The worst of these offers, notably the SMS ones, are scams by any definition and are only defended by people making money off of them or the typical forum "devil's advocate" that in his/her ignorance find these practices to somehow be defensible. The author gives very good examples in the article e.g. the IQ test. It is an affront to all that is ethical and fair in market practices that these kinds of businesses (the scam offers themselves) are even allowed to exist at all.
Fair points and perhaps I should have refrained from commenting until I had clearer understanding of the types of offers this article is referring to. The more I've read about some of the offers (sms in particular) in the article and in the HN comments, I realize I spoke too soon.
