I think it's important to define clearly and unequivocally what it means for a site to be labeled a "scam" site, since people throw the word around a lot and since the word is used so much in this industry.
The most common misconception I see is that people often think, "If a site is paying, it must not be scam" or "This site paid me recently, so it must not be scam."
That may sound natural and intuitive, but here's the kicker: for a website to be legitimate (not scam), it must pay *all* honest users to whom it owes money, on time, and according to terms of service. It's not good enough that the site paid you recently, or that it's paid a few people recently (as proofs posted somewhere), or even that it's paid most people. For a site to be a legitimate business, it must be caught up on all current debts to all honest users.
That is not an unreasonable standard, or some impossibly high bar. It's a basic function of the business model adopted by the administrator, who is either running a cash positive business, or an inherently doomed ponzi on borrowed time. The big fallacy I see is that people think, "Hmmm...well, I saw that x or y got paid recently, so this site is obviously still paying! It must not be a scam." Also, people sometimes say, "Well I got paid, so it's not a scam." Sorry, but one person getting paid is statistically irrelevant. Even a 1000 people getting paid is irrelevant, if 9000 other honest users earned their pay and are not getting paid.
For a site to be legitimate it must: have sustainable rates (which indicates it's not just planning on grabbing quick profits over 3-6 months and closing), deal promptly and honestly with user questions and concerns, have reasonable Terms of Service and not change them simply as a means of damage control to deal with a cash-negative problem, be transparent about operations, and actively and successfully solicit outside ads that cover expenses on an ongoing basis.
Everything has to be upfront and right for a site to be labeled "legitimate": the advertiser rates/clicks payout ratio, the referral earning offerings, etc. Only if a site meets the basic criteria of an operative business model should it be granted legitimacy. Failing that, even if only one factor is askew, it can and should be labeled a suspected "scam"--an unsustainable model. We all know that 90%+ of PTC's are scams, and if you take auroras out of the equation, it's 99+%.
So, I guess my main point is that in the current climate, this is not an "Innocent until proven Guilty" industry. The burden of proof is on an individual site to show that it has a sustainable model and a proven track record, to earn the honor of being taken seriously. In the meantime, you don't throw the word "scam" around just because a site went down for a few hours when you tried to go to it, but you can and should label a site as a "scam" for unsustainably high click earnings rates or other suspicious indicators.
People throw the word "scam" around too loosely in certain situations (when they have personally had a bad experience with a website), and not loosely enough in other general situations (when analyzing the general viability of a website's business model).
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