Question Regarding Closure

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Posted: Fri Dec 18, 2009 3:41 pm

I have been lurking here on and off since the hilarious segment on This American Life aired in the US. I took the plunge about 6 weeks ago and my first scam is faring a little better than I thought it would. I think I am going to get some trophies- would like to try a safari but I don't think my lad has the $$ to do it- but I am going to try to keep him tied up regardless.

However all good things will come to an end and I forsee that by early January this will probably be over. I have read a few things on other sites about burning (is this the proper term for telling the lad what happened to him? that he got his ass baited off...) or just letting the thing die when he refuses to do one more silly thing without money showing up (not sure what that is called in the lingo of the baiting world).

In general what are the pluses of minuses of burning vs. leaving the lad wondering "what in the hell?"

I know I would get a great deal of personal satisfaction from burning him- but something nags at me and says that this would not be a good thing to do.

Sorry for the long windedness- just wanted some thoughts from vets or baiters with more experience than me (that would be anyone who has completed one bait)

Posted: Fri Dec 18, 2009 3:48 pm

It would seem to me that it would be a bad idea.. the idea is to try NOT to educate the lads,

If your lad suddenly stops emailing just shrug your shoulders and get yourself another playmate !

Posted: Fri Dec 18, 2009 3:52 pm

^^

You might burn the lad, and feel some satisfaction from it. One advantage might be that you make him more cautious, and he might shy off from real victims who seem a little strange to him.

On the other hand, by burning him you educate him. You increase his awareness of "jokers". (The lads are reluctant to believe in baiters who spend time and money for no apparent reward.) He may also modify his behavior, selecting real victims more carefully, and shying away from baiters who would waste his time and resources, keeping him from scamming real victims.

It's a subjective thing, but many baiters choose NOT to burn a lad at bait's end. Instead they try to appear as a real victim who is intellectually or financially unable to comply with the lad's demands for money. I'm a member of this group, except in unusual circumstances.

Baiting Guru Joined: 03 May 2007 Posts: 18313

My opinion is that burning them is probably more satisfying for the baiter in that you get a few minutes of "ha ha, got you!" but this is at the cost of educating them, so I don't do it.

Additional reasons why I don't think we should burn lads:

If you used any tools from here, they are now implicated as fake. Any de-educating you do while baiting is now worthless as he knows it was all a game.

Plus, lads come back! After you bait a lad and are sure it's over they very often have a way of coming back to you out of the blue some day. I have a lad that I baited for two years continuously.
I dropped contact with him out of boredom about six months ago but didn't burn him. Now, he's emailing me again regularly with a new script, new story, but completely referencing my character and fake ministry from my previous bait. He obviously bought it all hook, line and sinker. (and some of it is pure nonsense and purposeful de-education).

Baiting Guru Joined: 31 Jan 2007 Posts: 12237

+1 for Ima's post.

Burning them is a temporary joy that fades quickly, but a lifetime of the lad wondering "what could have been", is priceless.

Posted: Fri Dec 18, 2009 4:50 pm

As Ima said, you don't really get much out of the "gotcha" at the end of the bait. You know you're baiting the lad, and the longer you can keep him going, the more satisfaction you should get just from stringing him along. When the bait dies, no matter how it dies, just leave him wondering what he did wrong to mess up his scam.

Posted: Fri Dec 18, 2009 5:01 pm

Burning is not the way to go. If and when you are sure the bait is done, fire off a "it's all your fault" mail blaming all the failures on him and be done with him.

You can then rebait him with a new character. You will have an advantage knowing how he operates.

Posted: Fri Dec 18, 2009 5:03 pm

I'm with Ima. Lads come back and in my experience it happens frequently. I love getting a returnee as I can carry on where we left off without having to do all the boring stuff again.

Posted: Fri Dec 18, 2009 5:03 pm

I agree with all above posters "never burn"!!!!! As aid many lads come back to you.I got few lads who wana reward me for my wasted time now they found a "real" partner,its ofcourse another scam,and if he was interesting enough i folow him in his new script and play with him again its like they love to be tortured by us...if you burn them you lose that option and he will maybe smarten up and thats something we really dont wana happen.

Posted: Fri Dec 18, 2009 5:46 pm

I'm with Ima, too.

Rather than burn them, I prefer to let them feel that other lovely burning sensation: a dolla chop. I get the satisfaction of a burn knowing that they are feeling genuine pain -- thousands of dollars they thought was finally just about to land into their bank accounts was suddenly all stolen by another despicable lad. So, it is kind of a win-win thing. Twisted Evil

Posted: Fri Dec 18, 2009 7:18 pm

I have had several lads who dropped me and then in a month or longer
came back for more fun.

Smile

Posted: Fri Dec 18, 2009 8:05 pm

Just back up for air from my other job. This is good feedback I read a couple of baits where the baiter said "Idiot blah blah" and even though there was some pull inside me to do it- it did not seem to be "right". I had never considered the educational part of the issue- which I think is the paramount reason.

Plus I do agree that a life time of "what the hell?" is probably worth more than 20 seconds of satisfaction of watching the burn.

Many thanks and thanks to those who have given some pointers on my virgin/first time bait. Members keep telling me "you will never forget your first" and I hope it is true.

Thanks again

Skeeter

Posted: Fri Dec 18, 2009 11:30 pm

'Skeeter'

You fit right in here, and welcome!

I think your intincts are right, and agree with everyone above.

Ahh...the Agony and the Ecstasy of baiting. Very Happy

The Ecstasy: 10 seconds of satisfaction, and knowing why.....

The Agony: 10 months of no satisfaction, and not knowing why..... Twisted Evil

I never burn, and 'I never hold'. Very Happy

Posted: Sat Dec 19, 2009 4:14 am

I had a lad called Joel. He still talks to me from time to time. I pretty much screwed him over with some other baiters months, I think even a year ago. I never burned him, but he found out I was a baiter using google. He still talks to me though. Laughing

He thinks we get money for doing this, especially for arrests. He's a strange bloke.

Posted: Sat Dec 19, 2009 10:56 pm

Regarding the returning lad - I've recently had a lad get in to a bait that he believed with all of his heart that was truly real and that he was going to be essentially set for life, acting as a contract man over in Nigeria for my character. He was a little too reluctant to do much of anything but write very long winded emails about how it was just too much effort.
I introduced a fake lad, had his dolla chopped twice, and he dropped me out of sheer frustration.

After contacting him a week later with a different character, he's given me 4 trophy pics with signs, filled out over 40 pages in forms, and has been to S3cur3 sh13ld not twice, not four times, but 7 times and has answered hundreds of questions.

It's amazing how much agony you can serve up to your lad when he suddenly realizes that it's not good to be lazy. You'll find him much more open to suggestions and lots more if you establish this in him.

So, burning, in my opinion, is counter-productive. The name of the game is to waste as much of their time as possible, and I believe that if you create a huge investiment effect with them by way of doing it with multiple characters, you leave him open to wasting much, much, much more time in the future.

Posted: Sun Dec 20, 2009 6:11 pm

After stupidly "burning" my first bait, my mentor "whupped me upside da haid a good one!" Now I work into the bait that I have been adopted by an Indian tribe and when the bait finally comes to its inevitable end, the "medicine man" of the tribe sends the "dreaded rattlesnake curse" to the lad. The lads so far don't write back to the shaman to get the curse lifted, but based on the culture that I'm dealing with, I presume the lad does head to the local "ju-ju man" to spend some of his ill-gotten gains on an amulet or two, thus aiding the local economy. It's good to spread the wealth around!

Posted: Mon Dec 21, 2009 9:13 pm

Thanks to all. I just send in my paypal $$$ for a premium membership figured I could use all the help I could get!

Baiting Guru Joined: 31 Jan 2007 Posts: 12237

^^

Do you have a mentor? I have a slot open.

Edit: Sorted.

Posted: Tue Dec 22, 2009 7:49 pm

No but I damned sure need one LOL. You can see my rookie mistakes writ large on the publish your baits- under "Waking the Line"

If I could pick your brain and get some advice and perhaps not have to reinvent a bunch of wheels that would be great.

Thanks Pastor!

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