Tuesday, February 16, 2010

For realsies.

I was wasting what little free time I have on facebook the other day when I saw this:

The ads you see when you have a European IP address are odd, no?

My next thought was that this had to be a scam. This couldn't possibly be for real, could it?

Oh, it's for real. And they are advertising on facebook.

Thanks to Google, I found the webpage for this project.

So the US holds a lottery for green card applicants while Switzerland cuts their permits in half.

Interesting.

6 comments:

Mike said...

My jaw dropped when I read "Green Card Winners will get FREE Airline ticket to the USA. What the...
And then I read the fine print. That website is for real, but it is not an official US government website. It sure tries to look official, but it belongs to an online marketing firm.
Having said that though, we all know that the US is far too lax on enforcement of immigration laws - everyone in South America knows that if they can make it to Maryland, the state will help you survive! (CASA MD receives state funds to support the illegal alien community)

mrsmac said...

Thanks Mike for reading the fine print for me! So, who profits from giving away free airline tickets to lottery winners?

Mike said...

The marketing firm - you have to hire them to handle the paperwork to get your visa. You can bet that the cost of processing will more than cover the cost of airfare :-)

Z said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
mrsmac said...

Z- Nope. Guess I'll just file it under 'learn something new everyday'!

Z said...

Oops, Mrsmac, sorry about deleting that comment on ya! I realized after writing it that the link you provided already explained about the DV and all and I felt like a chump for just repeating it without acknowledging that you had alluded to it via the link. Hope I'm making some sense here. Anyway, here's the edited version:

I thought everyone knew about the green card/DV lottery. But it makes sense that "native" American citizens might not know about it. In my experience, it is only when people have to deal with the immigration procedures of other countries that they might look at their own. :-) In case some of your readers don't know: this DV program allocates visas to particular ethnicities in proportion to their representation in the US or something like that. The Wiki page has a good summary, including info on countries that are not eligible at the moment. And a mention of these scams run by companies that charge money and claim to provide an advantage. Anyway, in comparing the US with CH, I always try to remember that the US (like Canada and Australia) is mainly an immigrant nation.

P.S. I was a foreigner in the US (in Maryland most recently) and now I'm a foreigner in CH.