Scamming & Sharking, know your stuff

[Boros György]

Hey guys, I have seen a few posts about people claiming they have been scammed, or got reported for scamming. The problem is, lot of people seems to have poor knowledge about what is the difference difference between scamming, and sharking, so I've decided to make this basic guide. Let's start.

1, Scamming:
Tricking someone into thinking you will give them items/money later, after they gave you an X item. One should always be aware of this happening, if someone adds with a message like "hey, I like your hat, can I buy it? I'll transfer the money later to your account". (Transfering money between steam accs is not possible, they may say something like "I'll send the money to your paypal account").

2. Sharking:
Taking adventage of someone who has poor/no knowledge about the prices. For example: selling a selling a hat for 3ref instead of 1,33. (Note.: there are of course greater/lesser price differences) I would like to mention, that in my dictionary, there are two kind of sharking. In general, we can sum it up as a bad trade.

a, In the first case, the sharker adds the player to trade, hoping for a huge profit. Targets for sharking are usually people who are new to trading, or new to TF2 at general.

b, The sharker gets added by the other player, who would like to trade his/her stuff for something less valuable.

In my personal opinion the b, case is morally acceptable, the a, case isn't. You must understand, that sharking is not bannable, you should't report someone for doing it. (I wouldn't even really consider the mentioned b, case as sharking.) In the other hand, scamming is ALWAYS bad, and players doing it should be always punished.

Also, if you buy/sell something, and you are irrationally overpaying, AND the other player made it clear (like you give a hat for a weapon), you have no rights to say you are a victim afterwards.



Well, thanks for reading, I hope it helped a few players. Also, feel free to add something to this, if I missed something. (ps.: sorry for the spelling errors.)

~ s-sight

[Boros György]

thanks for mentioning, actually, I forgot about it. :) I may just move this thread there.

[Apple Zoo]

OR you could play the real game instead of playing to trade

[Boros György]

Originally posted by Fmab Eulb:

OR you could play the real game instead of playing to trade

You know, trading is just as much real as the playing part. I'm just trying to help people on the forums, f*ck me, right?

[Apple Zoo]

Originally posted by s-sight:

f*ck me, right?

Right.

[Boros György]

Originally posted by Fmab Eulb:

Originally posted by s-sight:

f*ck me, right?

Right.

Okay, sorry mr tryhard, I'm just gonna conga away.

[Ultrix]

Originally posted by s-sight:

Originally posted by Fmab Eulb:

Right.

Okay, sorry mr tryhard, I'm just gonna conga away.

You are helpful,you're help is needed,thanks for helping

[-1Grit]

The light of wisdom has been shown to this dude

[Yatsuzume]

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/editguide/?appid=440

[Boros György]

It's good to see, that someone finds this useful (this is its purpose). Also, I've considered making a guide, but I've already found a similar one in the subject, so I've just added this text as a comment to it. I may still create an independent one.

[Viinabeebi]

Yes, i find this helpful, because i totally don't have a common sense.

[Ranko]

I find this funny because sharking actually only has its own definition for TF2, everywhere else it has a totally different definition. But I guess if everyone uses it that way it may as well be that definition.