3 ms·

The Truth Behind the Amazon Mystery Seeds

6 points by mkmk 5y ago

h2odragon 5y ago
WE got one of those packets; my wife is a postal carrier, says the barcodes were scanned on those... So where'd that data go? seems like this shouldn't be that hard to actually track down. If it's brushing, then there's a lot of records of orders received, somewhere, that could be traced back to some of these tracking numbers, right? Seems to be far more interesting to either indulge in wild conspiracy theories and/or mock the wild theories, instead. Certainly easier.
- mkmk 5y ago
  The article addresses an alternate theory at the end— after the lengthy exposition— that the packets were just very delayed shipments from earlier in the pandemic. Does that sound like it’s a plausible answer for what happened to you?
  - h2odragon 5y ago
    No; we ordered seeds but not from China and not in such quantity as to forget an order. We'd bitch about something that didn't arrive. I've seen offered the theory that they were "thank you" gifts sent to people who left positive reviews, too; but that flies about as far as the "forgot we ordered it" before it runs into problems.
bryan0 5y ago
This was covered pretty extensively last year as a brushing scam, so it’s odd the article still paints this as an unsolved mystery. https://www.newsweek.com/mystery-seeds-china-brushing-scam-1531809 https://www.newsweek.com/mystery-seeds-china-brushing-scam-1... https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2020/08/04/free-amazon-orders-scam-mysterious-seeds-packages-brushing/5580858002/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2020/08/04/free-amazon-... https://fortune.com/2020/07/30/what-is-brushing-scam-china-mystery-seeds/ https://fortune.com/2020/07/30/what-is-brushing-scam-china-m...
- mkmk 5y ago
  The article presents evidence that this is not a brushing scam.
  - bryan0 5y ago
    Talk about burying the lede! I read through 2/3 of the article and stopped before they proposed other alternatives.
miles 5y ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27846146 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27846146
- mkmk 5y ago
  Thanks! Not sure why my post didn’t hit the dupe checker.
readflaggedcomm 5y ago
>In fact, in every single case that we were able to research fully, we found a convincing connection between a mystery package and an earlier order. No wonder the Mandela Effect has such caché when reminding the recipient to look at their purchase history is all it took to resolve hundreds of orders.

6 points by mkmk 5y ago

WE got one of those packets; my wife is a postal carrier, says the barcodes were scanned on those... So where'd that data go? seems like this shouldn't be that hard to actually track down. If it's brushing, then there's a lot of records of orders received, somewhere, that could be traced back to some of these tracking numbers, right? Seems to be far more interesting to either indulge in wild conspiracy theories and/or mock the wild theories, instead. Certainly easier.

mkmk 5y ago
The article addresses an alternate theory at the end— after the lengthy exposition— that the packets were just very delayed shipments from earlier in the pandemic. Does that sound like it’s a plausible answer for what happened to you?
- h2odragon 5y ago
  No; we ordered seeds but not from China and not in such quantity as to forget an order. We'd bitch about something that didn't arrive. I've seen offered the theory that they were "thank you" gifts sent to people who left positive reviews, too; but that flies about as far as the "forgot we ordered it" before it runs into problems.

bryan0 5y ago

This was covered pretty extensively last year as a brushing scam, so it’s odd the article still paints this as an unsolved mystery. https://www.newsweek.com/mystery-seeds-china-brushing-scam-1531809 https://www.newsweek.com/mystery-seeds-china-brushing-scam-1... https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2020/08/04/free-amazon-orders-scam-mysterious-seeds-packages-brushing/5580858002/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2020/08/04/free-amazon-... https://fortune.com/2020/07/30/what-is-brushing-scam-china-mystery-seeds/ https://fortune.com/2020/07/30/what-is-brushing-scam-china-m...

mkmk 5y ago
The article presents evidence that this is not a brushing scam.
- bryan0 5y ago
  Talk about burying the lede! I read through 2/3 of the article and stopped before they proposed other alternatives.

miles 5y ago

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27846146 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27846146

mkmk 5y ago
Thanks! Not sure why my post didn’t hit the dupe checker.

readflaggedcomm 5y ago

>In fact, in every single case that we were able to research fully, we found a convincing connection between a mystery package and an earlier order. No wonder the Mandela Effect has such caché when reminding the recipient to look at their purchase history is all it took to resolve hundreds of orders.