warning: acid jones - etsy scam

Considering they joined etsy less than a month ago I would be very wary of that. And what an odd place to contact someone about a video. I haven't heard of them before, but I would definitely stay away. Sounds super sketchy.

 

It is a scam

 

Yep I got that too!
And if you've never heard of Marina Joyce, she's a youtuber that started acting strange in videos and people started saying she had been kidnapped or was abused in her home. Now people are saying she has schizophrenia.

I have no idea if she is actually involved with acid jones or if they are using her name to look more legit.

 

I literally came back to this forum to see if anyone posted about this! I also got the same message from her, sounded like total bullcrap. This is the message I got in case you guys are curious:

 

I honestly think this is a scam, it's better to not send anything unless there's proof that they will definitely return the doll and give the money to you. It's too good to be true, and it's better to be safe than sorry.

 

Haha, I got this message, too, and immediately deleted it based solely off the message title alone. Didn't even bother to read the body because it is obvious spam (clearly in the same vein as the Nigerian prince money scams).

 

I got it too. It's 100% a scam. The obvious red flags are that they're not fully saying what they're doing and they use Marina Joyce as a name drop without actually explaining who she is or anything. Also they ask you to send your dolls which should be a huge robot yelling "Danger! Danger!" I posted it on tumblr to warn people and several others have said they received the same thing. Please use common sense. No one should be asking you to send your ENTIRE DOLL for a video. Especially not someone named "Acid Jones"

 

I received it too, it's obviously a scam. I didn't even bother replying, just laughed it off because it's so fishy. I wonder if this person is looking through reviews on BJD items to find potential victims though, since I don't have an etsy store to connect me to the hobby on that site.

 

That is so sketchy. I wonder if there is a way to report them on Etsy? The message doesn't really have anything to do with Etsy, so maybe it would be possible to report them. I am sure you can just block them, but I am wondering if there is a way to prevent others from falling for this.

 

It's interesting that their name is Acid Jones but their etsy url is quietsprout, like Acid Jones is such a peculiar name to choose as a pseudonym!

After a little more digging I uncovered a brand new dA page under the same name opened about a month ago - I wonder if they're planning to start contacting people there too?

There is an artist on Instagram called quietsprout, but I suspect it's a coincidence as they don't seem to have any connection at all to BJDs (not that this means they can't be involved, just that I feel it's highly unlikely) and doesn't seem to be terribly active, but has been around a fair old while by the looks of things.

 

I got a message as well, but mine was worded differently with a name, location, an actual phone number and Instagram accounts listed. She also mentioned Marina Joyce as well as Miranda Sings, but says she "hasn't been in a video yet". In mine, she was asking me to send clothes for her to model. I replied and said my clothes are doll clothes, not human, thanks anyway, and she replied, saying she had a doll. I told her I prefer to handle everything in my shop by myself, and she said ok and thanked me. So it is a real person replying to the messages, but I also felt it was super fishy.

EDIT: I looked at both Instagram accounts, and they are both mostly drawings and selfies. In the description, she says she's 14. Looks accurate by the photos. I traced the phone number, it is from the area she told me, listed under a man's name, which very well could be her dad. I think this could be a scammer, but could also be a young teenager trying to make a name for herself in a not so safe way. I will say, she was very polite and friendly in her messages, but I would still not feel comfortable sending my things to a complete stranger.

EDIT EDIT: But I do find it amusing that she's promising all you guys so much cash, but told me "Right now, I can't afford to purchase things, but if you wanted, you could send me a package of one or a few items and I'd return them after I was done modeling."

 

I wouldn't put it past a teenager to try a scam. It could very well just be one dumb teenager hoping she can get another dumb teenager to send her a doll for free. It would certainly go with the total lack of creativity in the scam setup.

 

If this is indeed a 14 year old, it does not make me trust them any more about the transaction and the doll being in safe hands (even though I started collecting at 14).

The whole thing is even weirder now.
If it's a scammer trying to pass as a teenage girl, do they really think we'd be more trusting towards a kid in a deal involving hundreds of dollars???

And if it's just a kid, then clearly they're lying about a lot of things (already having connections to two somewhat big youtubers in different countries, even though she never made a youtube video) and went through quite a bit of trouble to contact that many people. There's being young and naive, then there's thinking people are completely stupid!

 

Acid Jones is climbing in your window, he's snatching your dolls up trying to steal them so you better hide your kid delfs, hide your Williams and hide your Heliots because he's stealing everybody out here!

 

I saw this on FB too.

 

Yeah, I really have no idea, just saying that the info she gave me in the message does check out (other than the guy's name linked to the phone number not being the name she gave me) so it very well could be a young teen trying to make it big. Maybe one of the big YouTubers followed her on Twitter or something, and that counts as "a connection" to her? (Not gonna lie, when I got a postcard from the Free Willy kid, that felt pretty big and important to me as a preteen. XD ) I do get the feeling that even if she does mean well, it won't end well. I mean, honestly, if you can't afford to buy anything in my shop, you definitely can't afford to ship a full BJD back to someone, much less pay them! haha

But of course, there have been teen scammers in the hobby before, or it could be some dude using his family member/friends' daughter's Instagram to scam people. Which if that's the case, is not only a scam but also totally creepy that he's using this girl's photos and pretending to be her.

 

I would say anything offering you that much money to do something that sketchy ($5-20 per item, paid for 5,000 views, etc.) is probably something to keep away from.

 

Hmm I was followed by an Acid Jones on Etsy recently. I'm not selling anything on there yet so I didn't think anything of it (I'm followed by loads of people wanting to promote their stores so nothing new there), but I'll certainly keep my eye out for anything fishy like that and raise it as an issue if it becomes one.

I would certainly make Etsy aware of any messages you're getting as it will hinder them as a safe environment to sell/buy from.

 

Has anyone reported this obviously false seller to Etsy? Seems to me it'd be a good idea to nip this in the bud before somebody actually is foolish enough to fall for the scam.