That $50 Gold Buffalo Coin Scam: Still Going Strong eight years later....

 

There is so much hilariously wrong with this scam, it would take pages and pages of commentary to get through it all, but I'm just going to focus on a few of the lowlights:

Most of this ad is a glowing description of a coin which is NOT FOR SALE HERE;  a $50 Gold Buffalo Coin which was released back in the 1930s.  We are told how much gold THAT coin had and how rare THAT coin is.

Then, without missing a beat the narrator segues into a discussion of the coin which is ACTUALLY FOR SALE HERE:  a "tribute" to the previously mentioned, actually valuable coin which is "clad" in cold (gilded) but which in fact provides what is currently about seventy cents worth of the precious metal the original coin was MADE OUT OF.  If you aren't paying attention- and this scummy fraud company really, really hopes that you aren't- you won't notice that the commercial is asking you to buy a cheap imitation of a valuable coin.  You'll think you are being offered a rare $50 gold piece for a preposterously low price by nice people who for some reason want to practically give them away because they are so nice.

We are told that "the price of the original edition is going through the roof"- so yeah, if you happen to own one, you have got a nice little investment there that you might want to keep in a safe deposit box.  But if you don't own one, we can buy this piece of garbage which kind of looks like the real thing.  The narrator isn't going to put it quite like that, but that's exactly what he's saying- this is a "tribute copy."  

The price of this junk was "supposed to be set at $50" but of course that wasn't going to get morons to grab their phones to call, so instead this next-to-worthless piece of tin is being offered for "only $9.95 plus shipping and handling."  As soon as we get this price, we're reminded that the price of gold is skyrocketing- which is information about as useful as telling us that bark beetle infestations are expected to rise in the next three years.  The price of gold has zero to do with the value of this particular "tribute," since there's virtually no gold in it.  The ratio of aftershave to my face is probably greater than the ratio of gold to this trash.   But the scam must go on.

This 2014 commercial, which I saw rebroadcast while watching MSNBC the other day, tells us that this offer can only be guaranteed for the next seven days.  Well, that makes this the longest week since Genesis.  

We get guff about "strict limits of five per caller" (yeah right- I GUARANTEE that if I called the number I could talk the operator into giving me a special deal for as many as I wanted) and "registration numbers" (if these coins were legitimate, why would they have such things?  Just more evidence- as if we needed any- that we are being offered commemorative medals, not coins.)  

Ok, there's fifty seconds left to this nonsense but I'm exhausted so I'll just end it here:  This stupid impulse purchase comes with a Certificate of Authenticity, authenticating that, yes, you've purchased an all-but-worthless trinket you can try to explain to your exasperated children the next time they come over and beg you to sign over your power of attorney while you still have a little money left. 

The Pizza Hut Triple Bypass Box, just in time for the holidays....

 

Or maybe it should be "Triple Threat Box?"

I mean, is there really anything more to say?  I mean, except that the singing just adds to the cringe?

Think about it.  This guy doesn't seem to consume anything OTHER than Pizza Hut garbage.  He doesn't seem to talk about anything OTHER than Pizza Hut products, and he doesn't seem to think about anything OTHER than Pizza Hut.  The "restaurant" even dictates his "fashion sense," to put those terms VERY mildly.  So of course we are going to see him "celebrating" the holidays by singing about some stacked-sludge box set from Pizza Hut which, according to the comments, doesn't even come in a cool cardboard drawer contraption as is shown here.  So you don't even get to save the damp, greasy drawers to use to- um, attract bugs and mice?  

I read recently that CiCi's all you can eat pizza, pasta and cinnamon buns is on the decline (I may post about this in the future.)  The attraction of CiCi's was that for very little money, you could gorge yourself on carbs- probably to get your body ready for that long, long nap you planned to take that afternoon?  Maybe one reason CiCi's peaked about a decade ago is because stores (that's more accurate than "restaurants") like Pizza Hut is providing delivery of all the crap CiCi's offers at about the same price CiCi's charged?  I mean, the only thing better than glutting on warm fatty garbage is doing it from the privacy of your own living room, am I right?  Waddling off to the couch or bed afterwards is so much easier than trying to drive home in a carb coma, after all. 

I wouldn't buy food handled by these people, Wendy's.

 

Ok, I am now convinced that this series of Wendy's commercials featuring a staff of mental midgets doing really stupid things in front of customers is a subtle nod to the restaurant's Employ the Brain Damaged policy.  I mean, really- first one of these guys attempts to sit on an old man's lap because he looks like Santa, then this garbage.  Ok, Wendy's- we approve your noble attempt to get the mentally handicapped into gainful employment.  Now please, stop this.  Because, seriously- this is kind of gross and pathetic. 

Nothing "Progressive" about this commercial which doesn't feature sweet potatoes

 

1.  At no point during the preparation of this meal did either of these women notice that there were no sweet potatoes.  And apparently there were no sweet potatoes because sweet potatoes were not on the list.  So what else would the person doing the shopping not pick up because it wasn't on a list?  Or maybe she thought that it wasn't on the list because the other sister had already purchased sweet potatoes?  Either way, the original point stands- why wasn't the lack of sweet potatoes noticed before this?

2.  I note that all the meal prep was apparently done by these two women.  The men here showed up to share in the consumption of this sweet potato-less feast, but had nothing to do with its creation.  Because it's 2022 here in the real world but it will always be 1954 on television, I guess.

Carvana was a stupid idea that stupid people bought into.

 

So when this woman isn't stuffing her face with junk while sitting on her butt (I'm sorry, but seriously- find something to do that doesn't involve sitting on a couch sucking on a cup of sugar, PLEASE.  Sincerely, your arteries) she's blathering to everyone who can't find a quick exit how much she enjoyed her buying experience with Carvana.

Which means, I guess, that she's one of the lucky customers who didn't buy an automobile from Carvana that was later repossessed because it had been stolen months earlier (yes, this happens.)  Or bought a car that had been previously been through an unreported wreck (yes, this has also happened.)  Or she got the actual car that she ordered and not a random car the company decided to send him (yes, this has happened.)  Or she got a car which had outstanding tickets attached to the title (yes, this has happened.)

And judging from the smile on her face, she's clearly not someone who owns stock in Carvana- stock which peaked at $230 a year and a half ago but which can now be purchased at about $8 per share.  And she's not an employee who got laid off like more than 2000 have this year.  (Yes, both of those things have happened.)  I'm guessing that she spends most of her time indoors these days even if she still has a functioning car, because she's too mortified at the thought of bumping into one of the 300 people she bragged about her Carvana purchase to.  

Tom Brady, FTX and another commercial that aged like fine milk.

 

It's just way too easy to snark on the collapse of FTX, Tom Brady's marriage, and Tom Brady's career (the Bucs may very well miss the playoffs altogether) over the past 11 months since this ad first aired.  I am not even going to point out the ridiculous palace of a house, or the fact that Brady supposedly learns about the crypto currency "opportunity" that his wife is looking into by reading her phone screen from ACROSS THE ROOM and is "in" approximately six seconds later. *

In fact, I'm not going to talk about this particular ad at all.  Because that's just way too easy and it's been done already, including by me. 

Instead, I'm going to be my cynical best and suggest that the best indicator of how well my fellow countrymen will learn their lesson from the collapse of the scam FTX always was is the comment sections of multiple "what happened to FTX" videos currently popping up at the rate of a few dozen per day on YouTube:  At least half the comments I've read so far are endorsements for some other token purchasing platform which is, or soon will be, EXPLODING IN VALUE so we'd BETTER GET IN RIGHT NOW before we LOSE OUT.  You know, like Tom Brady was being scolded by his soon-to-be-ex wife to GET IN on FTX because hey, neither his football career nor her modeling career was going to last forever and it's not like they have enough money to live very lavish lifestyles for the next several centuries already.   The reaction of many YouTubers to the FTX collapse reminds me of people who get burned by Multi-Level Marketing scams and respond by looking for another one to invest in- "my experience with Amway was horrible, but I'm in a much better place now.  Do you have a few minutes to let me tell you about Herbalife?"

*in real life, Brady's "I'm in" would be correctly translated into "yeah whatever, I'm not walking all the way over there to look at your phone, I'm too busy looking at my phone, do whatever you want."  And in real life, a casual observer would see that this marriage was in trouble.   But I'm not going there. 

Depressing MetaQuest Ad reminds me of why I'm sometimes glad that I'm old

 

I remember when I was a little kid seeing an older kid in my neighborhood throw a baseball into the air and call out "Mantle's under it...and he makes the catch!" as the ball slapped down hard into his glove.  I remember playing backyard football and thinking "here's Grogan back to pass- he's got a receiver open!"

I know that there are kids out there today who dream of being a great baseball, football, or basketball player, and some of them feed that dream with intense practice and coaching.  A lot more just have a lot of fun playing with their friends and imagining the cheering crowds without really expecting any of it to manifest in reality- but they are outside, connecting with friends, getting exercise, having fun.

This stupid doofus wants to be the starting Quarterback of the Dallas Cowboys right now- and he's going to pretend to be just that by-- putting on a VR set and, well, doing basically absolutely nothing else.  Doesn't even have to get out of bed.  

Life was better back then.  Didn't even need fancy electronics.  And did I mention the exercise and connecting with friends and having fun while being outside?  There was that, too.