[SGVLUG] MS kickbacks attempt power grab from Google

[matti]

Holy smokes!

Microsoft is dumping some seriously $ to
battle google....

purchasers can get UPTO $750 kick back
from Microsoft!! (upto $250 per online
session at ebay, and 3 times.. they
have a rate limiter on this, so you have
to wait between sessions.)

Most places the kickback is only 2-4%, 
however, with ebay there's a kickback
potential of %35 (try different search
terms of a particular product on ms
live search and look for the ebay 
announcements.)

Hmmm... I wonder how many people will try 
to game this system, and use google anyways
after this is done.

This is going to be a very interesting
story.

note, ms appears to at times suffer
as i've seen some "page temporarily 
not available error messages."

best
matti



references:

http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?t=846962

http://pages.ebay.com/cashbackoffer/terms.html

[..]
The Cashback Rewards that you are eligible to obtain from Microsoft will be disclosed to you on www.eBay.com and will be equal to a percentage of the final sale price of the first item purchased during an Online Session (excluding shipping and handling fees, insurance fees and other such fees), for up to a maximum of $250.00 per Online Session. Cashback Rewards will be available in your Program account to transfer to your PayPal account approximately sixty (60) days of the date on which you complete your purchase on eBay.com. You must have a PayPal account in order to receive Cashback Rewards for purchases on www.eBay.com. You may not redeem any Cashback Rewards until you have earned a total of $5.00 in Cashback Rewards;

[..]
# After you complete an eligible purchase, before redeeming your Cashback Rewards, you must go to http://cashbackaccount.search.live.com/cashback/welcome.aspx and set up a Program account by providing all of the required information (or, if you already have an account, confirm your membership status);

# You may receive Cashback Rewards for up to a maximum of three (3) Online Sessions per account on www.ebay.com. Once you have completed three (3) Online Sessions under any eBay.com account, you will no longer be eligible to receive Cashback Rewards for purchases made under such eBay.com account. If you have exceeded the limit of permitted Cashback Rewards, eBay will notify you on the purchase review page of the “Buy-It-Now” transaction process. Please review the purchase review page carefully before you “commit to buy”. Cashback Rewards can not be transferred or applied to multiple eBay.com accounts;