[muglo] Re: eBay Scam, some OT

eBay itself sometimes feels like a scam to me (though, I do use it from time 
to time). They seem to do so little to prevent pyramid schemes or improper 
sales from being posted. There are some items which are a prime target for 
pyramid schemes (mostly high-cost electrical equipment, especially iPods and 
gaming systems). The form they take is that they promise to sell you 
information on how to get an iPod (or whatever) for a really low price (say 
$50). These are thoroughly illegal schemes and it would take very little 
effort on eBay's part to root these listings out with a simple daily 
automated scan of listings for such keyphrases as "you are bidding for 
information on how to get ..." and then flagging them for manual inspection. 
I've sometimes watched listings that were obviously illegal/shady that were 
listed for days on end and then when I reported them they were pulled 
virtually immediately. There are enough of these scams that don't even get 
pulled before they end.

Also, they could do more to protect buyers and sellers from unscrupulous 
people. They have the # of sales system for ranking sellers/buyers but what 
they could do is flag an account that is younger than xxx days (regardless 
of # of sales) or has recently run up a lot of feedback on low-value items.

Anyway, if you're careful you can get good stuff on eBay. I have yet to be 
burned on a buy or a sell but, then again, I do make sure that I research 
the seller's feedback before doing something.

[Off topic start]

PS Italy was wonderful. I didn't want to leave!!! The people were so 
friendly (making up for their rude tendency to butt in in lines). Their 
monuments were very well preserved. Hotels were cheap, _clean_ and spatious 
(compared to England, Scotland, Ireland, and the Netherlands), but most 
importantly, the food was _amazing_.

The food was tasty, _fresh_ and surprisingly veggie-friendly for a country 
with as many butcheries (what a waste of resources) as patisserias 
(bakeries) and once you figured out what was loaded with butter, ham, beef, 
cheese or margarine, everything was surprisingly healthy (Mmm. Olive oil 
dripping off thick crust no/low-cheese pizzas). _Real_ Italian pizzas were 
sooo good (i.e. not covered with excess cheese or meat). I miss them already 
(I even miss Canadian pizzas though, only Italian restaurant thin-crust 
ones). The Brits can't make pizzas to save their life, whether in a 
restaurant, a fast food joint or in grocery store: they don't use garlic 
(token amounts), basil, oregano, onions or tomato sauce (really dry) and 
slather on the cheese (usually flavourless cheese).

Now that I have had the real thing (pizza) I really wonder why the crappy 
cheese-based pizza has become so popular in Canada (Pizza Butt, Pizza Pizza, 
Dominos, 2 for 1, 3 for 1, etc.). I think a pizza place serving _real_ pizza 
would do extremely well in a cosmopolitain neighbourhood like the Annex or 
Little Italy in Toronto, and probably would also find a good following in 
London (since London has a *lot* of good restaurants, despite its relatively 
small size... 7 Indian (oh, how lucky you are!!!), and numerous Mexican and 
umpteen Italian restaurants last time I remember... oh, how I miss a good 
restaurant selection).

PS Verona was a BEATIFUL city. There's not _as much_ to see as in Venice, 
but it's also a lot less busy and still quite spectacular. It also has the 
benefit of being near the Alps and not having a nightmarish industrial 
wasteland associated with it like Venice (PS Milan sucks... there's enough 
to do for a day but we tired of the cars and filth very quickly). If we were 
to do our trip again, I'd spend no time in Milan, three days in Venice (we 
did 2), a stop-over in Padua to sample the _best_ hot chocolate in the world 
from the second-oldest gelaterie (1936) in the city and the rest (5) in 
Verona and area (probably rent a car to explore the area). And, of course 
Pizza Doge in Verona makes the best take out pizza (near the colloseum... 
third largest in the world IIRC).

.. when on holiday we make a point of avoiding restaurants and going to 
local supermarkets, open air markets), their historical sites were well 
maintained, and they had a FLEXIBLE and AFFORDABLE rail system.

Getting around Italy was cheap and convenient. Rail was very user-friendly 
and quite cheap (unlike Britain (VERY expensive, and user-unfriendly... 
imagine how airlines operate, along with air-line prices (it's sometimes 
cheaper and _faster_ to _fly_ between UK cities than to take the train). The 
British system is a strange paradox and is the poor cousin of the European 
network. Despite having one of the highest population densities in Europe 
(370 people/km^2 vs. 450/ for Netherlands, 190/ for Italy), England has by 
far the worst _and_ most expensive service (you don't expect the two to go 
hand-in-hand).

We spent Euro 90 ~ $140 CAD for the two of us to go from Milan to Venice, 
and make 4 smaller trips (on different days) back to our airport near 
Bergamo (town near Milan). In England, I figured out that going a comparable 
distances and buying tickets last minute would have cost us _more_ than 
three times that (because it's not possible to buy one-way tickets in 
England... booking cut the cost to two times but you still suffered from 
poor service freqencies (once/h, /2h or /3h)... it's amazing justhow 
INEFFECTIVE privatised rail is at providing PUBLIC transit (compounding the 
problem is the fact that the horrible state of service drives people into 
cars))).

There are two things I'm not looking forward to: all the !@#!$ tax whiners 
and not having sales-tax incorporated in the price.

Let's see: in Canada I want French pastries, Dutch desserts, cheese and 
bread, Italian pizza and some of their pastries. I've actually found a 
"British" food that I actually like (though, I think we have it in Canada): 
smoked Scottish/Irish salmon.

There I go again off topic. Only another 12 weeks and we're back in Canada 
:) :) :)

[Off topic rambling end]


Eric.
>From: Barry Takayesu <prestige.print@xxxxxxxxxxx>
>Reply-To: muglo@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>To: muglo <muglo@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>Subject: [muglo] eBay Scam
>Date: Thu, 15 Apr 2004 10:56:32 -0400
>
>REALLY IMPORTANT - forwarded from another group I belong to. I don't
>know a lot of people who use eBay, but pass this on to those you know
>who use it. - Barry
>
<snip>
>
> >Tonite I received an email telling me that my ebay account was in
> >jeopardy of being cancelled if I did not update my information. It was
> >quite colorful, and almost appeared legit. What was more convincing
> >however, was the link which led to the alleged ebay site. Note the two
> >links below. The first one was actually hidden but was triggered when
> >you clicked on the second one, which is in fact a legitimate ebay site
> >link.
<snip>

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