The whole point of not finalizing early and using the Silk Road escrow system is so you can buy from a vendor with out worry. If you do not FE then you have none of the risk you talk about here. I mean that is the whole point of escrow!!!! And your analogy of getting people not to finalize is like being told not to do drugs is really not even close to accurate. Meaning it is a terrible analogy. I get what you are trying to say...that no matter how many times we warn "them" they will still FE. BUT...the facts are that most people do not FE. And that the scams that vendors pull with the FE option is actually not that big a number at all. Now of course I wish it was zero. But that is never going to happen. Sure YOU can not control the other morons who FE...but you can control you...and you can totally buy from this vendor and have nothing to worry about at all if you do not FE. Also...as to your theory of fake feedback....it of course happens...but again...fake feedback is hard to do. Sure you can do a few...but if you just pay a little more attention as a buyer you could easily spot it. And fake feedback has never been a real issue here. In the forums you have some people ..like your self...that totally over value fake feedback and they believe that it is something that happens a lot more then it does...or they believe it is easy to do and is worth the time to do it. You actually address those issues...but the one thing you left off is that fake feedback is actually really a waste of time for a vendor and that is why it does not happen that often. I have no idea if you are a new buyer or just someone that is overly cautious....but the fact is if you just use the simple guide line of not FE'ing ever....you will pretty much eliminate any chance of getting scammed. You would also find that this is not at all how vendors scam here. They do not do it offering items for sale or with new accounts. They almost always involve BTC. And the accounts that end up scamming the people here are in fact accounts that are totally legit..no fake feedback at all...ever...and actually are model vendors...then when they want to leave......they start asking people to FE....and they blindside long time customers. That is what you have to look out for ...just giving you the real facts.