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posts about #markpincus more →
Facebook Named in Federal Class-Action Suit over Scammy Zynga Ads
Investors Punish Online Scam Trafficker with $15 Million
Scam-Brokering CEO Dissed His 'Bullshit' Ethics Class
Class Action Suit in the Works for Victims of Social Gaming Scams
The Secret Shame of Social Networking: How Silicon Valley Got Hooked on Scammers
Inside the Nerd Mansions of San Francisco
With nerds and Twitter behind me I will rule the world
Kleiner Perkins plunges into Web 2.0 far too late with Zynga's $29 million round
Hyped widgetmaker explains the widgetmaker hype
Mark Pincus licks, bites hand that feeds him

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Shadowlayer
01:11 AM

In reply to Scam-Brokering CEO Dissed His 'Bullshit' Ethics Class
Seems pincus here has sent a whole bunch of "friends" to spam the place...
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Magister
11/19/09

In reply to Facebook Named in Federal Class-Action Suit over Scammy Zynga Ads
In the brick and mortar world, it's often been the state attorney generals or the FTC who first step up about misleading recurring charges scams (see Trilegiant or Joe Francis), but what may have slowed the appropriate actions in this case have been the online community's idea, Facebook should do the policing.

I mean, whenever someone calls to sell me a recurring charges scam, I don't cry to the phone company.
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Edited by Magister at 11/19/09 3:01 PM Magister was starred Magister was unstarred

PontiusPirate
11/19/09

In reply to Facebook Named in Federal Class-Action Suit over Scammy Zynga Ads
I hear Farmville's customer service team has been offshored to Nigeria, where the locals are very adept at running these types of operations.
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katekate is squared
11/19/09

In reply to Facebook Named in Federal Class-Action Suit over Scammy Zynga Ads
Cue 10,000 "they were stupid for falling for it!" comments.
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MissNormaDesmond
11/19/09

In reply to Facebook Named in Federal Class-Action Suit over Scammy Zynga Ads
Here's the thing: even if it takes a certain amount of naivete/stupidity to fall for these scams? It's still the scammers who should be ashamed of themselves, not the people being scammed. The scammer committed an immoral act; the scammed at worst were stupid. It's not even the kind of stupidity that involves greed on the mark's part, like 419 scams; it's just a mistaken belief that people aren't quite as larcenous as the more skeptical of us know them to be.

The fact that every time something on this topic is posted so many people leap to beat up on the people who were duped and not the people who took advantage of them makes me sad about the general state of people's values. Meanwhile, no one remarks on the stupidity of thieves who leave a blazing electronic trail straight back to the hideout. That, my friends, is seriously dumbass.
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Z und Vielpunkt's chick
11/19/09

@MissNormaDesmond: I'd heart you again, if I could. It pisses me off that that's the reaction. Nobody deserves to be the victim of a scam, just like nobody deserves to be the victim of a crime.
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Perhaps Not
11/19/09

@MissNormaDesmond: I hugely agree, and that fucking attitude is not limited to e-trolls, either. You get grown men and women who are supposedly solid citizens saying "Well, you know, caveat emptor and all that." Fuck that noise. Caveat vendor. If you're going to con people, you deserve to be fined and publicly humiliated. The fact that you're conning the credulous or the dim makes it worse, not better - you're taking advantage of people who can't defend themselves for your own fiduciary benefit, which is evil by definition.
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PontiusPirate
11/17/09

In reply to Investors Punish Online Scam Trafficker with $15 Million
The bubble's always biggest before it bursts. #markpincus
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PontiusPirate
11/14/09

In reply to Scam-Brokering CEO Dissed His 'Bullshit' Ethics Class
What is most concerning is that this company is headed towards IPO and Pincus has admitted to doing "every horrible thing to get revenue." His tactics (scam revenue) are geared towards getting him the highest possible payday, and these tidbits above only confirm that he doesn't place much value on ethics.

What's just as concerning are what the people around him (his leadership team) are doing to further enable this. His CFO, Mark Vranesh, came from Supportsoft with him. Vranesh's successor and former Finance team at Supportsoft helped them lose a 10.7 million USD class action due to the fact they over-inflated revenues - did this practice start while Vranesh and Pincus were still there?

I'd be highly suspicious of Zynga's revenue statements in the lead up to their IPO. #markpincus
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PontiusPirate
11/14/09

In reply to Scam-Brokering CEO Dissed His 'Bullshit' Ethics Class
Never trust a guy who has an aspiring male model on the payroll whose sole job is to troll blogs and post cut & paste comments about how awesome he (Pincus) is. Surely I can't be serious? Oh, yes, say hello to "Blake Loftus" #markpincus
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Brad Brown
11/14/09

@PontiusPirate: If that guy is an aspiring model, I'm Brad Pitt! #markpincus
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insidefb
11/13/09

In reply to Scam-Brokering CEO Dissed His 'Bullshit' Ethics Class
I consider Mark a friend but he has lied to me on more than one occasion.
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Edited by insidefb at 11/13/09 11:39 PM insidefb was starred insidefb was unstarred

Benny
11/13/09

In reply to Scam-Brokering CEO Dissed His 'Bullshit' Ethics Class
Never heard of this guy, but this article has my agenda radar going berserk.

His comments about that class hardly show him to be cynical about ethics. He's lamenting what he considers to be the disingenuousness of the whole exercise, given that everyone in the room with him was apparently a sociopath. Whatever he may have done, his point of view, based on my reading of the above remarks, is pro ethics.

The use of the twitter post is also strange. If the guy's as bad as you imply you should be able to do better than a couple of tweets from someone who saw him speak once. #markpincus
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MissNormaDesmond
11/13/09

@Benny: Have you read the Tech Crunch stories? The post assumes you have, and recognize that these things are merely further indications of the lack of ethics he's pretty much crowed about publicly. #markpincus
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bowel_and_the_obstructors
11/14/09

@MissNormaDesmond: Should Tech Crunch be taken seriously? It always seemed to be a circle jerk of fanboyism to me. #markpincus
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MissNormaDesmond
11/14/09

@bowel_and_the_obstructors: Have you read the articles?
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Edited by MissNormaDesmond at 11/14/09 2:03 AM MissNormaDesmond was starred MissNormaDesmond was unstarred

DevilsAvocadoRedux
11/14/09

@MissNormaDesmond: What about the lack of ethnics? #markpincus
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MissNormaDesmond
11/14/09

@DevilsAvocadoRedux: This, too, is a serious failure. #markpincus
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forwardmotion
11/13/09

In reply to Scam-Brokering CEO Dissed His 'Bullshit' Ethics Class
In his defense: most graduate seminars in whatever subject that last 1-4 weeks are generally bullshit. #markpincus
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