In college I usually had at least one "free money" or "free goods and services" scam in the works at any given moment. I miss those days. And reading about these stories of found wealth make me want to take a vacation to Nicaragua or the post office. Keep reading, it'll make more sense.
First off is a town in Nicaragua that is rolling in dough despite the fact that unemployment is around 85%. What's their secret? Beach combing for bales of cocaine that traffickers jettison when chased by the Coast Guard. Apparently you can do pretty well for yourself by picking up packets on the beach and heading over to the local supermarket to cash in. Its like aluminum cans in Michigan except you can walk away with eighty grand.
This next one doesn't involve international travel or strolling on the beach. Not unless you consider dumpster diving a day at the beach. Sony BMG mails people CDs, which are normally paid for by subscribers. However, if a subscriber moves and can't be found BMG instructs the post office to simply throw the discs away rather than pay to ship them back. One postal worker noticed how many perfectly good CDs were going in the trash out back and decided to salvage what he could. He ended up making about $80,000 selling them to record stores before someone caught on.
Now he's in a heap of trouble, or so BMG thinks. They originally wanted to slap mail fraud charges on him, but someone must have told them that mail doesn't get put in dumpsters, trash does. And there's no such thing as trash fraud. So now they're throwing copyright violations and "lost opportunity" claims to see if any of that sticks. I'm not sure I buy the copyright part, but BMG probably did have some lost opportunity. Which TechDirt points out is like the deli suing the pizza joint for feeding people at lunch.
First off is a town in Nicaragua that is rolling in dough despite the fact that unemployment is around 85%. What's their secret? Beach combing for bales of cocaine that traffickers jettison when chased by the Coast Guard. Apparently you can do pretty well for yourself by picking up packets on the beach and heading over to the local supermarket to cash in. Its like aluminum cans in Michigan except you can walk away with eighty grand.
This next one doesn't involve international travel or strolling on the beach. Not unless you consider dumpster diving a day at the beach. Sony BMG mails people CDs, which are normally paid for by subscribers. However, if a subscriber moves and can't be found BMG instructs the post office to simply throw the discs away rather than pay to ship them back. One postal worker noticed how many perfectly good CDs were going in the trash out back and decided to salvage what he could. He ended up making about $80,000 selling them to record stores before someone caught on.
Now he's in a heap of trouble, or so BMG thinks. They originally wanted to slap mail fraud charges on him, but someone must have told them that mail doesn't get put in dumpsters, trash does. And there's no such thing as trash fraud. So now they're throwing copyright violations and "lost opportunity" claims to see if any of that sticks. I'm not sure I buy the copyright part, but BMG probably did have some lost opportunity. Which TechDirt points out is like the deli suing the pizza joint for feeding people at lunch.
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