo the deal man
***** > what are you talking about?
RANG DIPKIN > ur not good
RANG DIPKIN > and now ur busted
RANG DIPKIN > so u can pay 500m or im reporting u
RANG DIPKIN > its called blackmail
RANG DIPKIN > look it up
***** > for what sir?
RANG DIPKIN > u got 2 minutes
RANG DIPKIN > before i submit the petition
RANG DIPKIN > 22:48
RANG DIPKIN > 500m buddy
***** > I’m curious what you’re reporting me for
RANG DIPKIN > u got 30s
***** > until you…..?
RANG DIPKIN > dude i dont care for the isk id rather report u
RANG DIPKIN > trust me i have plenty
RANG DIPKIN > oops
***** > well….I guess it goes without saying you’re no longer welcome to corp
Still unsure what caused the sudden outburst, I assumed Rang was the butthurt alt/friend of someone else who’s stuff I’d reappropriated, and was now either a.) sulking somewhere, b.) furiously writing a soon-to-be-utterly-ignored “halp I got scammed” petition, or c.) probably both a. and b. Rang, however, was not finished with me or his hilariously bad attempt at extortion and convoed me again:
RANG DIPKIN > hey man, id trransfer ur stuff now to whatever accounts arent linked
RANG DIPKIN > i have reported you
RANG DIPKIN > it clearly stated that u cannot scam in recruitment
***** > for what again?
RANG DIPKIN > dude dont play stupid
RANG DIPKIN > at this point im just trying to help u
RANG DIPKIN > u’ve already been reported
RANG DIPKIN > i blackmail scammers all the time
***** > and hows that working for you?
***** > want to know something funny?
***** > well, 2 things actually
***** > 1.) if you *already* reported me, its not blackmail. Thats called “losing your leverage”.
RANG DIPKIN > i gave u a chance
RANG DIPKIN > lol theres no if
***** > 2.) if you DIDN’T report it, and i WAS doing something bad, then NOT reporting it in exchange for isk is whats actually against the eula
***** > oh and 3.) scamming is as old as eve
RANG DIPKIN > im not asking for isk
RANG DIPKIN > not anymore
RANG DIPKIN > whats doe is done
RANG DIPKIN > ur a bad scammer
RANG DIPKIN > and now u will prob bne banned onthis accoutn and any other accounts in the corp
RANG DIPKIN > so move ur shit now if u need it
RANG DIPKIN > get a freind, let them hold on to it
RANG DIPKIN > im just letting u knwo man
RANG DIPKIN > sorry bro
RANG DIPKIN > fly safe
Somewhere, theres a highly appropriate “u mad bro” meme jpg for this moment, but I really can’t bring myself to put it on this blog.
But wait, there’s more! Rang, sufficiently failing on one character, switched to another for a slightly altered yet still terrible attempt at scamming the scammer:
Calamity! At the time of this mail, I had four members in my corp; my alt, my other alt, 1 dude from the Belligerent Undesirables crew, and one mark, and apparently I was in cahoots with myself to Awox myself! Et tu Aiden?!
In blog news, I apologize for going rampantly inactive on this one for the past 4 weeks; its been a crazy month. However, more fun stories, tales of woe, and an insanely long-winded guide on infiltration and social dynamics engineering are in the pipe for this week. Stick around and stay classy.
-Aiden
Finders & Keepers 
You continue to delight and amaze! Just as long as you keep it on the other side of the verse from me lol.
Btw, reading your blog all these years has prepared me well for starting and running corps. Thanks.
You know, I’m just one man, providing a valuable and educational service.
😀
I think this is what he was referring to: http://i.imgur.com/RPWreO5.png
The awox scam might have just been hilariously bad timing; it’s been fairly popular recently in TEST due to the fact that you just shotgun out evemails with only slightly more effort than ice mining 😀
Still, nice story, thanks
@nycef & Trog – the technicality I’m sticking with is that I’m NOT posting a scam in recruitment channel; I’m actually trying to recruit people. As far as I know, the rule is there so people like Goon or TEST scam recruiters can’t hang in there and say “hey, pay me 500mil and you can join!”, take the money, and then do nothing. I’m actually recruiting and bringing into corp every person I intend to steal from or murder, so technically, I’m actually recruiting them, hence, not a scam. I only go into scam/kill mode after a perspective volunteers information about the 8 billion isk CNR they fly, and heck, I have 75% more legitimate corpmembers than marks right now!
Realistically though, its a heavily grey area I suppose, I just maintain that I’m toeing the line on the right side of it right now.
Yeah, the TEST line is that posting in the recruitment channel is off-limits but convoing people from there is probably fine – it’s another grey area really.
(also posting obvious scams in the recruitment channel generally causes 20 people to go ‘lol scammer’ which just spoils everyone’s fun 🙂 )
im curious if its a courier contract how can you steal the stuff, isnt it locked in the contract? how can you verify the content ? recruitment scams are only illegal if posted in recruitment chat right?
When you accept a courier contract, you can look inside the package you’ve accepted by right-clicking “view contents”. Actually the newer inventory UI doesn’t even make it that sneaky anymore, the package appears like any other container in your inventory in the side bar.
He’s not too good at this. Threaten for half-a-billion, then when that doesn’t work skip to another character and threaten for the same amount. Nope, no suspicion there!
Hi,
Apparently, I’m famous. The TEST thing wasn’t me. You didn’t sign on for at least a week after this happened.
Love,
RANG
Praise, Hosanna?