points2shop directions

Sandboxie pics

2009-04-01T20:18:00.000-07:00

Here is the desktop pic

Here is the control page

Here is the web browser pic...

The pic comment says "These signs ([#]) mean that you are on the sandboxie web browser.

Keeping away the telemarketer phone calls

2009-04-01T19:21:00.000-07:00

Brring is a free service for US residents which gives you a private, local second phone number to use in place of your primary phone. Any calls to this number forward to your primary phone, but only after playing a short advertisement (10 seconds or less). This short ad will deter approximately 90% of telemarketers and they will hang up before the call comes through and rings on your phone.

It's not only free, you actually make money... if they pay you, that is.
Brring pays its users for referring new members and for profiling their friends to specify what types of ads they would like to hear (earnings details). Although they had previously paid money for each call ($1 for each of the first 10 calls, $.05 per call after that), they have discontinued these earnings due to funding issues.

It behooves me to note that I have earned over $30 from Brring but I have not received a check yet. Do not use Brring with high hopes of getting paid, it is privately funded and for whatever reason they are collecting no money from their advertisers while their product is still in development stages. Conditions may improve in the future, no one knows for sure.

Using Brring
This guide assumes that you are using Brring as an alternative phone number to reduce annoying telemarketer calls while completing offers online, although if you want your friends to call your Brring number that's fine too!

First and foremost, after creating your new Brring account (sign up here), go to the "Earn More Rewards" page and select "Set ad playing rules." Move the ad frequency slider to "Always" to ensure that every caller hears an ad. If you skip this step, you are guaranteed to hear more telemarketing calls ringing your primary phone.

Your Brring number is ready to go! If you call it from your own phone, you can check your balance and record audio clips of your name and invite greeting. If the next paragraph interests you, you can upload the MP3 ringback tone by going to "My Ringback."

Icing on the cake for reducing the annoyance of telemarketer calls
Brring allows you to upload an MP3 file as a ringback tone which is played while Brring connects the caller to your phone. My suggestion if you want telemarketers to hang up right away is to use a busy signal! Where can you get an MP3 of a busy signal, you ask? I have one which you can download right here!

Results
Of the 220 calls I received to my Brring number in the first two months, approximately 25 of the callers stayed on the line long enough to make my phone ring. Of those 25, less than 10 stayed on the line long enough to make the phone ring a second time (because they heard my busy signal ringback tone). Of those 10, I answered about 5 because I wasn't sure if it was someone I knew or not. I earned $25 from calls (back when calls earned money) and another $10 at the time of writing from referrals. I cashed out over a month ago but have not received a check, so I am eagerly awaiting the day when Brring receives funding and moves their product out of the development stage.

National Do Not Call Registry

Many Americans, when considering how to stop telemarketers, think of the Do Not Call Registry (donotcall.gov). This is a great way to curb annoying calls from companies you've never heard of which seem to pull your number out of the ether (aka unsolicited calls).

However, when you're earning points online by completing offers, you are submitting your phone number directly to advertisers. You are soliciting their calls. Therefore, by agreeing to the terms of many of these offers, you are giving the advertiser express permission to use (and sometimes even distribute) your phone number. The calls directly relating to these offers are not bound by the Do Not Call list.

Here is a direct quote from the Terms of Use of one of the advertisers:

"By clicking on the Continue above I am requesting to be contacted by I Can Print Photos.com's offer sponsors and marketing partners regardless of any DNC List registration."
Thanks to Akari for finding this quote

It may still be a good idea and may deter some telemarketers, but if you sign a form stating that bees can't sting you, all the bureaucracy in the world can't protect you when you stir the hornet's nest.

If you have any alternative suggestions or would like to note your personal success or failure with any of these methods, please create an account with Blogger or log in with an existing Google account to post your comments!

Sandboxie

2009-04-01T19:06:00.000-07:00

Sandboxie is a safe way to install and uninstall programs on Points2Shop.

Download and installation walkthrough

The following guide is lengthy but the process is very easy once you've done it once or twice. Be sure to read everything the first time to avoid any confusion!

First, download Sandboxie from sandboxie.com and install it. You may need to restart your computer.
Open Internet Explorer as you usually would, not in sandbox mode yet. Most download offers do not credit if downloaded with Firefox and other browsers.
Log in to Points2Shop.
Close your browser; when you start it up again in the next step you will already be logged in to Points2Shop. Steps 2-4 are just for convenience if you will be completing multiple download offers in one sitting.
Pause your anti-virus and firewall protection. Some offers do not credit with these protections running.
Now, right-click your Internet Explorer shortcut and select "Run in Sandbox."

You may be asked which sandbox to run it in, choose "DefaultBox."
You will notice that the window title now has pound signs around it (i.e. [#] Internet Explorer [#]), this is the indication that the program is safely locked in a sandbox.
You may see notices about "Quick Recovery," recovery is the process of moving sandboxed files out to your computer (which is not what you want to do). Just click "Close."

Go to Points2Shop and search for a download offer. You might want to start with the downloads in high-paying free offers list or simply search "download."
Visit the advertiser and click the Download button. You generally do not need to provide any contact information for download offers.

If there is a bar at the top of the page mentioning ActiveX, click it and select the option to install the ActiveX control.
Otherwise you will be presented with a prompt to run or save the file, choose "Run."

Follow the installer's instructions and leave your browser window open as the program installs.

You may be presented with multiple additional offers, such as Weatherbug and the Yahoo Toolbar. You do not need to install these to receive credit, check for a Decline button or uncheck the option's checkbox.

The installer will notify you that the download is complete.
There may be a Finish or OK button, click it to close the installer. Otherwise the installer will close automatically.

Freeze offers will open a new browser window at this time. Be sure to go through each of the additional offers displayed here, you will probably want to click Skip until you get to the Freeze homepage.
If the software you downloaded was a browser toolbar, close all IE windows and open a new IE window (right click to run sandboxed), make sure you see the new toolbar.

Right-click the yellow Sandboxie tray icon, and in the DefaultBox menu select "Delete contents."
Click "Delete Sandbox" to close all programs running in the sandbox and delete all of the fake temporary files which were installed.
Your computer is now in the exact same state as it was when you started the process, no need to run uninstallers or spyware cleaners.
Go ahead and return to step 5 to try more download offers!

You do not need to clear your cookies because any cookies saved in your sandboxed browser have been deleted. Some people prefer to use Sandboxie for all the offers that they complete. It can be configured to automatically delete the contents of the sandbox whenever all the running sandboxed programs are closed, which can make it faster and more convenient than clearing the cookies separately.

Keep in mind that any changes made in a sadboxed program will be lost - so if you add a new bookmark or change browser settings, they will be lost along with browser history and cookies.

If you're wondering exactly what and how Sandboxie protects, check out sandboxie.com for more information.

Here is a variety of free download offers to get you started, nearly 30 download offers have credited for me so there are a lot more out there for you to find! 100 points is equal to $1.00 and you will need a Points2Shop account to complete these offers.

Total value of this list: 780 points ($7.8 USD)

Sort offers by: point value | number of approvals

240 download Nielsen/Netratings - Wave & Win Game
- Approved for: 132 users
- Your status:
120 download Nielsen NetRatings
- Approved for: 16 users
- Your status:
84 download Hotbar: Games (US,UK)
- Approved for: 6 users
- Your status:
60 download EZ Game Cheats
- Approved for: 13 users
- Your status:
60 download Hot Music Downloads
- Approved for: 9 users
- Your status:
60 download Music Video Downloads
- Approved for: 10 users
- Your status:
60 download Popular Screensavers
- Approved for: 10 users
- Your status:
60 download Smiley Central (INT'L)
- Approved for: 10 users
- Your status:
36 download Alot.com: Health and Fitness Tips
- Approved for: 48 users
- Your status:

CCleaner

2009-04-01T18:31:00.000-07:00

CCleaner is a simple tool for Windows which will clear your cookies (and other temporary/junk files) across your entire computer. It also has convenient options for cookies that you want to keep, which is especially useful for web sites like Points2Shop which keep you logged in.

Benefits

Easy to use and configure
Clears cookies from all browsers
Ability to preserve specific cookies

Shortcomings

Must close browser to clear cookies/cache
Slower than cookies-only cleaners
Windows-only

Visit ccleaner.com/download and click Alternative Download to get the free and safe program.
During the install you have the option to enable or disable desktop shortcuts, automatic updates, etc. The only important thing is to disable the Yahoo Toolbar checkbox.
Run CCleaner, you will see something like this:
First, let's configure the options, you will not need to do this every time.
Go to Options and find the Cookies page:
In the Cookies to delete column, select the names of any web sites that you use frequently (hold down the Ctrl key to select more than one). Points2Shop.com is a good choice.
Press the -> button between the two lists to move these sites to the Cookies to keep list. Now these specific cookies will be preserved.
Now click the Cleaner button and ensure that "Cookies" is checked under Internet Explorer. Firefox and other browsers will appear on the Applications tab, make sure their Cookies entries are checked as well.

I suggest checking Cookies, Download History, and Internet Cache.
If you use the browser a lot you probably do not want to check History or Saved Form Information.

Close your web browsers to ensure that everything can be cleaned.
Click the Run Cleaner button and wait for the CLEANING COMPLETE message.

Now you're ready to do another offer. You can leave CCleaner open if you're doing multiple offers and just follow steps 9 and 10 between offers. CCleaner will also clear other useless files from your computer to free up space. If you're interested in tinkering, you can change other options to remove even more junk, just make sure you know what each option means before changing it.

Clearing Cookies

2009-04-01T18:26:00.000-07:00

It isn't required but highly recommended, but every time you visit an advertiser's web site to complete an offer, tracking cookies are stored on your computer to allow the advertiser to tell you apart from other users, know which pages and offers to show you, and remember that an approval must be sent to Points2Shop.The problem is that a lot of offers use the same systems for displaying ads (think "eltpath" or "eversave"). When you hit one of these systems, if you haven't cleared your cookies they immediately think you are doing the previous offer that you just completed. This means that for the majority of the offers, you will not receive credit if you do not clear your cookies between offers.
In-Browser Settings
It is also possible to delete your cookies from within the browser itself, and this may be the only option if do not have a computer running Windows. This is, in my opinion, far inferior because it only deletes cookies in one browser and there is no way to specify which cookies to keep.

If you're using Firefox you can go to Tools then Clear Private Data and select Cookies and Cache. This will delete all of your cookies, so for any sites like Points2Shop which keep you logged in, you will need to log in again every time you clear the cookies in this manner.

Semi-automatic cookie and cache cleaning!
If you use Firefox and think it would be convenient to just close and restart your browser to clear your cookies and cache between offers, CookieCuller and in-browser settings to the rescue!

First, install CookieCuller using the instructions above.

In Firefox, go to Tools > Add-ons then select CookieCuller and click the Preferences button. Select the checkbox next to "Delete Unprotected Cookies on Startup" and then close the options and Add-ons windows.

Next, to enable cache deleting, go to Tools > Options > Privacy and then take a look at the Private Data section. Check "Always clear my private data when I close Firefox" and un-check "Ask me before clearing private data." Finally - this is important - click Settings and ensure that only the Cache option is checked (or if you want to clear other things as well that's up to you). Click OK a couple times to get back to Firefox.

Now you can just close the browser and open it again between offers!

If you want to get really slick, install the QuickRestart add-on which will restart Firefox and allow you to - once you have followed the steps above - do all this by clicking a toolbar icon or pressing Ctrl + Alt + R! After installing the addon, go to View > Toolbars > Customize and drag the Restart button wherever you want it.

A guide to Points2Shop

2009-03-30T21:38:00.000-07:00

O.K. I want to just clarify this website, that I have mentioned a few times... If you get to Silver Honour I will give you 100 points and if you get to Gold Honour I will give you 200 points. There is one requirement, that is, you have to sign up under me, chiman10... Also you can only have 1 ACCOUNT!! If you another account you will get banned, and they can trace your i.p. address if you change it!!

Points2Shop is a site that you do offers and earn free stuff...but there are many things that you can do, you dont just have to do offers, you can play games, get merits, join teams and then use those merits and win cash, and then every Wednesday there is a lotto, you get lotto tickets by commenting on offers, but you can only get 1 ticket, and if you spam the offer comments, you can get the lotto ticket taken away and/or you can get banned.

The most important thing you need to do is sign-up...here

1st lets start with the member page, this is after you sign up, there are many things there, but the most important items on this page are the quests and goals. You can also see your earnings over the past 2 weeks. You can also see what people have recentlly ordered.

2nd lets start with the offers...there are many different types, there are the free, paid/free trials (but for these offers you will no matter what need a credit card), daily surveys, "real surveys", and then recently approved offers. Once you click on one of those categories, you will see a bunch of offers, well I recommend you search for Arcamax and Quiz Rockets...They usually approve really quickly. With all the offers and mainly Arcamax and Quiz Rockets you will definitely get better results by making new emails on inbox.com or gmail.com.

3rd this is all about games, this is the most fun...there are 3 different types of games. The 3 games are: Racing, Shooting, and Number Limbo. Racing game is played by using your arrow keys and you do five laps. Shooting you HAVE to use your mouse NO TOUCH SCREENS otherwise you will get called a cheater and then BANNED!! They put up targets and you shoot with a cork gun. The Number Limbo is a game where you bet with numbers and you want to use the low numbers, but now a days there is a so many people that play it the low numbers are between like 1-30 and then 80-130. Also there is a better chance of winning if you are a new member meaning you have been signed up for like 3 or 4 days or more, but usually you won't win unless your lucky if your account is older than 1 month.

4th The top right hand corner with your info.

5th Honour Level, there are 5 different honour levels, these are great...here's a list...

6th Shout Box, this really cool, you can talk to every1 out thr thats online, they have moderators that will help you, and if you misbehave they will SUSPEND you for 1 hour

7th is the Amazon Page(I searched for xbox 360) and these are the top 3 items...

8th Your Profile, this is what every1 will see unless you change the settings to private

9th a.) the last 10 offers approved section on the middle left side

and b.) the easiest way to get to your account information at the bottom left hand corner

10th How to get merits and how to use them