Like many people who fell for these scam artists I saw news reports claiming that Freeipods.com was a legitimate multi-level internet marketing scheme. However, after dealing with them for over 4 months, it is now clear to me that they are exceptionally gifted scam artists, who are remarkably skillful at avoiding their having to give you anything.
How the site works is simple. You sign up for the freeipods.com site. Then complete one of their "offers". These are usually web sites ranging from blockbuster online to efax to BMG music service. When you sign up for BMG or another web service by clicking on the link in your freeipods account page, freeipods.com gets a kick-back from BMG. For BMG it just so happens it's 11 dollars. After 15 days or so your freeipods account shows that you have completed your offer (ie. They got paid by BMG).
Now in order to get your free ipod you need to refer 5 friends to do exactly what you just did. Freeipods gives you a referral link, which you get your friends to click on.
Now when your friends click on the link, register for the freeipods site, and complete an offer, you get credit for them. If 5 people get credit, they supposedly send you your ipod. But guess what, your 5 friends aren't going to get credit for completing an offer, even if they did everything correctly.
Here's my story which is remarkably similar to other stories I've now seen on this site and others. I signed up for freeipods.com, completed their blockbuster online offer, was successfully credited by freeipods.com. I then emailed 8 of my friends with the above referral link. 6 of my friends signed up, 5 of them emailed me and told me they completed an offer (and asked if I'd gotten my ipod yet).
However only 4 of them showed up as being credited on my account. The person who was not credited was my sister, who claimed she had signed up for Real Networks. She was billed for real networks for 2 months but the credit never showed up on the freeipods site. I asked her to try something else since I really wanted the ipod, so she signed up for a credit card. The credit card offers on the freeipod site take longer to go through (30 days).
However after waiting over a month it turns out that my sister wasn't approved for the credit card and freeipods only gives you credit for credit card offers if the card is approved and you use it to buy something. I then told my sister to join BMG, because that is what two of my other friends had joined that I did receive credit for.
So she joined BMG, paid the money, got some CDs. 15 days past and she still did not receive credit for signing up for BMG. She then contacted freeipods, who claimed they didn't have a record of her signing up and that it should have gone through and there must have been some sort of problem. They then asked her to cut and paste the email she got from BMG when she first signed up over 3 weeks previously. My sister deletes her mail after she's done with it and so didn't have that email but she did have all the BMG account information which she cut and pasted for them.
Then something miraculous happened!
I was simultaneous credited for my sister's signing up for BMG and my credits for my Dad and my girlfriend were declared FRAUDULENT. So for 3 months, these credits were fine, then when I received the last credit I needed to get my ipod, suddenly freeipods.com says my dad and my girlfriend are not real people. Or even more ridiculous, that my dad or girlfriend are the same person as my sister or one of my other friends. This is absolute bullsh*t.
Freeipods is basically doing everything in their power to avoid giving people ipods, because their business model is crap. Say everyone of my friends signed up for BMG. Freeipods.com would make $11 from me and $55 from my friends. That's 66 bucks, well, that's not enough to pay for an ipod, let alone the salaries of all the people who work for Freeipods.com, office space, shipping, bandwidth, etc etc.
So what freeipods does is basically scam people. They convince them either A.
That their friends did something wrong in signing up or completing their offer, suggesting that you get more friends to sign up
Or B.
That you or your friends committed fraud and therefore violated their Terms and Conditions.
The crux of my point is this, these guys are scam artists. They do not want to give you an ipod, they will bend over backwards, contorting the truth in ways that would make even a seasoned yoga master shiver, all in an effort to make it as difficult as possible for them to have to fulfill their obligation to you. Regardless of whether or not you did everything correctly.
Save your time.
Save your friends' time.
Stay the hell away from these internet con artists.
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