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HOW DO YOU IDENTIFY A SCAM POSTING?
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Message
Posted
We have had, recently, several scams running on the Forum which a lot of the more experienced artists on here seem to be able to identify. However, I find it really hard to sort these from the genuine threads. Is there something specific that you look for? For example one of the threads started with 2 oil paintings and no text. I put that down to the language barrier but some of you are certain it is a scam.
Posted
It is very difficult to be certain in some cases - in the one you refer to, there was a link implied (but cleverly, not embedded in the post) which was followed up a few days later by a direct marketing plug. And we spotted that because we know about the Chinese knock-off shops. But at the same time, the issue here really was the deception - hooking us or trying to with an advert, basically, which those posting it didn't want to pay for.
In other cases - there's one we're all keeping an eye on - it's very hard to be certain: certain enough to delete the posts, anyway (and I know this frustrates some of our members: but I don't think either Dawn or I wish to be heavy-handed; I'm sure she's more tolerant than I am, but even I require certainty before removing people's posts), when the issue is at least partly unfamiliarity with English. But of course, spammers can be unfamiliar with English too! I don't yet feel certain enough that one of our visitors is simply trying to drive trade to China - and he doesn't give enough information for me to be sure; which is either just coincidence or, as I suspect, deliberate.
These things come and go, though: if the idea is to gain trade, and it doesn't (as it won't) they won't be around for long. We've had far worse than this in the past -- it was once necessary to delete up to a dozen posts per day, which just advertised some sort of computer game so far as I could tell. At least there are some actual paintings associated with this one (just not very good ones, but good enough to fool some). We are watching - and as a rule of thumb, if a painting is on a square of cloth with a border round it, and it looks as if it might be at home on the wall of a certain type of restaurant, chances are the person posting it is a spammer. Long answer, but I know people are getting very cross about this; patience is called for, but no one's is inexhaustible.
Posted
The one I mention in particular started whilst I was away from the Forum so I didn't see the marketing plug. The trouble with a lot of the threads is that they don't use their real names and if they are new to the Forum I can't tell if the are Asian sounding. Robert, Sylvia and Syd have been on this website a lot longer than I have so I expect they can spot a scam from a mile away!
Posted
Yet again during the early hours of this morning I received around 20 or so 'comments' to my gallery posts.
Long ramblings of rubbish followed by numerous names of artist's, same blurb cut and pasted to each post. This time the pathetic time-waster is calling himself 'jack tomasohn', I had the last person doing this removed but of course they just re-invent themselves and join up again. Absolutely nothing we can do of course, just put up with it and hope these mindless half-wits get fed up and leave.
Posted
The ****** has had a go at one other artist, at least: whether he's practising to see what he can do with the site, or just is playing about because he's a brain-dead waste of time, space, and oxygen is not yet clear. I have an impression that we're being used as a test-bed by juvenile pests who need hanging by their pleasure plums ....
Posted
Is the problem with the scammers more common on the gallery or in the forum here?
On the forum, the scammers usually ask members for comments on a picture on another site. It's not clear if it's by the author. I assume it's to direct the reader to a site selling paintings
Other irritating entries relate to advertisements for art courses - there was one for a paiting trip to Transylvania..We used to get those strange entries about football and FIFA.
There are others which are odd. One asked how do you buy a painting, I'm still not sure whether that was genuine or not.
Edited
by keora
Posted
Having had experience of most types of "wrong uns" posters on various forums, at the end of the day we have to accept that there are some very strange, malicious, odd and even deranged types hiding out in cyber space. How they must love the internet, a place where they can sit at home and call, abuse, challenge, insult and wind-up people and cause mischief with no fear of recrimination. BxxxoX to them. Sounds aggressive, which I'm not, but then again, we aren't dealing with sensible rational people half the time, but sad, bored and vindictive morons who's only pleasure in life is causing aggravation and argument. Sorting out genuine ones, I agree, is a real problem and the only way is to ignore them and let them run. They'll either identify themselves or, if nobody is taking them on, drift away. Give them attention and they are winning, Ignore them and they lose.
p.s. I've seen all sorts of nonesense in the unlikeliest (and seemingly mildest) places, on ballroom dance, art and even a Jane Austen literature forum ( I confess, I got banned off an American one for having the audacity to disagree with someone then refuse to apologise and see their point of view. How very English/Irish of me) 😆