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A friend of mine recently asked me about Notebooks4Free.
NB4F is a referral program, one of many that ask you to get people to buy crap so you can get credits and eventually claim your prize. They have several levels of prizes, depending on which program you sign up for.
Personally, I’m not really a big fan of it. It reminds me of pyramid scams, but I know some people online that sign up for these things and actually get what is offered. I remember when Heather and I went to Krissy’s house to watch TV on some new box she got from one of those programs. So even though I don’t believe in them, I know they can work.
Since Krissy had experience with them, I decided to poke and prod her for more information. I expected to get more information about whether these programs were worth getting. I stumbled upon something “bigger.”
The basics behind all the programs is that they all use some kind of referral system.
“A user signs up under your referral ID,” explains Krissy. “Automatically they’re placed on a “Referrals List” under the account they were referred by.”
“They sign up to whatever offers are available,” she says, “take AOL for example. They click on the icon, and are taken to AOL’s site for the sign up.”
From there they sign up and eventually have their own AOL user and password, all thanks to your referral. And three days later, the referral is validated through NB4F and you are credited as such.
Can you cheat the system? Sure, why not. Just make a bunch of fake email addresses and go from there. Not so, says Krissy.
“So say 123.4.567.89 signs up with one email address at krissy.nu, but the same address signs up with an email address at thedeadend.net,” Krissy explains. “You both sign up under the same referral ID. They’ll see the matching IP addresses for those two email addresses and both accounts will be void, whether an offer was completed or not.”
Interestingly enough, Jennifer recently earned a laptop of her own. A HP Pavillion zd8120 with 3 gHz processor, 1 gig ram, 80 gig hard drive, CD-R/RW & DVD R/RW drive, Wi-fi, and more. I would have asked her myself about the program and how it worked except for one thing.
“It’s funny actually,” she continues, “Jennifer had two email addresses under my referral and every time she went to cash out it said that her account was denied because of multiple addresses.”
With Jennifer’s credibility at issue in the past, I decided the best way to get the right information is to go straight to the source. Krissy was a step ahead of me.
There’s a bit of confusion with another member whom recently received a laptop that you sent to her. I’m wondering if you can clear this up for me.
She had 18 referrals and went for the HP laptop with these stats:
Intel Pentium 4 3.2GHz Processor
1GB DDR SDRAM
100GB HD
DVD/CD-RW Combo Drive
802.11g Wireless
Now, she’s claiming that this one was the one that was sent to her:
Could you please clear this up for me?
If I were to choose that laptop, I’d like to know which of the stats I’d be receiving.
A reasonable request, and a timely reply.
On 2/21/06, support@offercentric.com < support@offercentric.com > wrote:
Hello,
Depending on the availability from our vendor, the specs may vary slightly.
Of course, it was also a bit vague. Krissy followed up with another email.
From: Krissy < krissy@acidgloss.net>
Date: Feb 21, 2006 4:07 PM
Subject: Re: General Question
To: “support@offercentric.com ”
So is that the one she most likely received, or is she boasting ‘em up?
Cause you list your HP for like 1200 and she’s claiming to get a 1900 laptop. I don’t think the vendors would send out one that’s that advanced.
In fact, not only would venders not send out a fully loaded box, they generally tend to send refurbished products.
From: support@offercentric.com < support@offercentric.com>
Date: Feb 22, 2006 1:11 PM
Subject: Re: General Question
To: Krissy
Hello,
No we would never replace it with a model that is 500 dollars more.
Best Regards,
OfferCentric Member Services
Why would Jennifer lie about the specs? The NB4F site tells you what the computer is worth, and they’ve confirmed they wouldn’t send a computer valued at $500 or more than what they offered.
Maybe she really didn’t get it from them? Who knows with her.
Whatever the reasoning, it’s ridiculous, and it could make someone seriously interested in a program that gives free computers away second doubts.
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