Snake oil

[MrMobodies]

My wife’s uncle sold “mysterious health devices” like that in the 1990s until he was prosecuted. He died of stomach cancer last year. Someone said on Facebook that it was karma for all the harm he caused by selling lies and caused a massive flame war and now half her family aren’t talking to each other. Which is great because 50% less family events for me to get dragged to 

Nice joke.
"Mysterious health devices".
No longer mysterious as to what they did.

After pointing out the obvious, I fed her that big Agro was adding C6H12O6 into our food.

That one is more of a serious matter!

She'd may find aluminium pots and pans for cooking in but most now have non stick coatings.

[helius]

C6H12O6 is the formula for glucose or fructose.

[gildasd]

C6H12O6 is the formula for glucose or fructose.

Yup. That was the joke. I am a naughty brother.

[Specmaster]

On the subject of "Snake Oil" take at this then, type this in to the search bar on eBay "45 RPM Record Adapter Turntable Spindle(AT001". That's shining example of snake oil being applied and then at the sellers other items for sale 

[McBryce]

I may be getting different results as you don't specifiy which ebay, but I couldn't find any "snake oiling" in any of the offers for this device. Tell us more.

McBryce.

[vk6zgo]

On the subject of "Snake Oil" take at this then, type this in to the search bar on eBay "45 RPM Record Adapter Turntable Spindle(AT001". That's shining example of snake oil being applied and then at the sellers other items for sale 

Back in the day, some 45 rpm discs had a very large hole in the centre.
It seems some record changers specially made for that speed had large diameter spindles (perhaps, juke boxes).
To use such discs with a normal spindle, two types of plastic adapters were made .

One type was pushed into the large hole, presenting a small hole to the small spindle, whereas the other one
slid over the spindle, & the disc was played in the intended manner.

[Specmaster]

This is correct, the large hole is designed to fit jukeboxes and all 45RPM single records came with a breakout centre section to enable the same record to played in a jukebox or the far more common standard record player which only had a small spindle. Point of my post was that all record players of all makes all came with standard sized spindles and all records were made to fit either standard players or jukeboxes and yet that seller on eBay is trying make believe that each maker of record players required different sized adaptors to convert ex jukebox records to be played on their record players.

The same also applies to the power leads the same seller is selling, even when the equipment in question uses a standard figure 8 or IEC C13 type of plugs

[glarsson]

Many ebay sellers have multiple ebay items for the same "generic" product with the only difference being added brand names. It must be some form of search engine optimization. It's stupid and irritating but can probably not be called snake oil.

Also, the adapters are needed when you want to play a 45 with the big hole on a old record player that plays a sequence of records. You stack the records on a long center pin and the records drop down one at a time. The center adapters delivered with most record players don't work for this type of player.

[Richard Crowley]

On the subject of "Snake Oil" take at this then, type this in to the search bar on eBay "45 RPM Record Adapter Turntable Spindle(AT001". That's shining example of snake oil being applied and then at the sellers other items for sale 

That is ordinary Ebay description "coverage".  So that buyers who are unfamiliar with the generic nature of the product will still find the listing if they include a particular brand-name in their search.  It is quite clear that all the listings are for exactly the same product but with different brand names to allow buyers to find them.  That is a very common practice on Ebay in all sorts of products.  Nothing "snake-oilish" about it.

It is very similar to people selling test equipment to identify a piece as "Hewlett-Packard HP Agilent Keysight"  Clearly no piece of gear is labeled with more than one of these company names.  But the description is "overloaded" (a programming term) to attract searchers for any one of the brand names.

Ebay has many quirks that bug me.  Much worse than this is when you find 20 listings for exactly the same product at the same price and the same description from the same seller.  I don't see any reason for this except perhaps to catch more buyers.  In my view, it just clutters up the search results and makes you scroll through pages and pages of extra listings to find what you are seeking.

[Specmaster]

It is very similar to people selling test equipment to identify a piece as "Hewlett-Packard HP Agilent Keysight"  Clearly no piece of gear is labeled with more than one of these company names.  But the description is "overloaded" (a programming term) to attract searchers for any one of the brand names.

Maybe we are coming at this from 2 different directions here. In the case of the example you give above, I'm very happy with that description, since HP changed to Agilent and then to Keysight and this is a way of informing people that equipment carrying any of these brand names is a good piece of equipment and embraces all the goodness of the original Hewlett-Packard brand and image.

The eBay listing for those record adaptors, to me at least, suggests to people that an adaptor that mentions Aiwa, will not work satisfactorily on a record made Garrard, BSR, Goodmans, Akai, B&O, Philips, Teac, etc which is utter rubbish.

I sell items on eBay myself and I have never had eBay take it upon themselves to alter my heading and or the description of what I sell which leads me to conclude that the entries have been produced by the seller themselves.

[Richard Crowley]

The eBay listing for those record adaptors, to me at least, suggests to people that an adaptor that mentions Aiwa, will not work satisfactorily on a record made Garrard, BSR, Goodmans, Akai, B&O, Philips, Teac, etc which is utter rubbish.

Of course it is utter rubbish.  Which is why I don't think anyone, the seller or the potential buyers are taking it that way.

I sell items on eBay myself and I have never had eBay take it upon themselves to alter my heading and or the description of what I sell which leads me to conclude that the entries have been produced by the seller themselves.

I wasn't suggesting that eBay changes anything.  It is clear that the sellers themselves are writing those descriptions.  As you say, our perceptions of the intent are clearly quite different.

[McBryce]

The sellers add brands to the heading themselves to let lesser experts know that it will work with their device. You often see it with generic USB chargers, where the same seller will have multiple items with branded headers such as "Samsung compatible charger", "Asus compatible Charger" etc. Even though they are all the same item. They are not suggesting that the different devices need different chargers, just giving the buyer that warm fuzzy feeling that they ordered the right device.

McBryce.

[Specmaster]

The sellers add brands to the heading themselves to let lesser experts know that it will work with their device. You often see it with generic USB chargers, where the same seller will have multiple items with branded headers such as "Samsung compatible charger", "Asus compatible Charger" etc. Even though they are all the same item. They are not suggesting that the different devices need different chargers, just giving the buyer that warm fuzzy feeling that they ordered the right device.

McBryce.

Much clearer and less confusing to simply to state that the adaptor fits all records with large hole and works with any record player, including autochanger. Job done.

[Pluscrafter]

He is litteraly sell snake oil

[helius]

Interesting video! Reminds me of Szasz.
However, I think many of his points are self-defeating. He over-simplifies psychiatry by ignoring different clinical traditions (analysis, Rogerian, CBT, etc).
There's also a kind of "whataboutism" in criticizing the DSM to deflect attention from some of the claims that Quackwatch focuses on made by naturopaths, chiropractors, and so forth. The Quackwatch site is primarily directed at warning people about dangerous "alternative medicine" claims, not innocuous things like vitamins and fish oils.

[Buriedcode]

That video, he' seems to think EPA and DHA are somehow theraputic when there is little evidence that supplementing ones diet with either has any benefit whatsoever.

https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/fake-news-about-fish-oil/
https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/no-benefit-from-fish-oil/

Then compares that with.. psychiatry.  I don't think anyone claims that psychiatry is a solid science, but it does strive to do better.  There are many dodgy theories that need to die, and often there are theories du-jour that turn out to be complete bunk.  Honestly, it sounds like he just doesn't like psychiatry, and tries to compare it to well grounded medicine, whilst at the same time promoting oil supplements that aren't snake oil, but are in the same vein as vitamin and mineral supplements (= expensive wee wee).

I completely agree with helius: picking apart the DSM which has undergone quite radical changes in response to evidence in recent years doesn't compare to actual quackery like chiropractors.

Often there isn't some nice dividing line between "solid science" and quackery.  Just look at how integrative medicine tries to adopt "diet and exercise" to give it some form of legitimacy: so any criticisms can be countered with "so you say diet and exercise aren't important for health!?" whilst simultaneously promoting homeopathy, "energy healing" and all that crap.   Or claiming that their treatment helps via placebo effects (that don't have any therapeutic value).  It's becoming more difficult to distinguish fact from fake news these days, journalists and even medical doctors can fall prey.

[GreenHW_GUY]

does this count as Snake Oil see attach, the source say it is taken in Australia

[vk6zgo]

does this count as Snake Oil see attach, the source say it is taken in Australia

if our slithery friend has passed away in there, we may find some very cheap, strong smelling Elecronics on eBay

[LapTop006]

does this count as Snake Oil see attach, the source say it is taken in Australia

It's Brazil, on the full image which this is a crop from you can see a label identifying the Brazilian telco whose rack it is.

[Cerebus]

if our slithery friend has passed away in there, we may find some very cheap, strong smelling Elecronics on eBay

Sadly for those of us with TEA tendencies there won't be any cheap gear going. To me it looks like it's near the end of shedding its skin. I would imagine that shucking off one's whole skin is an exhausting process and, poikilotherm that it is, it's found somewhere nice and warm for a quick kip to recoup its strength before finishing the job. At very first glance I thought that the shed skin was one of those knitted braidings used to bundle cables together.

Looks like a comms rack to me, particularly it looks like one of those that tends to turn up with a hodge-podge of different kit at a point-of-presence which, especially with there being a photo of it, suggests that some engineer on a call out for a fault or an install got a big surprise.

[Cyberdragon]

Is that a danger noodle or a harmless noodle? (Given it's aussie I'm guessing deadly noodle)

[bd139]

That’s clearly a lesser spotted fibre munching noodle.

[Urs42]

You need to buy some dell servers to feed the snake...

[StillTrying]

At very first glance I thought that the shed skin was one of those knitted braidings used to bundle cables together.

So did I. I wonder if it thinks some of the other cables are sleeping snakes.

[CJay]

That’s clearly a lesser spotted fibre munching noodle.

Deadly to bandwidth and wetware.