Marcia, don't feel silly, how could anyone possibly know, who would ever guess that people could be so callous and malicious just to make a buck. This whole experience has been an eye opener for me; if only we could all learn this hard lesson for $20-$30 and be wiser for the experience.
Dave, the clay foot baths are most definitely sold under fraudulent terms. Any clay foot bath product being sold for the purpose and use by ALS patients to improve their health, any use other than "clay foot bath to soothe feet, soften calluses and unravel daily damage", is being sold under false pretenses.
Yes, these foot baths can be had at a cheaper price, unfortunately the first XX pages of any search engine are all links to places that sell this product as a "benefit" for ALS patients. Unfortunately, people that have read about the clay foot baths product will NOT purchase the non-ALS benefitting clay foot baths, they'll naturally purchase the product that mentions ALS. Sad, true, and very profitable for the small handful of website owners that own hundreds of clay foot bath product sites.
Remember, it doesn't matter if you purchase the clay foot bath from Eric Edney's website, the EBN website, or any of the other websites that sells the ALS-benefitting clay foot bath, chances are, the same people own all the websites; they'll even have different prices so that when you find one for half the price you think you're getting a deal.
It's a complete SCAM and it makes me sick to my stomach.
Dave, I don't question your ethics or motivations, there's no possible way I could know what your intentions are.
I am curious why you continue to defend the clay foot baths and suggest that it's "worth trying" - this is a product endorsement without question. Originally you mentioned the low cost as a good reason; however, I fail to see any correlation between product cost and benefit.
What has convinced you that it's useful or beneficial? I assume it must be the Eric Edney book, or information you have read online; both of which have been shown to be misleading.
It's clay foot baths today, and it will be a "new and incredible" product tomorrow; I have no illusions, these scams will continue; and I can only hope that myself, and others, are around to put a stop to it before anyone purchases anything.
I'm very proud that ALSforums is trying to stop this nonsense, I only wish that the forums would do the same. The forum has to be one of the largest forums for ALS patients and its absolutely filled with false hope, veiled salesmen, and individuals only posting to make a dollar.
I question the motivations of the individuals responsible for running the forums. Those forums and their sister sites in their "webring" are all generating large amounts of revenue; such a shame. The worst part is the BT forums are promoted by what appear to be reputable organizations.
However, we'll leave the chat for another day, as I'm tired and worn out from this discussion
Stay tuned though, the discussion will be interesting and I'm sure there's a lot going on over there that most of the legitimate members are completely unaware of.
Hopefully, in time, individuals will choose to abandonthe BT forums completely.