I have a simple question, which has been on my mind bothering me for some time now. Is all this legit? I mean, is Mystery, RJ, Neil Strauss - are these guys legit, or just scam artists grabbing money from everyone? How can I find out for sure that they're legitimate?

I've been obsessed with the community as of late, but now I'm starting to feel like a lot of it is a big money-making scam.

My opinion is any guru, no matter how good and how reputable, can not replace real experience and going out there and just being social. That is not to say gurus do not have a place in developing game; they do.

It's just not their job to game women for you. You have to go and game women for yourself.

It's like the difference between college and career. The best any college can do for you and the best you can do for yourself in college, is to learn how to think rationally and solve problems--this is applicable to any career from engineering to medicine. A college can not give you every scenario possible in your profession and answer it for you and then all you have to do is memorize it. That is just unrealistic. However by helping you understand how to come up with solutions to problems in general, college can prepare you to be prepared for yourself in any situation arising in your career.

Analogously, a guru at best can only give you an understanding of how think about social relationships and your role in them. They can not come up with every scenario and give you a canned response.

Thanks for the reply, Nash. You've definitely addressed an interesting point I certainly didn't think of. I think, though, fundamentally I'm starting to have cynism about this whole community... is there REALLY a community of designated pick-up artists, or is pick-up just the game of jocks and rich people who are naturally attractive to women? Is there REALLY a science?

My response is only my personal opinion and is completely subjective, but I would argue not only is there really a community of Pick-Up artists it is actually now becoming part of popular culture.

The only TV I watch is news and finance channels. An old college friend who got divorced was having trouble getting back into the dating scene. So, I wrote to him about Pick-Up in an E-mail. His response? "Wow, these people really exist they were portraying them on Ugly Betty a few weeks ago." This happened maybe a year or two ago. Why he watches Ugly Betty, I don't know, didn't ask.

Recently when I was watching Bloomberg News, there was a commercial for what is called a Swiffer mop. Without going into details, at the end of the commercial a girl compliments the personified mop by saying, "wow, you surely are the pick-up artist."

Finally, for some fing' reason every month I receive Maxim Magazine. I never subscribed to Maxim, I hate Maxim. Most likely scenario is I ranted to one of my friends about how much I thought the magazine was BS and he bought me some kind of lifetime subscription to be an a-hole. Anyway, getting back to the subject. Go to the supermarket and look at this month's copy. It has a blond chick who is covering her chest with a bra. Throughout the entire magazine Pick-up is mentioned.

Now, you sound like you are pretty new to Pick-Up. I became aware of Pick about five years ago. The best time to be a kind of old school Pick-Up artist was before Neil Strauss published his book, "The Game." I got in afterwards. From the beginning, to when I started, to now the Game has changed.

Because so few people knew about Pick-Up, in the beginning it was all about canned routines to pick up girls. I'm not certain how effective they were, other than knowing there exists somewhere on the internet an archive of all the old school PUAs going back and forth on a vague message aboard sharing experiences.

When I got in, that kind of approach was going out. The big issues at the time revolved around approach anxiety, inner game, and general life skills to improve your social self. That is the kind of game that I know.

I'm not certain what is big right now. But for me, just knowing there was something called, "approach anxiety," that a lot of guy's experienced was huge. I started out skeptical, but over time I did end becoming more social and more interesting. I have a lot to thank to the PUA community for that.

Granted, I have never purchased anything. Everything I learned, I learned from message boards like this.

So does that answer your question?

Hey, thanks a lot. That's exactly the kind of response I was looking for.

I guess you're right that the game has changed, and that pickup isn't really as underground and discreet as it once was. But you know, I kind of think now: if Pickup is becoming more and more popular, I imagine it'll eventually become commonplace and a new breed of pickup artists will arise that will again be doing things never before seen, repeating the cycle. To me, it seems like the Game is something that will always evolve and will never quite be understood save for those who study it and live it. What do you think?

And yes, I am very new to the game. I'm in my first year at University, so I'm really just starting to get my feet wet!