Coca-Cola and scholarships: yet another clickbait fake partnership

[ghostlypast]

And why don't you post the link to the Coca-Cola site you claim to have? 

Didn't make this claim. You're the one claiming that no such partnership exists. Prove it.

Since you're on a roll, why don't you drop the link to that Simone Biles partnership too?

PS: make sure they're official links, not just University of the People fluff.

Simone Biles made a post on her Instagram. Though, I can already see you moving those goalposts.

You claim they're mine, I actually have no idea where they came from

Continued deflection.

Some people consider this "university" a scam. By the way, "University of the People" has a ridiculous English name just because it is not located in the US. It is an Israeli for-profit company, which also uses a PO box in Pasadena, California, claiming they are "based in California". It is no accident they have never had a real phone number (apart from a virtual number, and nobody ever answers the "virtual phone").
See also https://www.uopeople.review

Sounds like someone we know.

The funny thing is, you're coming here asking me why this latest partnership is fake, when you're the one who still has to prove it's real 

You can attempt to shift the burden of proof, but it won't work.

You've shared dozens of links so far but still nothing from Coca-Cola actually announcing a partnership.

Why would I accept a burden of proof that isn't mine?

And those past proclamations were fake too. The partnerships with McGill and Edinburgh someone mentioned above were just a PR stunt, given that no one could actually use them. If memory serves, it was McGill itself that announced the partnership: it's a pity, then, that they went on to reject degrees from the University of the people

This is more telling than you realize. You see, McGill was mentioned further up the thread.

Unlike the McGill non-sense, they really have no reason to lie about this.

Edinburgh was not. A search reveals that Edinburgh has never been mentioned in the context of a partnership with UoPeople on Degree Forum.

It seems rather odd to raise Edinburgh when it's not mentioned here, but it's mentioned on the Selvaggia Lucarelli Blog. It's almost like you're channeling prior knowledge, eh?

The moral of the story is: a huge number of people were swindled. They expected their purchased degrees from the University of the People to get them into McGill "according to our partnership", only to find out they weren't recognized

Do you have evidence for this claim? Or are you talking out of your rear-end again?

That being said, you haven't answered any of my questions regarding the University of the People's alleged partnerships, other than vague phrases like "it’s a lie", "it's not true"... There is a complete lack of evidence for these partnerships, aside from your own press releases.

It's weird how you accuse others of a "complete lack of evidence" while also admitting "it was McGill itself that announced the partnership." And you still haven't successfully shifted the burden of proof.

You said the partnership was fake, prove it.

[ghostlypast]

I decided this comment warrants a little more scrutiny.

And for the record, I'm reading the reviews you posted and having a good laugh. You claim they're mine, I actually have no idea where they came from, but they're hilarious: basically, it's just people protesting against University of the People, and you're the one getting upset I'm copying this one below because it's pure gold:

Let's see what is "pure gold" about this review.

Some people consider this "university" a scam. By the way, "University of the People" has a ridiculous English name just because it is not located in the US. It is an Israeli for-profit company, which also uses a PO box in Pasadena, California, claiming they are "based in California". It is no accident they have never had a real phone number (apart from a virtual number, and nobody ever answers the "virtual phone").
See also https://www.uopeople.review

This review was taken from a [https://www.city-data.com/forum/colleges-universities/2760091-university-people-uopeople-4.html#post61567787]comment on the City-Data forum by joanna95[/url].

First, joanna95 directly refers to uopeople.review. Second, joanna95 left the comment at 13:02 (or 1:02 PM) on 30 July 2021. Because the City-Data forum uses GMT -6 as its base timezone, this means the comment was posted at 19:02 (or 7:02 PM) GMT/UTC on 30 July 2021.

Why is this important?

If you use the ICANN registration data lookup tool to learn more about the uopeople.review domain, we discover that the domain was registered on 2021-06-30 at 12:25:47 UTC.

Joanna95 managed to find the uopeople.review site less than 7 hours after the domain was registered.

That's pretty impressive given that Google's own documentation suggests that it "can take anywhere from a few days to a few weeks" for a page to be crawled, and that's when a site owner specifically requests that it be crawled.

I'm thinking joanna95 didn't find that site in Google. If we apply Occam's Razor, the simplest explanation is that joanna95 is the creator of the website.

If you like, question, I'll be happy to provide more details to solidify that connection even more.

[ghostlypast]

I am feeling inspired by the "fake partnerships" in the thread heading, so I want to talk about some fake things.

Fake Dog Degrees

The article, "UoPeople University of the People Reviews and FAQ", contains a story about a dog earning a degree at UoPeople using ChatGPT. It's an obvious work of fiction, but it's history is educational. It tells us something about its author, Giuseppe Macario. That is, he evolves his attacks.

This is an abbreviated version of the current rendition.

How our dog graduated from the University of the people using ChatGPT
...
As for the tests, a (human) student provided us with the answers, which have remained the same for years, while we handled essays and daily journal entries by simply using the free version of ChatGPT. The vast majority of UoPeople students, especially those who barely speak English, copy-paste their homework directly from ChatGPT. Perfect results and an exceptionally high GPA: truly an "education revolution"!

After paying $4,860, we were finally able to celebrate our Jack Russell's well-earned degree! Therefore, we feel compelled to write this positive review, just as a UoPeople ambassador instructed us to do on social media. Rating: A+ ️️️️️ UoPeople is a great university to buy an online degree from an Israeli diploma mill. He is already considering further education, most likely an MBA from UoPeople.

Question made a suggestion we'd be wise to heed.

See also https://www.uopeople.review

So I did.

The domain was registered on 30 Jun 2021. The first archives were made on 1 Jul 2021. The story of Jack Russell first appears in the 30 Jul 2022 archive. Allow me to quote an abbreviated version.

The education revolution: how our dog graduated from the University of the people
...
As for the tests, a (human) student gave us the solutions, while we wrote the daily journal by dictating lots of nonsense to a speech recognition software.
After paying $4,860, we could celebrate our Jack Russell's deserved degree! Therefore, we feel compelled to write this positive review as a UoPeople's ambassador told us to.
️️️️️
To be honest, our puppy is a little said because nobody has hired him. However, he is already considering further education and we believe that an MBA from UoPeople will be a huge opportunity for him to be appointed CEO of the aforementioned multinationals.

The 30 Jul 2022 version does not mention ChatGPT. Why not? That's because ChatGPT was not launched until 30 Nov 2022.

So what we see here is an example of how Giuseppe Macario evolves his attacks with fake, made up stories.

Fake Forums

This is a fun one.

The uopeople.review website moved to uopeople.reviews in August 2022. It survived on uopeople.reviews until December 2023 when it moved to onlinescams.uk.

While the website was hosted onlinescams.uk, it operated a forum about the university. If you've read his website, you'll immediately notice the patterns. There are threads about the "scam" of UoPeople, connecting UoPeople to Israel, buying a degree from UoPeople, and calling DEAC schools "diploma mills." And the usernames include NoScams and UoPoo.

Yeah, it's obvious this is not a real forum. But, someone had some fun with it.

hellogiuseppe created an account and archived the page on 16 May 2024. giuseppemacariorunsthissite also did the same.

Now, our friend, question, might want us to believe that this website was not operated by Giuseppe Macario, but...


On 17 May 2024, gmacar shows up in the FreeFlarum support forums asking how to ban a user with the forum software. He even says his forum is "uopeople".