Is agora loaded with scammers like pandora is, or is it relatively legit?
Agora question
Is agora loaded with scammers like pandora is, or is it relatively legit?
[2 Points] LongLiveThe_King:
[2 Points] urgetochimein:
TL;DR: Raw is not necc bad, chaos is opportunity
I got on there a few weeks ago when BMR went into shutdown, following Warbeast (who, as it turned out, was taking a break from selling what I wanted). It was so, so bare over there- very few vendors, and the ones I was looking at had little to no transaction history. No one did. The forums were mostly filled with vendors complaining that they could not set up their accounts (free accounts were offered to BMR refugees, but none of the links worked), and the whole thing was buggy as hell.
The site is entitled "Agora beta" and it is very, very beta. Bugs all over the place, from the annoying (shipping was always expressed in BTC, but with the dollar amount- so, shipping something small would cost 4btc instead of the correct 4 dollars. My first order was like $65 with $1500 shipping. Vendors had to zero shipping cost and tack the price on to the product or no one would buy.)to the inconvenient (sorting sucks, there was no searching listings) to the potentially crippling (on my first order the "detail" button went to a 404, so I could not finalize the order, even though I had received stuff I was really happy with.) The number of vendors is growing quickly but is still comically low- BMR was a mid-sized supermarket in a nice part of Los Angeles, Agora is a grocery store in 1972 Brataslava. Luckily, there was a single meth vendor (kind of like the one brand of planned economy bread) but if I wanted, say, 4-MEC I would have been out of luck.
With that said, the newness makes it awesome, and at risk of blowing up my spot I think everyone should go there.
Why? As a new market it is ripe for opportunity. Yes, I know it is also right for scamming, but don't be an idiot (PGP everything, keep 0BTC in your site wallet or just enough to make the purchase, never ever FE, etc) and you will not lose anything, but the right now potential makes it so worth it.
Since it is so new, all of the vendors have little to no feedback. As a result, they really want to please the first wave of customers. Even if they plan on scamming big later they still need to build up a rep now, so the service is the best you will ever experience, anywhere. Shipping is fast, communications are spot on, weight is obscenely heavy. Bad feedback right at the beginning will totally screw whatever the vendor has planned, so they will do whatever they can to avoid it.
Beyond simple buying, this is also an excellent opportunity to get a good, direct relationship with a vendor. They got nothing but time, so communicate all you need to. It helps build trust- remember, the vendors are spooked of the new market too, (they have a lot more to lose than you) and if they do end up scamming it will be the suckers further down the line, not you. When the market goes down (and they all do) you can have a contact to deal with directly. Also, they will be much more likely to give you extras to pump up the word of mouth.
The market is buggy, and the admin is barely there- took three days for the broken "details" button/impossibility to finalize bug to be acknowledged, and from what I see on the forums this is common. However, this problem is also an opportunity, as the market awarded me .2btc for reporting a bug. (seems like the vendor got a bonus, too.) This seems like a great opportunity- even if you are not looking to buy, do some rigorous QA and get paid for it.
All in all I think it is a pretty great market, and the rapid growth that is happening right now provides a lot of interesting opportunities.
Cover your ass and be safe, (it amazes me that this needs to be said- you are buying illegal drugs from drug dealers. You are dealing directly with an industry where torture, murder, and mayhem is an accepted part of the culture, and everyone is tainted, and everyone has some blood on their hands. Personally, I am ok with this, as life is kind of cheap most everywhere and everything you consume or use has a body count. The gas in your car, the chips in your phone, the plastics in your everything are all awash in the blood of the innocent, a step or two further removed than the bodies that prop up your bag of coke but still very there. Everyone is guilty, but mild cognitive dissonance gets you through the day. It always amuses me when people online condemn anyone for being a hypocrite, because I never know if they are really lacking self-awareness or are being subtly, archly ironic. Also, you are doing these crimes in such a way that LEO - some of the laziest people I have ever met- do not even have to get out of their chairs to build a case against you. Short of doing deals on a cops desk as he watches there is no easier way to give them all they need to bust you.) If you do not PGP, tumble, and practice paranoia at all times you SHOULD be busted.
EDIT: Line breaks- I am new here
[1 Points] None:
[deleted]
[1 Points] mortenxl:
Just got an invite for Agora Beta, know nothing about this market, and with SR2 Down i got an invitation in my forum inbox. At seems to load faster, and is more robust that SR2. But there is precious little infomationabout it online. Think i recognise a few vendors, but none i have used personally. Would have hoped there was a thread on it though.
Do you not have any trusted vendors?
Even if a site is filled with scammers, if you can verify that a vendor is one you trust then you can feel free to use them.