3 ms·

There are a lot of judgment posts in the comments here. Let me ask a few questions of the HN crowd: * When were these kids educated about pyramid schemes and o

There are a lot of judgment posts in the comments here. Let me ask a few questions of the HN crowd: * When were these kids educated about pyramid schemes and other scams? When were they taught the patterns to look for? * Who is responsible for teaching them? Most of you will say "Parents", but are they equipped to understand and teach? The old cliche is Those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it but who is responsible for teaching that history? And it's not just this scam. It's all over Cryptotokens right now. It's in our free-to-play games. It's MLM. It's the house-as-an-investment because "housing will never go down". It's thinking you're "Smart Money" so long as you aren't the bagholder. And for the first few entrants, these tactics really do work. This pattern of economic exploitation is old. Instead lets educate as many people we know about the warning signs. It's especially important to teach kids as they have no prior experience to guide them. Everybody is stupid until we are properly taught, or burned. Maybe somebody will warn you against a "hot new thing" that's hypnotized your attention.

paulgb 9y ago
Maybe games like this are the education. Part of me wants to see Instagram/venmo allow these to continue to happen because it's better for these kids to lose $150 now than $10,000 later.
- JamesLeonis 9y ago
  That would only work if everybody experienced the $150 expense. However the winners never feel this pain. Additionally not everybody is exposed to the Venmo scam. How many of us are hearing about it for the first time here? It's a first for me to be sure. Instead think about vaccinations: It's supposed to be distributed universally and it does not harm the individual receiving the inoculation. This is what you want. We can design tools for parents and teachers that have the same educational impact without the side-effect of harm.
trhway 9y ago
>* When were these kids educated about pyramid schemes and other scams? When were they taught the patterns to look for? >* Who is responsible for teaching them? Most of you will say "Parents", but are they equipped to understand and teach? learning by getting you own bruises seems to be the learning way of choice of human species. Beginning of 199x pyramids of all sorts and at all scales swept across former USSR - pretty much everybody was a "kid" back then when it came to anything market/capitalism related, and thus they had to pay for their "practice based economic education" out of their own pocket : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MMM_(Ponzi_scheme_company) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MMM_(Ponzi_scheme_company) "МММ was a Russian company that perpetrated one of the world's largest Ponzi schemes of all time, in the 1990s." I expect that some ICO will soon finally beat the MMM record :).
- JamesLeonis 9y ago
  MMM is alive and well in Africa, unfortunately, ICOs make me feel like Chicken Little. > pretty much everybody was a "kid" back then The Universality of the blindness is what bothers me the most. What am I blind to? When does Caveat Emptor bleed into paranoia? My hope is to inspire more people to speak up to others so somebody can warn a future me away from a mistake. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MMM_Global https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MMM_Global
conradev 9y ago
I knew a few people in my high school engaged in multi-level marketing schemes. One of them tried to sit me down and sell me on joining, and I flipped it into trying to explain to them why it was a bad idea. It was a new concept to me at the time! The best part? They're legal in the US: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-level_marketing#Legality_and_legitimacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-level_marketing#Legality...

paulgb 9y ago

Maybe games like this are the education. Part of me wants to see Instagram/venmo allow these to continue to happen because it's better for these kids to lose $150 now than $10,000 later.

JamesLeonis 9y ago
That would only work if everybody experienced the $150 expense. However the winners never feel this pain. Additionally not everybody is exposed to the Venmo scam. How many of us are hearing about it for the first time here? It's a first for me to be sure. Instead think about vaccinations: It's supposed to be distributed universally and it does not harm the individual receiving the inoculation. This is what you want. We can design tools for parents and teachers that have the same educational impact without the side-effect of harm.

trhway 9y ago

>* When were these kids educated about pyramid schemes and other scams? When were they taught the patterns to look for? >* Who is responsible for teaching them? Most of you will say "Parents", but are they equipped to understand and teach? learning by getting you own bruises seems to be the learning way of choice of human species. Beginning of 199x pyramids of all sorts and at all scales swept across former USSR - pretty much everybody was a "kid" back then when it came to anything market/capitalism related, and thus they had to pay for their "practice based economic education" out of their own pocket : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MMM_(Ponzi_scheme_company) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MMM_(Ponzi_scheme_company) "МММ was a Russian company that perpetrated one of the world's largest Ponzi schemes of all time, in the 1990s." I expect that some ICO will soon finally beat the MMM record :).

JamesLeonis 9y ago
MMM is alive and well in Africa, unfortunately, ICOs make me feel like Chicken Little. > pretty much everybody was a "kid" back then The Universality of the blindness is what bothers me the most. What am I blind to? When does Caveat Emptor bleed into paranoia? My hope is to inspire more people to speak up to others so somebody can warn a future me away from a mistake. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MMM_Global https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MMM_Global

conradev 9y ago

I knew a few people in my high school engaged in multi-level marketing schemes. One of them tried to sit me down and sell me on joining, and I flipped it into trying to explain to them why it was a bad idea. It was a new concept to me at the time! The best part? They're legal in the US: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-level_marketing#Legality_and_legitimacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-level_marketing#Legality...