A telemarketer is a telemarketer is a telemarketer. They prey on people to get money. These scams have adapted over the years from car warranties to phone service (remember "slamming"?) to other assorted BS. They bank on people wanting to believe that Bill Gates will pay you to spam people, and they use powerful motivators. They appeal to peoples' greed and/or peoples' fears. A Nigerian General wants to share millions with you. I'll send you a check for $5,000.00, you send me your car and a money order for $3,000.00, your grandson will go to jail for 20 years in a foreign country, you'll lose your house, be burglarized and so on. Here's a pretty good recording of this scam. It's over 1/2 hour long but you can skip through it for the entertainment, but it also has some good info in it to educate people on how they work. Once they get you to download one of the programs, they can get into your computer and you will have problems. They use essentially illusions to look credible and the non-skeptical will often swallow it hook, line and sinker. I always told my clients that if it comes to you in an email, assume it's false until proven true. And when they call you on the phone, it's not much different. The sad part is people WANT to believe scams. And they want to be the first to share this secret with people so they send it on to everyone they know. Anyone can challenge/dispute any charge, just like anyone can sue anyone for anything, however it takes proof to prevail. The banks have no liability to reimburse someone for being a sucker. The easy dispute process was tightened up on many years ago because people would buy something, then have buyer's remorse and dispute the charge. There are rules with a rescission period requirement on large purchases but on smaller purchases when you authorize a charge, you're basically on the hook for it. And to get a refund, you have to go through the proper procedures. People think a credit card protects them because if they drop the TV down a flight of steps, or leave the cake out in the rain, and they can just dispute it and get the money back. You can't challenge a charge because another store put the jacket on sale two weeks after you purchased it. Doesn't work that way. It's similar to people thinking they can buy something with a check and stop payment on the check with no ramifications or even to put them in a better bargaining position. Not always so. You can have issues with criminal charges against you for defrauding an innkeeper for one thing. Attempting to evade payment of a debt is a criminal charge in many places. For instance, writing a check on a closed account. Sadly there are some cards who will sometimes indemnify suckers and that costs everyone money. They'll do it for "customer service" I suppose but again, ever since the changes in the credit laws a number of years ago they aren't as friendly about it. Most of these telemarketers are educated, at least more than a lot of the people they call. I'd suspect the caller did not say they were with Microsoft. They probably said "tech support" or something and babble something about Microsoft certification or something and people who don't know better or don't pay attention assume something different. One of the collection agencies out of Canada operate under a name similar to a law office to gain credibility and scare people into paying up, even on debts they don't owe. People need to be educated and at least learn more than the telemarketers to protect themselves or they're destined to lose.

I lost 55# six years ago by doing two things. 1. Eat ONLY when I'm truly physically hungry. 2. Stop eating when I'm comfortably full. I did not "give up" any specific categories of food. I did not change my activity level. I continue to maintain my weight if I do these two things consistently. If not then my weight fluctuates. I lost weight with various other methods but could never keep it off and I felt deprived and "hangry" (hungry + angry) much of the time. With this strategy if I feel physical hunger then I am free to eat whatever food I want until I am comfortably full. Again if I eat due to stress or boredom or if I consistently overeat my weight will go up and this has happened on occasion. And right now I am up a few pounds though I also have gained freedom from the scales with this. I know because my jeans feel a little more snug. But if I get back to these two basics then the weight comes off and stabilizes. It really is a wonderful feeling of freedom. I hated counting fat gram/calories/etc, etc, etc. and constantly thinking about what I could/couldn't eat. It consumed so much of my time and energy. Now I don't have to think about it until my body says I'm hungry then I can eat whatever I like - birthday cake or a salad or both as long as I don't overeat. I agree with the poster who made the point that what works for one person may not work for another. This really worked for me and so I just wanted to share it. Also let me clarify that while I did not increase my activity level I am a physical therapist and therefore a big proponent of fitness in general. I just did not use exercise as a means of weight loss. The loss came from the changes I made in when/how much I ate. As others have mentioned portion sizes will be much different when you eat this way. The basic premises came from a couple of different sources. Two books - Thin Within and Weigh Down. Both are faith based but the principles work whatever your beliefs. There are statements in both of these books that are counter to my beliefs but following these two basic tenants have given me a freedom that I never experienced with any other diet attempts. While this is simple it certainly is challenging especially in the beginning. It takes a while to know when to start and when to stop eating. But each mistake helps you learn. Also I did have the support of a group for the first 12 weeks. As a further note - approximately two years ago I quit eating meat and cut most of the dairy out of my diet due to my concern about the treatment of animals by the food industry. This did not make my weight maintenance any easier or more difficult. I hope this info is helpful.

I've actually had a similar idea to yours cynic, but with a slight change that might actually make the solution workable. Whenever a call is received, the recipient has the option of hanging up and dialing similar to *69 (I'll call it *96) which would cause some amount (say 50 cents) to be added to the callers bill, and that amount would be credited to the recipient's bill. Think about it. You've just got a call from 'Bridget at card services" or from "Microsoft" or from some annoying survey or from the opposing political party regarding their reprehensible candidate, and rather than merely hanging up and walking away silently fuming (like I did moments ago in the middle of writing this message) Instead imagine hanging up, dialing *96 and walking away slightly smirking because you've actually affected the annoying caller, and your phone bill will be slightly smaller this month. Imagine the smile when you think, "Five more of them, and this month is free!" The details of the plan would need some careful thought to avoid creating a new mode of abuse wherein some scammer calls you leaving a message saying "Its an emergency, call me back at this number ASAP" and then when you do, they *96 you and garner 50 cents from you. Maybe each caller gets a handful of *96 calls in a given month before they are debited. Or perhaps the caller is notified that the recipient has done a *96, and the caller has the option of dialing *97 and negating the charge back, but only a couple of times a month. It would take decision at the Federal level to force the phone companies to implement this, since I'm sure they'll fight it tooth and nail. Furthermore the telemarketing industry will surely claim it would affect their business, and jobs of all the poor schlubs they employ, but ... duh, that's the entire point of the measure. The one issue I see with the measure is that it would be so effective, that perhaps within a year of being implemented, the need for it and the use of it would drop to near zero. (Note if a lawmaker reads this and wants to implement this scheme, I'll gladly license the design for a meager 1/100th of a cent per call that is *96'ed :-)

You're only half right there sushipup1. SSI is Supplemental Security Income, yes, but it is NOT disability. RSDI (Retirement Survivors And Disability Insurance) is the "disability" program. It's sometimes referred to as SSD or SSDI. SSI is an income supplement program funded by general tax revenues (not Social Security taxes) designed to help aged, blind, and disabled people, who have little or no income. It provides cash to meet basic needs for food, clothing, and shelter. People on "disability" are able to also apply for SSI if they meet the requirements but it's very different from the disability coverage. There's so many scumballs out there. I think phones should have a button on them whereby you can push it to activate dumping a pail of water on them and then give a 50,000 volt zap to telemarketers and scammers. Voltage would increase every time they call someone. That would cut down on the lowlife calls from these "poor people who are just trying to make a living and feed their starving children..." to whom we should talk so nice and considerate!