TreeLooters: Stealers of Time
Written: Jul 14 '00
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That’s right, stealers of time. Monopolizers of the hour. They caused me to be delayed in submitting for the Favorite Authors Write-Off last night (by half an hour) and today I had to do two hours of research on them. Epinioneers of the world unite and don’t allow them to go unpunished!
Well, actually it isn’t illegal. Actually it makes good business since to keep somebody stuck on your site for hours and not pay them a dime. Pretty dang smart. How do they do it?
What is it and how does it work?
A big tree, and you click it, respectively.
What’d you say? This review has to be at least 100 words long? Oh.
When you go to the TreeLoot website, in the center of the “home” page you’ll see a small picture of a tree. Click it and you will be taken to a full-screen tree. That’s right, somewhere in there is $30,000 in prizes. Pretty cool, huh? Not to difficult? Wrong.
When you click the tree, the server reads the pixel number that you clicked. It then proceeds to tell you if you are hot or cold. I’ve never been all the way hot, so I don’t know what size area things are narrowed down to each time you get “hotter.” Anyway, sounds like a good way to win some money, eventually, right? Just narrow down the area and click a few thousand times and find the winning pixel, right? Well, not really.
You see, the fine print states that some (I take that to mean nearly all) prizes are hidden at double coordinates, meaning that you have to click two certain pixels in a predisposed order to win the prize. That causes the odds to jump substantially. I think about the only thing you can win is Banana Bucks and Stuffed Monkeys.
Banana Bucks are stupid little things you get for visiting sponsors websites and filling out surveys. If you win a prize, your Banana Bucks are added to your total. Otherwise they are worthless. Periodically TreeLoot will give you a “Punch the Monkey” round where, if you hit a monkey (who is jumping around inside a ring) enough times you allegedly win a stuffed monkey. I have heard from numerous people saying they never got theirs. I’d sue. Seriously. It’s the only way you can make money.
So, what happens when you click a spot on the tree? A new page comes up featuring a very irritating monkey. More on him in a minute. Plus, you can choose to see how close you were to a given prize on the “Cold and Hot” meter. Just select a prize from the drop-down menu to see how close (hot) you were. You can also fill out really long surveys and get “hints.” Sorry, I’m all into taking one for the team, but I’m not going to stoop to the level of filling out surveys. Tough luck.
In the box under the drop-down menu is the dialogue that the monkey is saying. Junk like “You’re a professional clicker, friend.” He’s the reason above all that I won’t ever return to the site. That and it’s a waste of time. He also says junk like “70 more clicks till you can play ‘Fight the Monkey’” and “187 more clicks until you reach a bonus round.” And “I’m going to eat you alive if you don’t visit more sponsors.”
Every five times you visit a sponsor (you have to click a couple of links and stay on the site for a few minutes) you get a special bonus round, which consists of three clicks to one smaller tree where “The odds of winning are enormous!.” Actually the odds are about 1:3000 and there is probably only one prize in the whole thing. Believe me, if you click 5000 banner ads, they make WAY more off you than the meager prize you’d find. I visited 15 sponsors, actually the same sponsor 15 times (what’s the point in that?) and the dang monkey was still cussing me wanting me to visit more sponsors when you already know that they get paid a fortune just to run the four banner ads, much less click-throughs.
After a couple hundred clicks you get another bonus round (basically the same as with viewing five ads). Nothing special there either.
Confessions of a Monkey
I called TreeLoot.com up and asked to speak with their representative monkey.
<David> Hello there, I’m a reviewer from Epinions.com and had a few questions for you.
<Monkey> Have you clicked one of the sponsors at least 5,672 times?
<David> Well, no, but…
<Monkey> Stop wasting my time then.
<David> But, Mr. Flea-and-Tick-Bag, can’t I get a statement for my review?
<Monkey> Yeah, “I’ll eat you alive if you don’t visit more sponsors.”
That was the end of that.
Seriously, I did try to get in touch with customer support, but both AOL and MSIE refuse to connect to the site. In the end I guess that’s a good thing. So, let me simplify and give a condensed listing of the…
Pros and Cons
Pros
~Might win a stuffed monkey.
~If you don’t read the fine-print you may think you’ll win something
~Well-designed site
~Great stock buy, must make a ton of money in advertising
~Allegedly displays canceled checks
Cons
~The odds of winning anything (even the single coordinate prizes) are at least 1:100,000, much higher for double coordinates and about 1:3000 for the occasional bonus round.
~Don’t pay up on the stuffed monkeys
~Annoying monkey—seriously deters traffic
~Same ad all the time, only one sponsor
Perhaps this will help you reach a decision not to go to this site. But you never know, some people are gluttons for punishment. If you’ll excuse me now I need to go play a new game called “Kill the Monkey.”
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
lovdbyGod7
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Member: David Dinkins
Location: Rolla, Missouri
Reviews written: 139
Trusted by: 307 members
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