Rippln: Multi-Level-Marketing invading App store

http://stephenkiers.com/post/48502528622/rippln-app-scam

by kiers • 13 years ago

23 16 13 years ago

kiers2• 13 years ago

Would love to hear what you all think about this, self described, phenomenon. Also hope that you will warn your friend about it. :)

t0• 13 years ago

Certainly a clever scheme. I personally don't buy into such nonsense, but I'm sure lots of people would.

The sad thing is this could be a legitimate product, but the over aggressive scammy marketing gives it a bad image.

jordanbaucke• 13 years ago

I'm so confused. Just put the word "rippln" into Bing and the first result was a non-sensical Yahoo News article that seemed like it came out of a random text generator with the buzzword app-marketing setting 'up to 11'

http://news.yahoo.com/rippln-invites-spreading-globally-over...

I read "Rippln" and thought of the digital currency "Ripple"...oh well.

kevingadd• 13 years ago

Yeah, that's a PR spam article. Scummy services like PRWeb and PRNewsWire lets you get pagerank and hits by paying to get your press releases syndicated on websites run by people who don't know better... like Yahoo News.

junkilo• 13 years ago

good effort on the marketing, but when someone invited me and I saw the NDA, I went and found the video elsewhere and ratted out those MLM scum right away.

use your friends and family to make money? makes me feel dirty.

bcoates• 13 years ago

I'm seeing handbills around the LA area for a something similar called "ilivingapp" that seems to be a free app that lets you pay $10/mo for the privilege of promoting it. It has remarkably well-astroturfed Google search results.

skore2• 13 years ago

Christopher Hitchens diagnosed antisemitism (or anti-Jewish prejudice) as "an unfailing sign of a sick and disordered person".

Support for Multi-Level Marketing is an unfailing sign of a credulous sucker.

(And yes, there are people who are quite happy to defend MLM, just watch any comment thread on some shill product or another. It's quite amazing to witness to what extent of... rationalization the human mind is willing to go.)

onemorepassword• 13 years ago

I would say you're being to kind.

MLM-believers are willing to exploit friends and family for profit. That goes well beyond just being a "credulous sucker".

Confusion• 13 years ago

Theoretically, MLM can work. In practice, most implementations don't work. The condition under which MLM can work is that the lowest level 'salesman' have sufficient incentive to stay at that level, because they can earn as much as any 'manager' or because they like the work better. As soon as the 'managers' can quickly earn much more as any 'salesman' or the pitch is that everyone shoul strive to become a 'manager', then it's no better than the next pyramid scheme.

Tupperware is good, Herbalife isn't.

skore2• 13 years ago

So what you're saying is that MLM works the better it resembles an actual, honest business that does not rip off its employees.

At the extreme end, MLM is pretty much exactly a pyramid scheme. Move, step by step, towards the way in which an honest business operates and eventually, it's working. Take it further to that point and eventually, it's not MLM anymore.

So - why have MLM to begin with? Because there are con men and suckers. Which is why MLM is inherently bullshit.

stefek99• 13 years ago

Sending passwords in plain text is yet another thingy to stay away.

I need to admit videos are professionally produced, seductive... Anyone joining my ripple? (in the first moment I read "rip-off")

Relevant: http://www.sauliuz.com/building-on-what-you-own/ building on what you own!

snaky• 13 years ago

The detailed analysis including the company's CEO previous schemes - http://behindmlm.com/companies/rippln-review-mobile-app-recr...

>I’ve seen Rippln being marketed as a mobile app social network, which I’m assuming is based on Rippln affiliates being able to communicate with eachother via the app.

>Social networks and MLM are nothing new and as usual Rippln marketing material focuses heavily on Facebook, Twitter, Angry Birds and other succesful internet properties, asking the question “why aren’t users paid to promote them?”

>The key ingredient with each internet property mentioned however is the idea behind it. A key ingredient Rippln is missing.

[..]

>CEO Brian Underwood’s involvement in various MLM schemes of dubious reputation and legal status certainly don’t inspire any confidence on the subject. Nor do Rippln themselves when they constantly refer to their MLM opportunity as a “game” which affiliates “play” in their official marketing material.

>At the end of the day this isn’t the first time we’ve seen a social concept paired with MLM and to date every single one of them has failed to gain any traction. The last social network MLM that went high-profile (and also pulled a silly viral pre-launch campaign) was Wazzub.

bochoh• 13 years ago

I would point out that this actually is not in the App Store, you need an Apple developers account to install it.

kiers2• 13 years ago

I was "to kind" in the review so that potential scam victims may actually read the post. I am hoping it helps some people avoid getting to involved, and getting pulled down the cognitive dissonance rabbit hill try are so prone to taking :(

niwky• 13 years ago

They don't use the terminology "use your family and friends to make money". They always say they are going out and "helping" other people to make money. They want to make people think that if they don't ask their friends and family that they are actually causing them to miss out on the opportunity of a life time.

oftenwrong• 13 years ago

Rippln is spamming the fuck out of 4chan too.

Rippln: Multi-Level-Marketing invading App store

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