Nostr Web Client

DO NOT GET SCAMMED: A cautionary tale

When you buy and sell stuff using nostr and nostr-based apps, make sure you are not getting scammed. Personal experience story time below.

Sites can pick up market listing notes and show them in their website and put a "buy now" button but the payment doesn't actually go to the seller. It goes somewhere else, who knows where.

I had this happen to me. A customer messaged me and said they bought my hand knit nostr beanie hat on a site and sent me the LN invoice that they paid. It shows that the invoice is paid, but it doesn't go to my wallet. I did not get paid.

As someone who has been in the community a long time, I know that the buyer-seller relationshiop is precarious and based in trust. In the moment, I believe the buyer and give the benefit of the doubt that something is wrong with the site. I reach out to the site owner to find out what's happening because the site is absolutely unusable for me. I see my items listed on their website and have absolutely no way to removing them. I worry that someone else will come across a hat that they like and they hit buy, only to send their money to someone else.

The site owner said they will compensate me for this mishap. As a show of good faith, I shipped the hat to the customer so that he would not sour to the idea of buying on nostr. Imagine if you were this customer who paid 107k sats and ended up with no product? He would likely never buy anything from any of us again.

At the time of writing, it still hasn't been resolved between me and the site. They have not paid me like they said they would but I'm giving some grace since it is a holiday weekend.

I had to talk about it now though. It has been a cloud over me the last few days. I hope that holiday shopping on nostr will be very successful for all sellers this year so I felt responsible for putting this message out so that we can continue to build confidence is the nostr marketplace.

The moral of the story:

When you buy on nostr, make sure you are in touch with the seller and that you are paying the seller. Do your due diligence.

I would have been well within my rights to say "too bad so sad. I didn't get paid. you got scammed by that site. bye." If you were a buyer and didn't do your due diligence to check that your money is going to the right place, you may not get what you paid for and that is perfectly reasonable within the realm of commerce on nostr.

If you have read this far, please share/boost this post. I don't want any one, buyer or seller, to get scammed shopping on nostr.

#nostrmarketplace #buywithbitcoin #shopnostr

CR45H 0V3RR1D3 1mo ago 💬 1

That sucks and I feel for both of you, especially you. As the seller of a product you have a certain level of responsibility to ensure the buyer understands what he/she’s purchasing and to offer an easy and verified way to transact.

Unfortunately, when the buyer doesn’t do their homework, things like this happen and even though you have done your part, you still feel somewhat responsible and that is understandable.

However, I do find it a bit unreasonable for the buyer who doesn’t do any due diligence, to try and lay all of the responsibility on the seller.

I would say within the next year you should be able to stop using websites and just sell your product through the Nostr protocol, there are enough safeguards already in place, on top of common sense, to ensure something like this doesn’t happen here.

I would suggest writing in your bio, which website was selling your stuff and not compensating you for it, with a nice be DANGER written above it.

That should hopefully ward off any other possible users of that website that may find themselves on the losing end of a transaction.

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Discussion

karo 1mo ago 💬 2

oh absolutely. this is a huge lesson for me. I am planning to make changes like what you mentioned so that this never happens to me again. I hope all other sellers can learn from what happened also.

campusalot 1mo ago 💬 1

what about the writing their website in the bio part tho. or do you prefer to signal that you will remain silent and confidential, even in cases of abuse, so you dont lose imaginary friends you dont have in the first place?

campusalot 1mo ago

no pressure, just saying, blanking that suggestion was a choice, too

karo 1mo ago 💬 1

I'm not going to name and shame when they're still in attempt to make things right.

Whether or not this site was dishonest, it doesn't negate the message that buyers need to be careful of where and who they buy from.

Also, I'm not concerned about losing imaginary friends when I have real ones. What a weird thing to say.

campusalot 1mo ago 💬 1

it is not a weird thing to say

any maker or merchant or business is constantly in the arena of imaginary friends, imaginary customers

example: if i knit a "fuck trump" hat, who could i lose as a customer who hasnt even arrived yet to my shop. do i want to lose them? do i not care? will the customers i already have who hate trump buy more?

all speculation. all imaginary

a little strange you dont know that

campusalot 1mo ago

what if an imaginary friend, possible future friend, who raises wonderful sheep would offload incredible roving to you very cheap

unless they find out you are not christian first

that's all im saying

if you believe this website is trying to make it right, cool

maybe some customers out here are into naive knitters