FreeLaptops! Yeah, Right!
So, I was driving home this evening and I heard an advert on the radio for this website offering "Free" laptops. Given what I know of the free market economy in which we live, the word "free" always always always means "you pay for it another way". On a lark, I decided to look up the website. Here are their Terms and Conditions which pretty much speak for themselves.
Cut for length so I don't clog up your friends page
The first big condition is that they don't just give you a laptop for signing up, like the splash page seems to indicate. No, you have to participate in page after page of "offers" which seem to include credit cards with obscene start-up fees and interest rates ($300 credit limit with $295 in fees AND a 29.99% APR, ooooh, sign me UP!) and gods know what else.
By "participating" in these offers, you earn credits toward your "free" laptop, but the Ts&Cs explicitly state that they can deny credits on a whim.
It also contains such caveats as a time limit to earn enough credits, print out the coupon, send it to their special address, and receive your "free" laptop. The take no responsibility for "lost" or damaged mail items, so they can chuck every single letter in the bin, claim them as never received and walk away laughing.
They can also deny or revoke credits if they get information from the purveyors of the "offers" that you have canceled their card or service after you received your credit.
They can deny or revoke credits if you make a post (such as this one) decrying their site and describing their Terms and Conditions in context so that people who otherwise would not have bothered to read them will now be forewarned not to walk into their spider's web of money sucking lies.
Oops, I guess I won't get my free laptop now.
Cut for length so I don't clog up your friends page
The first big condition is that they don't just give you a laptop for signing up, like the splash page seems to indicate. No, you have to participate in page after page of "offers" which seem to include credit cards with obscene start-up fees and interest rates ($300 credit limit with $295 in fees AND a 29.99% APR, ooooh, sign me UP!) and gods know what else.
By "participating" in these offers, you earn credits toward your "free" laptop, but the Ts&Cs explicitly state that they can deny credits on a whim.
It also contains such caveats as a time limit to earn enough credits, print out the coupon, send it to their special address, and receive your "free" laptop. The take no responsibility for "lost" or damaged mail items, so they can chuck every single letter in the bin, claim them as never received and walk away laughing.
They can also deny or revoke credits if they get information from the purveyors of the "offers" that you have canceled their card or service after you received your credit.
They can deny or revoke credits if you make a post (such as this one) decrying their site and describing their Terms and Conditions in context so that people who otherwise would not have bothered to read them will now be forewarned not to walk into their spider's web of money sucking lies.
Oops, I guess I won't get my free laptop now.