Internet Deals & Free information - free should be truly free and not offered with strings attached

I just went through another hoop and decided to share some dead end experiences with you. Any time someone offers something free , check it out. Do not spend any money while checking it out. Not one red cent. No matter how tantalizing it may seem, you are the fish and the word "free" is the bait.

There are literally thousands of examples out there and hopefully I will not get into a law suit by hinting at the exposure of some.

I just checked out some information about how this person, I will call him "Richard" to protect the identity of the example. Richard felt compelled to offer free advise because he makes so much money that he feels it is time to teach the rest of us how to do it. Advisedly, all the tips and information on that particular page were free information. However, Richard, links his totally free SEO search engine page for a further in-depth look at how to link traffic to your internet sites. Here is where you become the fish and "Free" is the bait. The minute you go to another site, you feel compelled to find out all there is to know about the topic and how it will assist you in your search for more traffic. You take down some notes, or maybe worse, you go through the listed steps in order to get the full learning experience. The problem is that you have already done the first one or two easy steps by the time you get to the "bait" step.

Now you are told to...

• click a link or...
• click on a tab or...
• go to a site

to receive your totally free information. Well, wouldn't you know it you need to enter some information or create a login and voila! you have to complete an offer, or get some friends to join, or give out e-mail addresses of contacts, etc in order to get the "totally free information". Then, if you follow through with an offer you have used money of yours (even free offers can cost you time). The so called free information will cost you time to open, the time to input all your information, the time to cancel & if you forget to cancel, actual money out of your pocket for something you only did to get FREE information.

Free does not make it so. Truth in advertising is a fine line of interpretation. If I give anything, and I do mean anything for something in return it had better be worth my valuable time or effort. Most people will blog because they feel compelled to do so, but rarely do find the individual compelled to answer surveys because they are so compelled.

If you have to spend several hours a day answering surveys, or let me rephrase, attempting to qualify to then spend your valuable time answering surveys, the monetary compensation is literally pennies AND has no continued return on your effort. If however, you write about what you feel passionate about and post it as a hub page, add a few links, tweet it and tell a few friends on facebook, the difference is you feel accomplished and you may also feel that the time you spent has value. You will have a concrete reminder in the form of your hub pages that can last to infinity rather than the flash in the pan answering of some questions that will be gone in a heartbeat or more disappointingly never answered because you do not fit the survey profile.

Free is never truly free unless given from the heart. When I say I will give you a free picture, I mean free. When I say I will give you a free cleaning chart, I mean free. When I say I will give you a free recipe for meatloaf, I mean free.

If I say free I mean free, I don't pull punches and the general populace needs to understand that a few of us could become many if we all stand up to ours or any words spoken or written having true value once more. The time for simpering and twisting the truth is past. I may be a dreamer and this may sound like a temper tantrum, well it is! Dreamers of the world unite and bring down the fake, phony, panhandlers looking for a handout. They are not on the street corners, oh no, they are at every intersection of the world wide web and waiting with their spider web hands outstretched waiting for you to come along and get stuck in their web of lies!

Well, that's what they say, totally free web site. They offer you pre-made web sites. You just need to plug in your information and how much you want to sell the "stuff provided on the site for".

• Offers one free site, then offers to give you ten for anywhere from 69.00 to 100.00 us.
• Has limited access, but offers you to upgrade to platinum status for additional money.
• If you tell them you want a refund, while you are waiting for the refund their auto-responder sends you an e-mail telling you how great your sites are and the traffic is increasing and you are in the top 100 that month, but you have not earned any money yet so they want to offer you platinum at a significantly reduced price to get you jump started. (I personally tested this three times to get proof)
• If you go for it and use all their tools you still have not sold anything because every site has information for sale that you can get for free at other locations on the internet.
• You do not get to chose anything to sell except their linked sites and after a few months some of them switch to search landing pages instead of your original site.
• Using all their search engine linking gets you over 100 hits per day per site without actual sales.
• When ever you send a complaint ticket out they ask for more information because they are "confused" as to the exact complaint and then post the ticket as completed.
• You never, ever get to talk to a real person with this one, not even in a chat format. Definitely a total scam and should never be used.