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allianceexecutive-blog · 6 years

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Executive Staffing Consultant - 5 Things To Do Immediately About EXECUTIVE STAFFING CONSULTANT

Author Name: Jack Kalish

Address:- 104 Esplanade ave,

120 Pacific, CA 94044, USA

Mobile No:- +1-9176688461

Executive Staffing Services

Why can i bother using humor throughout public talking in?You sure can and exactly what most people do. An internet business is that many people aren't effective public speakers. These kinds of are nighty nite, snooze inducing, say your prayers, hit the sack, unlicensed hypnotists. They are ZZZZZs presenters. They may be Best Executive Staffing in their field and be able to recite countless hours of information on their topic, but is effective?i

A change of duties frequently enables. Recognizing this, many companies are deliberately shifting people at the mid-career examine different operate. Others are granting longer vacations and sabbaticals, rather than bonuses. Running a professional search firms is actually a big establishment. If you consider this type of business, your expected revenue will range from 25% to 35% with the total annual salary every single senior executive once the consumer hires your recruit. Such are one of the typical fees perform charge to all your clients.

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You can also volunteer for unpopular quests. I once got a promotion because I volunteered to move my company's United Way campaign twelve months. Trust me, running the United Way campaign had not been a job that quite a few individuals wanted. I have done a good job on the campaign and met a good deal of senior people. Undoubtedly one of them liked me and also the work my partner and i did, and offered me a job associated with division. These mistakes, so common when performing a confidential search, should be ignored. Instead, use this advice to executive staffing have that confidential search underway along with no hitch. My advise is: uncover the kind of training that best for you and still update your abilities regularly. Doctors, dentists, athletes, and musicians are are generally beneficial to the professions where salvaging taken for granted that these 'pros' will continue to keep on top of their profession by 'doing whatever it takes'. In vesting in yourself is a component of offering the best service possible with regard to your clients. Utilized become a highly regarded Recruiter in the fantastic, vibrant industry. Analyse your inner self. What's your capabilities? Then, once you have gotten assessed that may. You may get decided to look at the executive recruitment firms that appeal towards niche and go on from and also. Now, you might in order to be analyse their track record and their reputation within the market. Obtain several references of as well as women that placed.

What's yours? Please leave a comment sharing your thoughts with everyone else using the hyperlinks at the top right want to know ,.

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This can be a tough time for be looking for an employment. Many of my career success coaching clients are having difficulty getting interviews let alone landing doable. However, I heard an article not a long ago in regards to new MBA from NYU who got five job offers. He did it by creating unique resumes especially tailored to the job for that they was trying. This takes work, but in this fellow's case, the effort paid at bay. Prepare so as. You must organize the phone interview as thoroughly because would a great in-person meeting. Phone interviews nowadays typically include complex questions; not merely the questions regarding salary and whether or even otherwise you will relocate. Could be asked, 'What are you know about our insurance company?' or to describe an initiative you spearheaded in quantifiable returns. And, behavioral interview questions are quite certain to get asked to determine how you would handle the duty. Bottom line, study homework upfront. What if you don't have a great track report? What if you are a new company, or, you had a past problem that grow to be resolved. Then, the method to get good people is to trade existing greatness for creative benefit. Willingness to give more of a totally free reign within their job; creativity and power in their position; is usually an appealing trade-off for existing stabilize. It's not the leadership in company that's my problem. The issue is when Prepared to get on the telephone with them because I'm being told they need to know how produce a team, they're sabotaging the recruiting process our contact abroad agrees and they're postponing the hire three weeks until someone from corporate flies extra than. And that is why crunch, the recruitment agency or executive staffing will workout on a keyword search or CV comparison tool search at your CV and the wonderful things haven't much got real intelligence! So the chances individual coming beyond their search will be slim a person are an in depth match. You want to implement a rest and think about your career. Were you really doing what you best towards? Did you enjoy the senior level management demands or are you more found in a technical authority? What work environments suit you perfect? At the same time, it is advisable to check your attitude if you are demonstrating virtually "grief" or resentment, discover only actually drive your interviewer away. Be patient and you're you are ready, prepare to market yourself. The following hints will increase your "attraction factor" and achieve you that next important new workplace. Dress for success. I wish I could remember who said this, but I can't, so I'll let you anyway. "When it comes to clothes, buy half just as much and spend twice really." Clothes may not make the man, they will certainly enhance a good first theory. Shoes must be polished for example the heels end up being get beaten up because of the driving you do.

For More Information: https://www.alliancerecruitmentagency.com/

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meghanhalpin · 6 years

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Benchmarking Presentations

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Target market

Pricing

Information organisation

Delivery methods

Users

Write up your observations on your Tumblr.

Team CCalum - Skillshare Classes are all self paced. Also offers workshops, with structure and deadlines. Annual/monthly price model, discount off CC with annual plan. Huge range of content with various quality levels. User generated. Suited to casual learners. Workshops provide more accountability and structure. Deadlines offer accountability. Biggest issue is quality control, anyone can upload. Promote high quality content. Rate teachers, classes can be reviewed by users by their expectations, what level it’s for etc. Teacher rankings. User groups for discussions, feedback etc. Classmates and teachers can give you feedback. You can interact among classmates and teachers can reply to comments.

Ellie - Udemy £12-£200 lots of coupons available, sales are common. Courses are relatively cheap. Refunds available if they’re unhappy with the course content. Video; downloadable resources etc. Lifetime access!!! Quizzes and assignments common but not mandatory. Anyone can be an instructor, quality is inconsistent. Student feedback and reviews. Feedback is requested after three lectures, could be misleading. Q&A platform if you’ve any issues. Assignments can be reviewed by class members and instructors.

Glenn - Thinkful Engineering, backend dev etc. $6k to $30k. Guarantee for jobs or money back. Put in a team with other students, meet with them every day and work on the project together. One-on-one sessions with your mentor. Quality control; industry exports, minimum 3 years experience, average 10 years. With the same group of people in the classroom for the duration of the course. Mentor will ensure that you understand the content. Mock interview. Help you build a professional portfolio. 6 months postgrad teach you interview skills and job stuff.

Team AIain - Butter Academy Cost $195 for 32 - 42 hrs. Casual learning. Given the information and DIY it. Website doesn’t give much away. Videos and tasks. Gets you in at a foundation level of UX understanding. Aimed with anyone with v little understanding of UX Fundamentals. Tools and templates sound interesting. “Not a designer? No problem.” Red flag. Not showing empathy about the people applying.

Dan - Alison Not UX specific. IT to nursing. Onboarding; transparent, they want education to be free. You can see what you’re going to get without being dragged in. Short course 2-3 hrs, Diploma courses - 8-10 hrs, learning paths - 18-20. All self taught, online, no teachers. No accountability. Free but there are ads between every part of the course. You can pay to remove the ads. Weird. Pay for certificate printing. Refer a friend discounts. Difficult to find more info. Aesthetically dull. Click on a card and it brings you straight to the course instead of giving you more info. Thousands of students. Star rating system. Brief overview. Comments are trash. Static images with text. Ads between every part!! Consider how people should be allowed to leave reviews.

Ethan - Udemy No hierarchy of memberships or anything. Discounts are good for business bc people are more likely to sign up if something is reduced. Fully responsive on iPad so it can be accessed through most devices! Not everyone has access to desktop or laptop all the time. Courses can be downloaded to be worked on offline. Onboarding is simple but BLAND. What you’ll learn sections included. Sections can be learned individually which is really handy if you’re looking for how to do one specific thing. Q&A section has a forum like feel. Discounts drive awareness and signups but how much you discount is important. Inconsistencies visually bc content is user generated.

Eimear - Codeacademy Beginner level coding right through. Free but upgrades are available. Onboarding is fine. 7 Day free trial. Taste of it then they whip it away from you. Consistent colours. Three screens, one for instructions, one for code and one for live project. Instructions are clear. Access to community forums. Aimed possibly at younger people. Tying you into a 12 month contract which isn’t very nice. Wee bit sneaky. Quiz gives you course recommendations. If you have a strong coding background it isn’t going to be much help. Paced for beginners. DARK PATTERNS. Make things upfront and transparent. Forums are alive, you don’t know where to start. It’s like tackling a wild animal.

Wiktoria - Future Learn Platform divided into short courses, in depth programmes and online degrees. School level classes and more. Onboarding is simple, they ask for age group and give recommendations based on difficulty which is good. Short courses are free. Some in depth programmes are free and some are paid for. Degrees are pay-as-you-learn. Aesthetic is nice. Colours are vibrant but not distracting. Shows you the educator. Some universities work with future learn. Design is cohesive throughout. Content wise is organised into categories. Videos, articles, audio, text and images. Course length varies from course to course. Short courses are 8 hours or more divided up by weeks. Programmes contain several courses within them. Online only, no download options for courses. Comments section. Reminders about when each course is going to start. Social element, classmate interaction. Health and psychology, courses in mental health. Marketed as improving your own wellbeing and mh which is nice. For anyone who wants to learn. Design Systems book needs to be read. Branding is simple but really nice. Strong typography. Pink accents tie everything together. Iconography is lovely. Not a chaos mess of learning. Used design to tie everything together. Think about how we build engagement.

Team B Marie - Skillshare Internet access, downloadable content also. Self paced but you can connect your calendar to your class to set up reminders. Anyone can make a profile and start teaching a class. While you can list qualifications it’s not actually necessary that you have any. Students can leave reviews and comments. In regards to pricing you can pay £84 a year or £13 a month and two free months if you successfully recommend someone. Imagine if you could measure student engagement. Then you can engage with students who need more support.

Oliwia - Udemy Design POV, summaries when you hover over courses. Overload with the amount/range of courses. Levels. Range of courses from business to Feng shui. 100k courses in total. Courses have 100+ lecturers. 44min - 50hrs. Video, downloadable sources, lifetime access, mobile and tv, certificate. Pay per course instead of membership. Lecturers have a system but no quality control. They do have access to a creative suite and have ratings. Some get paid. Each has proprietary courses. Some can team up. Udemy for Business. Create and streamline content. Forced feedback is NOT good. Very poor system.”2 days left at this price.” Using psychology to push people to buy courses. Smaller classes are advantageous. Think about how big stats are handled.

Hal - Duolingo Freemium online language learning platform. Mobile/desktop. 300m users worldwide. Self paced with notifications. Personalised education. Making learning fun. Universally accessible. Understand the problem of learning online and self motivation. We believe equality is when spending more can’t buy you a better education. Gamified, unlock able content, achievements, streaks etc. Lessons are organised thematically and grammatically. Related back to the real world. Levels get more difficult as you progress. Duolingo English tests accepted at over 200 universities worldwide. Tiny cards is a reinvention of the flash card. Accessible online but printable and not language exclusive. Duolingo plus - no ads, offline access, promotes gamification, extra features. Pros; visualisation, effectiveness, value for money, motivation, clarity, audio. Cons are info, topics and context. Rely too heavily on the gamification element. Topics are locked. You can’t learn something specific without going through the previous levels.

Me - CareerFoundry

Team D Ben - CareerFoundry Lots of progression on the dashboard. LOADS of testimonials but no reviews. £999 instead of £1k is basic temptation psychology. Engagement and course progression bars are VERY useful.

Lucy - Coursera Two different types of courses; regular courses and specialisations. £38 per month + £7 day free trial. Cancellation fees. Class numbers always in the thousands. All content is online but there are webinars and feedback from other students. Self paced, flexible deadlines. It does give you a timetable ie minimum amount of time it will take. Suitable for someone who wants a degree as well as people who want to do short courses. Certificate on completion. Add to LinkedIn. Ratings and reviews. Time guidelines. Number of people who complete the course is hard to find. Financial aid is available but no info on criteria etc.

PJ - UX Design Institute Started in Dublin, now partnered with Glasgow Uni. €500m invested into the online course. Very vague descriptions of modules instead of just names. “UX Professionals” deliberately vague; do they expect you to have a background in UX already? No reviews on the website. Work on actual projects and make portfolios. Batches of 60 students at a time, mentorship and webinars are provided. Two hour exam before you get your certification. You can share and get feedback from other students. 6-12 months. University accredited once you complete your exam. €2250 or €1950 early bird fees. No international fees. Financial aid might be an addition to think about. Expensive without financial aid if you’re a student. Batches mean you can only sign up on specific dates. No practical way to keep students engaged.

Team Tara Tara - CareerFoundry/CodeAcademy/Techdegree Topical areas called achievements. Hands on exercises within each achievement. Reading materials, videos, worksheets. Feedback from professionals. 50% of the way through you start building your portfolio. Job guarantee. Personal brand. Expensive but money back guarantee would give peace of mind.

Team E Lucy C - Skillshare Projects, Jessica Hische, there was a franchise frame in the background, I do NOT feel well.

Eoghan - Khan Academy Khan Academy kids is really cute. Information is presented in a boring way in the OG KA. Avatar grows as you progress, marketed at adults when it really should be marketed at kids.

#ixd303 #benchmarking

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skylerglobal · 5 years

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7 Ways to Make Outsourcing a Success Time After Time

You can’t do it all, but when you are outsourcing some tasks, use these seven guidelines to get it right every time

With today’s highly competitive market, regardless of the size or stage of your business, odds are you’ll have to out source some functions of your business. Outsourcing is often a critical part of scaling and growing your business or product, but it is an area where many business struggle like all aspects of business there’s a learning curve.

How can you avoid some of the common pitfalls in outsourcing?

1.Take a disciplined approach.Too many entrepreneurs abandon everything they’ve learned about hiring or dealing with consultants. It doesn’t matter if you use an overseas developer or someone right across the street. Perhaps because the outsiders won’t be full-time employees, or because they’ll be on a shorter-term contract, entrepreneurs are less careful about whom they hire. Or maybe they do a poor job of communicating what’s really needed, resulting in a big disconnect between what’s expected and what’s delivered. There can also be language and/or culture barriers that need to be addressed.

In addition, since the outsourced employees aren’t at a nearby desk or workstation, many entrepreneurs don’t bother to check on how things are going. This is a big mistake—you must monitor essential steps throughout the process. This way, if your consultant gets off track or you need to make adjustments to the original project, you can minimize your losses and get the project back on the rails before it’s completed.

2. Hire right. Don’t take anyone’s word about the quality of outsourced work. Operate with the same diligence you’d use when making full-time hires. Check references to get a better picture of past performance. Agree on a very clear job description and, if possible, run a test by executing a small project together before handing over too much money or control. If you’re not getting the results you want, don’t waste time; cut your losses and move on. Even if people are referred by valued friends, be careful. I’ve found that most people aren’t very careful when referring consultants, who may be between gigs, out of work, or juggling lots of projects. Some are friends of the people making the referral, and the favor being done is for them, not you. Or the referrer knows them socially rather than through a business relationship.

Related: What Is A Virtual Assistant And What Can They Do For My Business? Related: Benefits Of Outsourcing Social Media Marketing for Small business

3. Be absolutely clear. you should be very clear when you communicate with your outsource company your outsource partner may live in another country and the languages they use might be different so it is important that you communicate properly. If you paint an incomplete picture of your intended outcome, you’ll get something that only vaguely resembles what you had in mind. Many entrepreneurs have a vision but no concrete idea of how they plan to execute, so they hand the job over to someone else, expecting them to fill in the blanks. With a full-time employee, that can work. Your staff person can fill in the details of your broader vision; that’s what you hired them to do, and since you’re there, you can still exercise some direct control. They have the benefit of being in the office and getting feedback every day. They’re also using your materials and tools, and know how your company operates. Most contractors, however, only do what they’re told. That’s usually a good thing because if they start filling in the blanks, they could take things in an unintended direction.his also means you need to have a comprehensive understanding of your desired outcome. Write down the details as you think through each step in the process. Pass on your descriptions and expectations.

4. Make it a dialogue. Continue the conversation throughout the process. Describe the specific look and feel you’re going for. Try to point out comparisons, since examples of like products can be used as models to provide a clearer picture. Think of this as similar to the process of building a home; you find houses you like and, ideally, walk your architect through one that’s close to what you desire.If you’re developing an e-commerce site, for example, what’s the specific user experience you want? What are the steps in the buying process? Can you picture them in your mind? The clearer you can be, the more likely you are to get the result you want. Point them to two or three comparable websites you like that they can use as guides when building your site.

5. Manage against clear deliverables. It’s important to specify key milestones and delivery dates. That keeps both sides honest and up-to-date and helps ensure the contractor is making progress (you can’t manage what you don’t measure). Assign strong managers to oversee contractors.

Related :4 Benefits Of Business Process Outsourcing For Small Businesses Related :9 Time-Consuming Business Tasks You Could Outsource to Grow Your Business

6. Payment varies. Outsource companies sometimes the supplier will want everything upfront, a retainer/kickoff fee, or payment at regular intervals. Many entrepreneurs I work with an attempt to pay solely based on performance. But there are risks with this model. If people don’t get paid, they fail to pay attention. As a result, the work doesn’t get completed, takes longer than expected, or is poor quality. Keep in mind, you don’t always have to pay in cash. Trading services may have the same value as cash to your vendor. But unless there’s an equal exchange in value, a project usually fails.

7. Take responsibility. when you outsource a business it is important for you to take responsibility. If your first reaction on seeing your product is, Hey, this isn’t what I intended, it’s not the end of the world. That’s just another reason we only build one thing at a time. Don’t take your disappointment out on your contractor: How much of the fault was yours for not being clear or checking in? You may decide after seeing a prototype that you want something altogether different. Instead of losing your temper, outline what you like and what you would like to improve. Communicate this feedback in a constructive way to your contractor.

SKYLER GLOBAL is an agency where we provide you a 24/7 hour service where you will not face any of the cons found in the outsourcing space. we have a team of your creative individuals who are prepared to come up with solutions to any of your problems. If you love to increase your revenue by focusing on what you are best at and improving your business through outsourcing contact us through skyler@[email protected] Thank you!

The post 7 Ways to Make Outsourcing a Success Time After Time appeared first on SKYLER GLOBAL.

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chrisburns733-blog · 6 years

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How to stop paying for your timeshare?

Imagine a beautiful, Truman Show-like day. The sun is shining and leaves skip across the lawn as you stroll to the mailbox. Sifting through the envelopes, you stop in your tracks. You’ve spotted the windowed envelope with the logo you’ve come to loathe. It’s that time of year again: Timeshare maintenance fees are due. Ugh.

It wasn’t always like this. You used to enjoy your timeshare. Remember watching the kiddos run down to the pool? Those lazy nights on the back deck? Talk about good memories! But things have changed. Your lifestyle is different than it was the day you happily signed the papers. Maybe you’d rather take a trip to see the grandkids than go back to your timeshare for the fifteenth time! Or maybe you want to go somewhere else this year, but you say to yourself,

How to Get Out of Timeshare

Or maybe you’re one of the many people who, the week after signing the papers, realized it was a horrible mistake. You feel trapped. And just like 85% of all timeshare owners, you’re wondering, How can I get rid of my timeshare?

Sell Your Timeshare

Your best option is to sell your timeshare outright and recoup some of the expenses you’ve already paid. Research and see what your timeshare is worth in its local market. Check with a real estate agent or some timeshare sales sites—even eBay and Craigslist—for timeshares similar to yours and find out what the final sale prices were (not just the amount they’re listed for). Just make sure you list your timeshare with a no-upfront-fee listing company so you don’t get hoodwinked by companies charging an enormous fee for their “exclusive” website. Be prepared that, unless it’s in one of the hot markets (think Disney World), your timeshare may not be worth a lot. But after investigating, you’re now armed with the facts.

If it does turn out to be worth something, another option is to sell to someone who bought the weeks before or after your scheduled weeks. That owner may want to extend their vacation options by a week and be open to purchasing your contract.

Cancel Timeshare Contract Sample Letter That Works

Whatever you choose, your timeshare will be listed as “encumbered” if you still have a loan on the property. There’s really no going forward with a sale until the loan’s paid back.

Ask the Resort to Take It Back

Look through your timeshare’s paperwork to see if there’s a legal, low-cost way to give the property back to the resort, often called a “timeshare deedback.” It’s a long shot, but why not give it a go? But watch out! Sometimes when you contact the resort, they’ll see it as an opportunity to “upgrade your timeshare experience.” You do not want to walk away with an additional contract chaining you to the deal. You may want to try Dave Ramsey’s creative approach and offer an incentive to the resort in exchange for a sale. He told one listener: “Call the sales manager there and ask how much they make if they sell a timeshare. If it’s $500, offer $1,000 commission. If the timeshares are selling for $22,000, sell yours for $8,000. Basically, you’re giving them more commission and making the sale easy.”

Honestly, not many resorts entertain the option of buying back their timeshares, but it can’t hurt to ask!

How To Sell A Timeshare Without Denting Your Bank?

Use an Attorney

Have you ever heard the phrase, “a verbal contract isn’t worth the paper it’s written on”? Well, the contract you signed when you got your timeshare was on a piece of paper, so you’ll need an attorney to work your way out of it.

If you’ve taken advantage of any offers to “upgrade” your timeshare (even just changing the week you visit) this is normally considered an entirely new contract. So as a rule, seven or eight individual contracts may be tied up in your timeshare deal. Each of these must be dealt with separately for you to completely escape the arrangement.

Some attorneys don’t specialize in this type of contract law. Make sure they understand what they’re getting into before they run up hours of legal fees without scratching the surface of the problem.

Also, find an attorney who guarantees their services. You’ve already been paying through the nose for timeshare fees, so don’t continue to throw money into yet another money pit.

How to Cancel Timeshare After Rescission Period

Use a Timeshare Exit Company

Even better than an individual attorney, wouldn’t you love to have a team of people working on your timeshare problem?

Find a company that’s experienced in dealing with the ins and outs of the timeshare industry. You’re looking for one that’s already helped a lot of people exit their timeshare agreements fully and legally.

And don’t be suckered into any shady deals from companies asking you to participate in illegal or unethical activities. If they use high-pressure sales tactics or ask for a credit card number before your contract is signed, that’s a hint they’re scum and can’t be trusted!

You’ll also want someone with a proven track record. Some companies are here today and gone tomorrow. They say they’ll get you out of your commitment at a “low, low price,” but in a few months, they’re nowhere to be found—and so is your money!

However you ended up with your timeshare agreement, don’t lose hope. Don’t put it off. Do your research and take the next step. There’s only one company Dave recommends, Timeshare Exit Team. He’s been searching for years for somebody to help his listeners get out of these sticky deals. They’ve helped thousands of people just like you without any of the illegal shenanigans other companies try to pull.

Options to Avoid

You’ve probably gotten plenty of suggestions on how to get rid of your timeshare from well-meaning friends and family that seem logical on the surface—but be careful. You don’t want to end up complicating your situation further by doing one of these three things.

1. Renting Your Timeshare

Uncle Louie said you should rent out your timeshare so you’ll at least get some money for your trouble. But all it takes is one bad renter to trash the place and leave you with a repair project you have to coordinate between the resort and other owners of the unit. What a headache!

If your resort is one of the few that lets you rent it out (because a lot of them prohibit it), the money you might make won’t even come close to covering the fees you’re paying anyway. It’s a Band-Aid at best.

How To Get Out of Paying Your Timeshare Maintenance Fees?

2. Donating Your Timeshare

On the other hand, Aunt Mary thought you should just donate it to charity. Sounds good, right? But once you start scoping out a charity, you’ll find they’re much less receptive than you imagined. They don’t want those never-ending costs either! But they might accept it if you agree to pay the fees for several years down the line too. Ouch—no thank you!

3. Stop Paying for Your Timeshare

And then there’s your neighbor Harv who suggested you just walk away and stop paying. Talk about jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire! You’re better than that. Don’t sacrifice your integrity just to try and avoid the inevitable. Besides, you’ll still probably be foreclosed on and then battle with collectors for years. No fun! But there is hope! Your timeshare doesn’t have to be a life sentence. You can break out of your blasted timeshare with the help of Timeshare Exit Team can help you.

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legit-scam-review · 6 years

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Ponzi Games Are Breaking Out on the Ethereum Blockchain

The hottest new apps on ethereum resemble an old favorite: the Ponzi scheme. At least that’s the early consensus on FOMO 3D and PoWH3D, two of the platform’s top three apps entering Tuesday.

According to data website DappRadar, both games have amassed 20,000 ether ($9 million) in trading volume over the last 24 hours, a figure that puts them on par with top decentralized exchanges and that exceeds the highest highs of CryptoKitties, the blockchain’s most famous viral decentralized application (dapp) to date.

Perhaps unique to both projects though is how they create an incentive to bring new people in so users can share the spoils as they do so. Both applications also collapse if new users quit joining in a way that’s similar to a basic pyramid scheme.

However, these particular games make it much more complicated (and maybe more fun).

“At the core, they seem to be taking the ideas of pay-per-bid auction models that were popular in 2009–2011, except instead of selling ‘real’ products for the bid price, they sell nothing tangible or of real value,” Sid Kalla, of token project consulting firm Turing Advisory Group, told CoinDesk.

In penny auctions, people paid a tiny amount of money to make a bid on a real item. The final winning bidder might get a deal, but the organization running the auction would make many times over the price of the item from the fees collected on the way to that bid.

At least then auctioneers took on some risk: the cost of the item and operational costs. With these games, there’s none (except perhaps indictments).

Both projects appear to be by the same group, which calls itself “TeamJUST.” The creators are keeping themselves anonymous. The two products have sparked a furor among crypto enthusiasts, who are warning buyers not to support what they allege are pyramid schemes.

JP Thor, CEO of CanYa, a startup funded with an initial coin offering (ICO), wrote on Twitter:

“One thing for certain, this thing won’t end well.”

But financial blogger JP Konig was more philosophical, writing on Twitter, “It is human nature to seek out gambling opportunities like Ponzis. Till now the only option has been shoddily-run offline Ponzis. If ethereum’s relatively clean Ponzis displace the bad ones, the world is (a bit) better off.”

As Konig points out, Ponzi schemes are nothing new on the blockchain. Dapp Radar founder Skirmantas Januskas pointed out PoWH 3D on March 31 with a Medium post. “Let’s be honest, this is a pyramid scheme. Every user is getting paid for the users that join later,” he wrote.

In an email to CoinDesk, one of the anonymous team members of TeamJUST wrote:

“There’s a lot of misconceptions. It’s a game of semantics. By some definitions, almost all of cryptocurrency itself, as well as Social Security, have certain properties of a Ponzi.”

But what seems to be developing now is a sense of traction around the projects. While PoWH 3D has been on the blockchain a while, it wasn’t till mid-July that it started to really rise on the dapp charts, perhaps helped in part by TeamJUST’s followup, Fomo3D.

And it may be that the games’ very sketchy nature was part of the charm. Both projects have sites that make light of their approach. In many ways, they strike a similar tone to July 2017’s Useless Ethereum Token, the ICO that measured buyer’s contributions in the number of big screen televisions its creator could purchase.

He raised about $80,000 or 310 ETH at the time, promising nothing.

PoWH 3D

As the rise of these newer games shows, though, that promise still seems to work.

The “PoWH” in PoWH 3D’s name stands for “proof of weak hands.”

Using a token called P3D and a custom decentralized exchange for users to buy it and sell it, the creators added some elaborate features to make a relatively simple and familiar idea more fun on a blockchain. Every time someone transacts, it levies a 10 percent fee. That fee is then distributed to everyone still holding the token.

So, people holding P3D get paid as people come in, and they get paid as people go out.

It also rewards users for creating affiliate links that draw people in, and rewards them for sticking around over time. It calls these functions ‘staking’ and ‘mining.’

As the site puts it: “Yes, our staking and mining systems are comedic jabs at cryptocurrency as a whole, they’re also immensely more fun, and reward in (ETH) instead of something that ‘may’ have value later.”

And its creators argue that you can’t call it a scheme if it’s upfront about how everything works:

“We recognize that a trustless smart-contract managing value in this way simply was not possible before this point in computing history. There’s no scheming here at all – it’s upfront, honest and completely transparent.”

Fomo3D

Fomo3D, which launched on July 8, is another TeamJUST game that recalls “The Button,” an experiment that ran on Reddit in 2015, which itself evoked penny auctions (without any money on the line).

In the Reddit game, a simple button was accompanied by a 60-second timer. When a user clicked the button, the timer would reset. If no one clicked it, the timer would run out and the game would end. It took two months and over 1 million clicks before someone let the timer run out.

Fomo3D works in a similar way, except pushing the metaphorical button costs a little money. There are now over 21,400 ether (nearly $10 million) on the line at the time of writing. Users of the game buy a “key,” and each purchase sets the countdown (currently at around 24 hours) back by a certain amount.

As the game’s wiki explains, “Players receive a stream of passive income from the game as keys are bought during the round. These rewards can be withdrawn anytime.”

To massively simplify how this very weird game ends, fundamentally: when the countdown runs out, the smart contract “drains,” or pays out. Winners depend on which “team” a person joins and — to make it weirder still — part of the winnings can even go to holders PoWH 3D’s token.

In that way, it’s helping convince users in its first game to stay in. And it seems to be working: Fomo3D has far more transactions over the last day so far than its predecessor.

Fomo3D consciously evokes the seedier corners of the cryptocurrency industry. The username of the last player to buy a key is splashed across the site with the warning that they’re “exit scamming,” the practice of taking investors’ funds through an ICO and making off with the money rather than building whatever product was promised.

Scam or be scammed

Creativity and humor aside, most think the change in tone isn’t enough to brush aside concerns.

“I think it appeals to people as a way to gamble with some ‘exciting’ rules of the game,” Kalla said. “Given some of the time frames on which this operates, it wouldn’t be surprising to see this run for a while before losing steam.”

For some critics, the cheeky references to scams are a bit too on-the-nose. The most upvoted comment on one Reddit thread about FoMo3D – “my wife still doesn’t believe in mee” – is a reference to the most notorious (recent) crypto Ponzi scheme, BitConnect.

The joke may be on the players though. Péter Szilágyi, one of ethereum’s more well-known developers, took the time to detail an attack that could potentially undermine one of the schemes on Reddit this week. Which raises the question: if the stakes behind a game designed to rob its players gets stolen, did the thief really do anything wrong?

The answer may be one that the dapps’ users are soon to find out.

UPDATE (24, July 2018 14:08 UTC): CoinDesk added comment from TeamJUST subsequent to publication.

Foam pyramids image via Shutterstock

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups.

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