GoFunRewards pull the plug on revenue sharing
GoFunRewards first popped up on my radar as an MLM penny auction startup. In late 2012, GoFunRewards announced it was going to launch a revenue sharing based penny auction under the brand “Go Fun Places”.
When GoFunRewards finally got around to launching in early 2013, the company got off to a rocky start with the news that former CEO Randal Williams had ditched them to go start his own revenue sharing opportunity, JubiRev.
Former Agel CEO Glen Jensen briefly stepped in, before he abruptly resigned just over a month after taking up the position.
That was in late March and throughout April GoFunRewards continued to remain open for business however on the MLM opportunity side things seem to flounder.
Today the owners of GoFunRewards, eAdGear (who are based in Hong-Kong), announced that they were shutting down GoFunRewards and “terminating” US-based affiliates.
Citing “legal advice” as the reason for the shutdown, eAdGear published the following brief message on Facebook earlier today:
Acting on advice from legal counsel, Go Fun Places has ceased operations in the United States. The company will operate in Hong Kong.
As of May 1, 2013, all operations and Affiliates in the United States have been terminated.
GoFunRewards affiliates are also claiming that US-based Vice-President Mike Driggers has resigned from the company.
Signs of eAdGear pulling the plug on GoFunRewards were already present with the company announcing on April 25th that it was changing banks from HSBC Limited to the Chinese owned and Hong-Kong based Hang Seng Bank Limited.
Meanwhile on the MLM business front affiliates had been reporting a steadily declining daily ROI:
its getting smaller every week…… .7% today im getting less daily to-day, than what I made 3 months ago…that means there taking out more than what I bring in now.
Before I joined, my sponsor told me this pays close to 2% daily. I was getting like 0.8% to 1% daily.
He could have been honest and tell me it is around 1% and not 2%. This barely breaks even for a passive earner.
This thing looks like it’s going in reverse. I think the earnings the last couple of days were around .03%!!
I’m surprised they’re still in business. I’m going to start taking out the 60% each day and hopefully I can recoup my seed money.
Well they keep on taking and not giving back…..having $1500 accumulated in a few months, now Ive got $700 left in there, with a daily reward of $4.08… what is that like .05%.
Following the shutdown and termination of GoFunRewards affiliates, it’s not clear what will happen to the funds affiliates had invested with the company.
One GoFunRewards affiliate asked the company about this on their Facebook page, however at the time of publication no response had been given:
Well that stinks, Does that mean I just lost the $2500 I put in just 6 months ago?
Pending refunds being issued by GoFunRewards, with the funds now being in an offshore Chinese owned bank, any recovery efforts will most likely prove extremely difficult.
In the closure notice they published, GoFunRewards cite the decision to shut down the company being due to “advice from legal counsel”. What this advice was in relation to is not clarified and leaves open a few possibilities.
In February this year former GoFunRewards CEO Randal Williams filed a lawsuit against eAdGear, seeking $30 million USD in damages.
eAdGear responded in kind by filing their own lawsuit against Williams, seeking a permanent injunction against Williams and his new startup JubiRev. eAdGear accused Williams of embezzling GoFunRewards funds and stealing trade secrets and proprietary information to start up JubiRev.
In their lawsuit eAdGear wrote that they were going to try to have William’s lawsuit dismissed and failing that, have the case moved to California (Williams filed in Texas) where they’d filed their own suit.
What happens now I have no idea, but with eAdGear abandoning ship and running back to Hong Kong it’ll be interesting to see whether or not they continue to pursue their case against Williams and defend his case against them.
One possibility pertaining to GoFunRewards “advice from legal counsel” is that it directly relates to the predicted outcomes of one or both of these cases. With eAdGear doing the retreating, it possibly indicates that their counsel didn’t have confidence in winning the cases.
The other possibility is that GoFunRewards’ legal advice relates more directly to the business itself, specifically the revenue sharing business model.
As it stands now the revenue sharing niche in the MLM industry is a bit of a mess. You pretty much have a bunch of companies running around with affiliate-funded business models paying their affiliates daily ROIs, all claiming to be different from eachother but operating fundamentally on the same principle:
Affiliates invest money into the schemes in one way or another on the implied guarantee they will be paid a >100% ROI over a fixed number of days.
In light of the fact that this pretty much equates to the simple renaming of what is otherwise referred to as a Ponzi scheme, one can only assume that these companies either don’t have legal counsel or are choosing to ignore the writing on the wall regarding the MLM revenue sharing niche.
Whatever the case it’s entirely probable that up until this point GoFunRewards hadn’t actually bothered to have their compensation plan combed through by someone halfway competent in MLM legal compliance, and having done had been informed that they were infact operating a Ponzi scheme or likeness thereof.
Which of these possibilities pertains to GoFunReward’s legal counsel’s advice I’m not sure but I strongly suspect one or both of them to be the reason behind GoFunRewards being shut down.
In the aftermath of this shutdown, I imagine it won’t be long before we start seeing marketing campaigns aimed at those who invested and lost money in GoFunRewards.
JubiRev’s official “Video Manager” T. LeMont Silver (who effectively jumped ship from GoFunRewards with Randal Williams to launch JubiRev), has recently started to describe such affiliates as “low-hanging fruit” and in a series of videos published on YouTube, urging JubiRev affiliates to approach them about putting their money in JubiRev.
Silver (right) is currently running his own “low-hanging fruit” campaign, giving $1000 USD away to prospective affiliates over two consecutive nights provided they attend a business opportunity webinar.
Business model wise, JubiRev (review) is pretty much a clone of GoFunRewards (review), and every other MLM revenue sharing company currently in operation.
In GoFunRewards affiliates invested in “LifeStyle Dollars”, in JubiRev they invest in “JubiBucks”.
After giving away these LifeStyle Dollars/JubiBucks to customers (accounts that the majority of affiliates either buy or just set up themselves), affiliates are then rewarded with points that pay out a ROI over a fixed number of days.
In GoFunRewards these are referred to as “Reward Credits” and in JubiRev, “JubiPoints”.
The idea as an affiliate is to invest enough initially and then compound the daily ROI paid out to effectively increase one’s point balance over time. The end goal is to withdraw a portion of the daily ROI (rather than compound 100% of it as affiliates do initially to build up the point balance), and still have enough money over to grow the overall point balance before the points expire.
With every other affiliate in the company doing this and new affiliates joining following suit, it not hard to see where the daily ROI is coming from.
JubiRev, primarily through T. LeMont Silver’s efforts have recently sought to distance themselves from this, by claiming legitimacy on the promise of future revenue being generated by customers (customers actually buying products with their own money after being given free JubiBucks money).
The problem with this is of course is that while every affiliates point balance grows, they have an ever-increasing amount of JubiBucks/LifeStyle Dollars (whatever the company calls it, they are all the same) to give away.
Why then would any customer actually spend their own money when, as long as the company is in operation, there’s affiliates willing to dump virtual money on them?
As such, all MLM revenue sharing companies operate on a one way, two lane street. One lane leads to the initial burst in affiliate seed money dwindling out around the time affiliate’s initial points start to expire, causing cash flow problems within the company (not enough new investors to sustain payouts).
Or two, things take off, more and more affiliate investors get sucked in and regulators then shut them down for being a Ponzi scheme.
As a long time observer of the MLM industry I can only wonder how many of these revenue sharing companies need to collapse before people realise that calling a Ponzi scheme something else (revenue sharing, daily leadership bonus, profit sharing etc.), doesn’t change the fact that it’s still a Ponzi scheme.
When these things will stop popping up all over the place and in the process continue to trash the broader reputation of the MLM industry (“hey guys, we re-invented the Ponzi scheme, honest!”) I have no idea… but it can’t come soon enough.
Update 2nd May 2012 – After speaking with GoFunRewards’ lawyer, Troy Dooly from MLM Helpdesk confirms eAdGear shutdown GoFunRewards after being advised their revenue sharing Ponzi points compensation plan was most likely illegal in the US.
No surprises there.
That’s probably why most people will prefer to jump ship BEFORE a shutdown or collapse, rather than being terminated.
Does this mean there is no conference call tonight?
I thought they just had a party not to long ago for US Based members? Wonder if they gonna honor the pending payouts… I will not hold my breath.
Driggers an other Americans that are defendants in williams lawsuit seem to be in a pickle. It seems as though the Wang’s just head to Hong Kong. Lawyer fees will be theirs to enjoy.
Two observations…
1) If the other party don’t show up when the suit goes to trial, the still-standing party wins by default. 🙂 he may not be able to collect, but it’s still technically a win. 🙂
2) Hong Kong has quite a few loopholes for “businesses”, because it had long been financial center of Asia until resurgence of Shanghai.
However, China has a far stronger hatred for pyramid and Ponzi schemes (having been long-ago advised by Robert Fitzpatrick on MLMs) that such shady deals only live on in Hong Kong, not on the mainland.
3) China views Pyramid schemes and Ponzi schemes as disturbing the economic order. They slapped down TVI Express within 6 months of reaching China. It didn’t stop various clones and similar schemes, but they are doing a much better job of it than we here in the “West”.
But then, the Chinese version was much more virulent. There were reports of indoctrination camps where people are held against their will (locked doors) where they are basically brainwashed into joining. It got really big when one or two people, trying to get away, climbed out the window from like 2nd or 3rd story window and fell to his death. This was reported even on CNN.
So, eAdGear is EVENTUALLY doomed, just wondering how long it would take.
If I want to bet, I’m betting more on the 2nd, i.e. the whole GoFunRewards being illegal, but that would depend on how bad eAdGear wants revenge on JubiRev.
They can easily pay the lawyer another 10K to ruin JubiRev, but in modern age that news will get back to HK very quickly, and you know Randall’s lawyer will seek to do the same to eAdGear in court, basically seeking MAD (mutual assured destruction).
Who knows, maybe they paid Randall off. 🙂
HeHe,
do you honestly believe either party would want or allow this to actually make it into court ??
After speaking to GoFunRewards’ attorney, Troy Dooly is reporting eAdGear pulled the plug due to being advised they were running a Ponzi scheme:
Shameless:
They claim Mike Driggers resigned but I just got off phone with GFP and they said he is on a “business” trip right now so I was to just email him… He must be going to Hong Kong….
Here we go again!! I have to come behind OZ and clean up his mess. Once again stating falsehoods!
I was on the first of two webinars given by T Lemont. He did offer $100 to five people but he NEVER said they had to spend it on JubiRev. He did offer to PIF through JubiRev if that is what the winner wanted which makes sense since most attendees would most likely be JubiRev Promoters.
However he did say he would send the reward to a persons Payza or STP account. To which, the winner would be allowed to use the reward as they see fit!
(Ozedit: removed derail attempt)
@Behind Oz
Blahblahblah Silver gave the money away for people to spend in JubiRev. It’s blatantly obvious that was the intention.
Cut the “father christmas you can spend it on whatever you want” crap.
Even Dooley is worried and even stopped rubberstamping ponzi schemes anymore.
Now, now, I don’t think Dooly was rubber-stamping anything. I think he was sucked in by Dawn and Burks’s magic act like everybody else (except us). But then, only Dooly would know what’s the truth. And you know which version he’s going to stick to. 🙂
Being sucked in by Dawn and Burks’s magic act based on a personal connection while maintaining “person of Authority” title is rubberstamping in my book.
When the SEC refused to investigate Maddoff for decades because of personal connection, it was rubberstamping. Why not the same true for Dooley? He is kind of supposed to be the first line of defence for MLMers.
IM(very)HO, what happened with Zeek and Mr Dooly was less about “rubber stamping” and more to do with him slavishly following the “think positive at all times” mantra which dominates the MLM scene.
For any observer even slightly objective, Zeeks’ promise to deliver a 1% per day ROI was the only clue necessary to declare it a ponzi, whereas a great many of the think positive MLMers, including Mr Dooly himself got caught up in all sorts of peripheral issues, based largely on the fact positive thinking will ALWAYS trump objectivity
If Mike Driggers is in Hong Kong he better stay there because when he gets back the SEC WILL BE CONTACTING HIM! Many people lost alot of money!
Wendy and Lynton Vandersteen were top promoters too and made tons of money and was already pitching another program last night but with their new reputation who would trust them.
We have our team in Vegas. These are relatives and close friends we signed up. So how can we get our money back, we need to do the right thing.
Right thing to do would have been not to recruit friends and relatives in money games. Now, you can do almost nothing.
You can right to local attorney general and SEC. Maybe it will start an investigation. Since this scheme is located in country where this stuff is legal, chances to get money from them are minimal. Consider it a lesson how not involve close ones in risky games.
Boris, but MLMers and get-rich-quickers ALWAYS goes after friends and family first. The MLMer has “social capital” to spend on them for promotional costs. On strangers they have to spend real money, and going after “low-hanging fruit” is human nature.
Ponzi schemes and pyramid schemes are actually illegal in China / Hong Kong, but they are quite a bit harder to sue over there, language barrier and all.
Thanks for the reports and breakdowns. I am amazed at not only how critical you can break down a complan, but also how quickly you can do it. I really appreciated the ripplin awareness!
GoFunPlacesNeverWentAnyPlace did/could not ever generate income, paid out on new member money, wakeup people! Do some sort of DD before you attempt to make money. LifeStyleDollars, gimmie a break
Can anyone share insight? Is Jubi is Next? JubiBux? They are creating income from their members buying products and in a round about way, giving them away?
This Forum has come to be my first goto for info, thanks again
Troy Dooly, Real American Hero!
Real American Hero…NOT. Unless sgt. Slaughter, Hulk Hogan and other WWE entertainers meet the criteria.
Dooly’s insight about his interrupted dinner phone call the night before GoFuns abrupt shutdown is another example of his shameless self promotion.
Fact: Monday the 29th of April, the top affiliate leaders travelled to GoFun offices to discuss problems with ownership (Wangs and Driggers) they were given 12 minutes before meeting was terminated by Wangs and lawyer.
Fact: payments to affiliates were “delayed” due to change of banks, from HSBC to bank in Hong Kong.
Fact: e-wallet “pay-too” was blamed for a faulty API further delaying pay.
Fact: Saturday April 27 conference call cancelled at last minute.
Fact: April 29 corporate update call postponed until May 2. Never happened, since company shut down the night before.
The eureka moment, portrayed by Dooly, that Gofun lawyers and owners had that this was ponzi, and therefore in need of immediate shutdown, is not believable.
The portrayal by Dooly that this lawyer reached out to him with this story leads me to believe the following:
1. It happened as Dooly said. C’mon man. Instead of being so inflated that you were contacted, be ashamed that you are being used to disseminate the spin, because your ego and self importance is so predictable.
Or
2. It did not happen. Umm… This lawyer contacted you….. To be off the record? You only said you would not tell us who this was……for what reason? To protect our virgin ears.
Real American Hero ….. I prefer the “nature boy – Ric Flair”. ……WHOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!
1. Collect some information, enough to get an overview over the case itself, enough to explain the case to a lawyer or other type of advisor.
2. You will probably need to use a professional advisor, e.g. a lawyer, to help you make the right decisions.
3. Make some decisions, e.g. whether or not to contact authorities.
But it normally starts with the first step, collect information and organize it. Just like you did here when asking for information and opinions.
* And it normally will need to have a “direction” from where you are now to when you potentially can get some of your money back.
* And it normally will need to have an overview backwards in time too, e.g. about the company itself and your own involvment.
This website has some information about the circumstances that lead to the shutdown of GoFunRewards, e.g. the 2 different lawsuits (eAdgear vs Randal Williams, Randal Williams vs eAdgear). It’s spread around in different articles, but typically in articles about GoFunRewards, eAdGear, JubiRev/JubiMax.
We also have some information about the aftermath of ZeekRewards, e.g. ongoing discussions about clawbacks and other legal issues. But you shouldn’t start from a point like that.
I can probably identify some of the information you’ll need, e.g. where to find it.
Oz, Check this out. Troy is been called a liar basically. Here is part of an email from Jubi/Rev.
Unfortunately, this is yet another case where a company basically lies through its teeth: you CAN be illegal even if you sell legal stuff.
Burnlounge and Equinox sold legitimate stuff. Heck, so did FHTM. Stating that if you have products you’re legal is a lie. (Having products simply makes it less likely to be a pure Ponzi like HYIPs)
And note where they just claim “we’re new, our comp plan is new”, and didn’t bother explained WHY they’re legal.
@NHRA
Ugh it’s embarrassing. We’re watching Zeek Rewards repeat itself.
Same BS rhetoric, same BS affiliate-funded compensation plan.
“Oh but we have real customers!”
“Who actually funds the purchases?”
“*mumblemumble*…affiliates.”
“So your customers don’t actually purchase anything?”
“but…but…we’re a category creator!”
“Right.”
*SEC sirens in the distance*
What stood out to me Kasey was this quote:
Didn’t Troy say that the legal counsel said there “comp plan” is illegal in the U.S. and not in Hong Kong ?..lol Is this some sort of denial because of Jubi/rev’s comp plan ? I think so. 😉
I’m sure Dooly will have a video out in the next 48 hrs calling them on their BS.
Who are you going to believe, another Zeek Rewards v2.0 Ponzi Points company running around telling everyone they are legal or GoFunRewards’ lawyer?
Lawyer of course. But Troy Also mention Lyoness but hasn’t explain of the comp plan. That might be the million dollar question. What comp plan structure is legal in the U.S.
Well, there are truly some interesting comments here!
Oz, I thought about a video, and realized based on the comments above that a new video would not be any different than the last.
If one listens to the above video I shot, then there are some very important facts that would have caught their attention.
1. McGuire Woods represents GFP against JubiMax, and they are also the law firm representing Kenneth Bell, the Receiver for Zeek Rewards. Maybe it is a fluke that this happened, or maybe there is more than any of us know at this time.
2. GFP after seeking legal counsel (Yes from a personal friend of mine), and receiving a legal opinion that made it clear their “Rev Share” compensation plan is illegal in the USA, decided it was in the best interest of all to withdraw from the North America market.
Now, since I am not affiliated with GFP in any way shape or form, I have no clue on any other legal opinion they may have received on paying back net investors who may not have received their initial principle back yet.
But, I do know that if their attorney told them they were illegal, taking any new money would leave them wide open for some serious issues if regulators were to agree with the legal opinion rendered.
If the above former GFP affiliates feel they have been cheated, and screwed, then I suggest they hire an attorney and file a class action lawsuit. And I would do it fast, and get an injunction against GFP to stop the removal of assets from the USA.
3. If folks have listened to my prospective’s over the last six months or so on “Rev Share” comp plans, then they would realize my beef is not against a specific company, but is against a specific comp plan model, and attorneys and consultants looking for loopholes to justify their opinions.
When people are seeking for financial breathing room, they tend to look for what seems like an easy road to make quick money. It is not much different than those who look to TV preachers for quick answers to their personal issues.
So to all of those above, both pro and con to the “Rev Share” business model. If you live in North America, and you join a company purporting that their “Rev Share” comp plan is within regulatory compliance, then they are lying to you!
I say that based on facts not opinion.
1. To date, the Courts have not ruled that the “rev Share” model is legal or illegal. However, the regulators have used case-law and current security regulations as well as pyramid laws to close at least three well known companies using some form of “Rev Share… ASD, Zeek Rewards and Profitable Sunrise.
2. Since no company has been willing to fight the regulators in court to prove their “rev Share” compensation plan is legal, no company can say their “rev Share” is within compliance!
Since we all believe in Freedom, then each person is well within their Rights to make any intelligent or stupid decision they want to make. Just realize, there are always consequences to pay with each of those decisions.
Living An Epic Adventure,
Troy
McGuireWoods has more than 900 lawyers in 19 offices around the world. (straight from their website). The chance of it being a coincidence (representing both Ken Bell and JubiRev) is pretty darn high, esp. when they’re arranged through different branches.
Profitable Sunrise is not rev share. It’s straight investment / HYIP.
@Troy
GFP and JubiRev have an identical comp plan. I’m taking Beistle’s factually incorrect comments (and not-so-disguised attempt to poach ex-GoFunPlaces afffiliates into JubiRev) as the ramblings of someone sweating something chronic.
Having customers isn’t enough, they have to be purchasing product with their own money. Affiliates funding the scheme is no different to Zeek Rewards or any other Ponzi scheme.
We of course all know this but Beistle and JubiRev appear to be in denial. Would be interesting to find out who their lawyer is.
Given Mr. Dooly’s hint and his mention of the same 3 companies that was mentioned in KT’s blog entry back in March, I’m pretty confident who that mystery attorney is. 🙂
I must be having one of my stupid days. You’re suggesting KT is JubiRev’s attorney or someone else?
I think KT’s the one that told GoFunPlaces to get out of USA before it’s too late. If he didn’t then someone checked his opinion and found it to be correct.
Remember in March KT posted this on his blog:
And what did Mr. Dooly write here?
The three companies are different, but the opinion is identical: rev-sharing, or “leverage revenue sharing program”. Same difference. (And they both got profitable sunrise wrong, as it’s an HYIP with Matrix commission, not revenue sharing)
IMHO, of course. 🙂
Could be although I wouldn’t have pegged KT to be specializing in SE Asian markets, as Dooly mentioned in his GFP video.
In anycase, Beistle is harping on about his attorney(s) trying to make the model work with loopholes whereas KT seems to be outright against it altogether (at least after Bidify).
Doesn’t add up IMO so I think JubiRev are dealing with someone else.
Great point! However, at the time McGuire Woods was hired, Jensen was the President, and he brought his attorney to the table to help with the legal issues.
The attorney he brought to the table already knew McGuire Woods was connected to the Zeek case, and that many of us saw GFP as a reload program for Zeek, because many of the top players had also been at the top of Zeek.
So, again maybe it’s coincidence, only time will tell.
Oz, as you know, I have not written much on either company. I have for the most part reviewed things, and referenced what you have written because I know the depth you and this community has taken to dig into things.
Which is one reason I find it interesting that people are using me or the reporting I have done as a Red Herring, instead of really digging in and debating the issues at hand. 🙂
Hmmm… 🙂 Well if you listen to the video again, you might catch the part where I am very clear “Most folks will never have heard the name of the attorney.”
However, if folks do take the time to back track specific issues surrounding the leaving of former executives, the hiring of others, they may be able to figure out who the attorney is, that offered the legal opinion, and brought McGuire Woods to the table.
KT is NOT representing GFP or is the attorney I reference.
@Troy
Rather than face facts, alot of people in these schemes find it easier to just pretend BehindMLM doesn’t exist.
@Dooly — got it. On the other hand, there aren’t that many MLM lawyers. 🙂
You’re right, I’ve been a bit brash in linking KT. However, upon further examination, I’ll throw out one more guess, which is of course, completely irrelevant to GFP’s decision. 🙂
It wasn’t Mr. Danning Jiang Esq., was it? Out of San Jose, CA?
And if I’m wrong, I’m not worrying over it. 😀 I kinda enjoy mysteries, but I won’t lose sleep over it.
Person? …. Place? … Or Thing?…. Give me a break. Only thing worse than the lack of information is the discussion of the lack of information.
Don’t “jump the shark” Fonzie……damn, too late. C’mon Oz….C’mon Chang.
What’s worse is commenting about discussion of the lack of information. 🙂
But don’t you find it strange that GFP basically says “yes” to the rest of the world… EXCEPT North America?
Touché 🙂
GFP is not saying “yes” to the rest of the world.
My understanding is that GFP was the USA branch of E-AdGear. EAdGear runs ponzi models internationally. E- AdGear via GFP did a “snatch and grab” in the U.S. after Zeek went down.
Perhaps, it is unfair to Dooly not too forgive the cheer leading for Zeek. But, the constant self promoting, insider info, that he espouses too have, seems to be revealed consistently after the fact.
And then, with a “can’t reveal source” ….. Is to me…….clownish
I just hate to see you guys, dignify this with a seeming game of 20 questions.
Personally I’m not fussed on who GFP’s lawyer as relevant. Not unless someobody can point out how it’s relevant.
My time and energy is better spent elsewhere so I’ve left it at that. I’m sure if it’s relevant it will surface at a later date, we’re a big enough community here now that these things always do.
T Le mont is actually doing a webinar right now on why he thinks Jubi/rev will pass the regulatory test. Maybe he is calming down the affiliates?
W. James Jonas III is Randal Williams Attorney according to the docs. https://sites.google.com/a/asdupdates.com/files-website/eadgear-filings
Let me guess… “rahrahrah we have customers and real products!” whilst completely ignoring that the scheme is still primarily affiliate-funded via JubiBuck investment?
If it’s anything like Beistle’s recent mountain of BS it might be worth pulling Silver’s webinar apart if it’s being recorded and someone can send it my way.
From what I understand, you can still join GFP… just NOT from North America. GFP still exists. Their website’s still up, but if you try to join and you put your location as north America, it’ll reject you. Not so if you say you’re located elsewhere.
Food for thought: With US investors GFP was paying a daily ROI of about 0.7% in its last days.
Someone verify my finding please… I check GFP’s address (or should we say, FORMER address) at pleasanton, which is listed as 4301 Hacienda Drive, Suite 500, Pleasanton, CA. (from Randall William’s lawsuit)
However, I also found a 7-Eleven at that exact address, weird, huh? And a notary by the name of Susan Curry?
The building is Hacienda Terrace, here’s the broker listing:
http://www.rofo.com/listings/CA/Pleasanton/4301-4305-4309-Hacienda-Drive-154710.html
The photo is same as the photo on GFP’s website. So it’s the same place.
According to the same website, suite 500 is available for lease? (It would be now, but still…) And it’s only 7500 sqft, not 10000 they claimed. 🙂
🙂 Since you love a good mystery, I will continue to riddle… Follow the career path of one of the former presidents of GFP and it will lead you down a path which might provide the answer you are looking.
And no, Mr. Danning Jiang Esq. was not the attorney.
You as with so many others, have no clue what I said about Zeek or even GFP.
You see a video, and never go read the editorial, or the additional comments.
Let’s take Zeek as a great example. From day one I made it clear, if they did not CHANGE the business model, the regulators could hit them as a pyramid. That is public so many times that I am truly amazed when someone ONLY focuses on the “Cheerleadng”, but it does show a lack of due diligence on the part of the writer.
I did strongly debate the ponzi side of things, and that was ignorant of me. If I had taken more time to educate myself in advance of the ponzi charges, I would not have been so bullheaded. Thankfully folks like Oz, and K. Chang continued to debate me and educate me on that issue.
Now as for GFP… From the very beginning I warned, mostly through Oz’s editorials, that this was a Reload and for folks to be careful.
What I might or might not know behind the scene was not important until the company decided to take their attorney’s legal counsel and close the North American operation.
As for the self-promotion. We can agree to disagree on this one. There is no self-promotion intended. I do make it clear, that the info I provide is not always opinion or subjective, but is coming directly from the source.
Eadgear Holdings Limited / 2710-11, K.Wah Centre,191 Java Road, North Point, Hong Kong / Customer Service (925)251-0888
The Hong Kong address with the phone number I listed above, directs to:
Dave Co
4305 Hacienda Drive Suite 530
Pleasanton, CA 94588
Which might be the office of Dave Co an Employee for eAdGear. eAdgear is the parent company of Go Fun Places.
http://www.manta.com/c/mx7jz38/eadgear-inc
Grimes and Reese
Steven A. Richards, Grimes & Reese.
He-he. 🙂 Danning Jiang was the guy they used to sue those “turncoat” affiliates that went to Zeek. That’s why I picked him. However, knowing who doesn’t really help *that* much.
As I said, it’s sorta interesting doing internet research. Any one ever played those search engine puzzle that appeared on Lifehacker a while back? This is kinda like that. 😀
@Troy…the answer you have “riddled” around is former general counsel for Agel, Jesse Riddle.
His office is currently located in Sandy, Utah. However, as far as I can tell he is not licensed to practice law in California. Also, according to GFP he is the one who advised them to shut down their U.S. operations for reasons unknown, with the exception of the one he wanted you to believe.
He was paid a lot of money to premeditate a planned exit from the U.S. while continuing to collect money from new people up and until the day before they decided to shut the doors and run with the money.
If you do some Googling, you will find some extremely insightful and helpful information.
I stand corrected. When pitched on Zeek, I was e-mailed a link to Dooly videos minus editorials. I saw videos of how Troy went to Red Carpet events and personally met with Zeek leaders. I did not look through “additional comments”
I looked at Troy’s affiliation with MLM associations and the video interviews with Dawn, yet I did not read the editorials. My bad. I should have known that the “comments” would Assuredly contradict most of the video content.
This may sound crazy, but maybe the videos and the “comments portion” should jive.
Bottom line: My money, MY responsibility, lesson learned
So now i’m off to re-view my wedding video…..hopefully, I didn’t miss any “additional comments”
The comments there mostly matched the articles, with only a few comments raising critical questions. But you would probably have found BOTH viewpoints.
The trouble is that people normally will have “confirmation bias”. They have already decided what TYPE of information they’re looking for when they’re searching the internet. So we wouldn’t have been able to convince you about anything, unless you already were willing to believe in it in the first place.
Ditto. People don’t see equivocal evidence as equivocal. If it can be interpreted in favor of what they’re supporting, they don’t see any other interpretation.
The simplest example is “it paid me therefore it’s not a scam.” Since Ponzi schemes and pyramid schemes do pay the early joiners, if a scheme pays it neither prove (or disprove) it’s a Ponzi or pyramid scheme. Yet somehow the believers latch onto it as if it’s validating of their opinion “it’s not a scam”.
Mr. Dooly *was* excited, and people took his excitement as approval, and ignored his warnings and cautions.
Some people, myself included, brought to Troy’s attention via blog comments the impossible math around the VIP points, the revenue for the auction assuming the best of assumptions (since the auctions could all be tracked from heir auction id), and also the complete futility of spam ads.
So while Troy had genuine debate with the anti-ponzi crowd on the structural components of Zeek, the data some of us were trying to bring to his attention should have commanded more due diligence.
Also consider that when “the critics” would bring up inconsistencies around Zeek’s claims about US sanctions, banking issues, and other what we now know to be blatant lies, Troy didn’t attempt to be objective about the issues and chalked most of them up to “growing pains”.
Remember the blatant lie on US sanctions? That was just swept under the rug and ignored by Zeek supporters.
Received the webinar (thanks NHRA), going through it now.
(Ozedit: URL removed) is now up and running for people who have lost money to join a class action lawsuit.
I lost money and know a lot of people who have too but a least this is a way to get our money back without paying any to a lawyer.
URL removed, that is an email address capture page that provides no information on who is behind the class action, what it will cost or which law firm will be engaged.
I sincerely hope it’s not the lawsuit T. LeMont Silver was advertising on that webinar I went through yesterday. The last thing those who lost money in GoFunRewards need is someone who sees them as “low-hanging fruit” trying to recruit them into similar schemes (under the guise of trying to help them recover funds or otherwise).
Wendy and Linton Vandersteen (high up distributors) in GFP held conference call to inform people about class action lawsuit. They had lawyer (unidentified) explain class action process at the federal level.
Here is the biggest problem. They opened call with a history of events leading up to shut down. They were terribly dishonest. Their misrepresentation of dealings with the Wangs and Driggers is laughable.
They portrayed that they were shocked, like the rest of the distributors, when hearing GFP terminated all US affiliates. They know this is blatantly untrue. What about the 12 minute meeting the Wangs and Driggers had before the company shut down? They know what happened.
You can’t have your cake and eat it too. I am all for bleeping the ownership of GFP. But, the Vandersteens need to realize that if they want to crusade, then they should be honest with the people they are looking to join them.
I’m having flashbacks of Robert Craddock and his Craddock 12 when Zeek Rewards went down.
You’d think people would learn…
How about Nanci Jo Frazer and how she pimped Profitable Sunrise through her ministry and her charity to the city of Toledo… then act “shocked” that “Roman Novak” was not real…
http://www.patrickpretty.com/2013/04/26/wtol-introduces-middle-america-to-the-profitable-sunrise-hyip-scheme-graphic-shows-3-tiered-affiliate-program-on-top-of-absurd-payout/
Apparently this email is being sent to Paytoo (a payment processor GoFunRewards used), detailing a “government agency investigation” into the company (email was forwarded to me):
No word on which agency is investigating GoFunRewards and I haven’t received any further information. Hoping others can add to the above email with more info.
Here’s some more info on PayToo:
You know this really sucks.. By that I mean cause a lot of people including myself end up all being victims in this.
Even if you were to make some decent money in a program (GFP or others) you end up having to pay it all back or most of it after GOV gets involved and it puts a person and their family in a worse situation then they were before for the fact, it’s not like we save all the earnings.
If I had to guess 80-90% of the people that ‘gain’ from the programs get hurt just as bad as the people who have not got their principal back.
I liked what Troy said about the small group of marketers need to clean this up and push out the huge gainers who do not get affected by this as bad and can afford these good attorneys etc, and then move on to next program practically unscathed.
Guess I will just search a company and if it’s NOT on “BehindMLM”, “MLM Help Desk”, etc… it’s ok to join.
Sincerely,
Real Average Joe Trying to Make Honest Money Online!
This is like expecting Phillip Morris to lead the way in removing addictive nicotine from their cigarettes. What I like is the way payment processors are being targetted.
What you need is a dedicated group of activists like what you had with Zeek Rewards posting links to BehindMLM, kschang’s hub, RealScam, and the PatrickPretty. The activists who did the great SEO work to get these sites and YouTube “Zeek skeptic” videos to the top of Google saved a lot of people from the scam.
The hidden story is not just the back and forth between Troy and the critics, but that the great SEO campaigns had Zeek management enraged when “the critics” websites would show up on Google searches, in some cases ranking above Zeek for their own search terms.
This is what led Greg Caldwell to call out “the critics” in his famous online outburst that only motivated the critics to do more.
Imagine searching for and seeing the BehindMLM review as your top search results, followed various articles from PPBlog, RealScam forum threads, and kschang analysis. That’d be a beautiful site, as it was with Zeek.
SEC and FTC are not stupid. They KNOW those payment processors are scam enablers (a lot like Western Union before they tightened down on the grandpa scams and such).
By choking off the money supply (simply by having the payment processors tighten up on the money conduit) and by invoking the laws on money laundering (normally used to track narco money and terror money) they can take a proactive approach on those scams.
Grandpa scams and such used to be prevalent (Grandpa! I’m f***ed up in West Bumf***! Send me money or I’ll never make it home!) that you have people rushing to Western Union to send money. WU had to reissue bulletins to retrain all the agents to WARN, and REPEATEDLY warn any one they suspect of being a victim of a grandpa scam.
Now the payment processors are getting the same “friendly suggestion”… tighten down the system or Feds will scrutinize your records so closely you can’t do business. Yes, it’s a “shakedown” of sorts… but for a very good cause.
It’s not difficult: each of us needs to put up a website and cross link each other, with our comments referring to each other’s website and other anti-scam website with discussions on the same topic.
Spammers and wannabe internet marketers already do it by buying up “fan domains” (and spam domains) and put up capture pages that tries to mine SEO keywords. Our discussions are naturally SEO keyword intensive, and reposting our own comments on our own websites with cross linking, as well as write our own articles, will help even more.
There’s a screenshot on ASDUpdates blog that shows GoFunPlaces denying any one in North American right to participate, which implies that the rest of the world can still join. Hmmm.
Here’s one. 85 Y.O woman loses her husband. Within a month she receives via certified mail an official looking document that informs her that a large lien was placed on her home by the deceased, that payment is overdue, and foreclosure is imminent.
Within a week she is contacted by several “attorneys” purporting to have seen the lien in the public record who then offer her “legal” service.
And how is that relavent?
Its not relative to payment processors. Just a short aside related to grand ma-grand pa scams.
My insider source tells me over 60k backlinks were created across a series of web 2.0 properties, article directories, social bookmarking, social media links, blog comments and forum profiles in a link pyramid with IP diversity, proper anchor text, LSI, and good ratio of dofollow/nofollow links. Basically, “the works.”
Not to undermine the value of linking between skeptics – that certainly helps – but the campaign on “getting the word out” for Zeek would make for a nice case study.
GFP is already gone, perhaps the next big scam will cause the SEO vigilantes to return… (cue Bat-Signal)
You can’t drown people in onesided information. That will normally make people become less interested.
It’s not worth the efforts doing it on a regular basis. We’re not SELLING anything, so we won’t need to use strategies like that (e.g. 1 website “confirming” the other website). That strategy is more typical for bad software.
People will normally find what they’re looking for anyway.
SOME efforts are normally acceptable, but too much efforts will probably have opposite effect, e.g. give people the feeling that you’re trying to “drown” them in specific types of information.
The other side’s already doing it with “testimonials”, fan/spam domains, spam blogs, and such. We’re getting drowned by the buzz in most cases.
Mike Driggers is a fullout liar. He along with Cathy Chang and the others run a pozi scheme to take hardworking peoples money. Hope the SEC catch up with all of you and put you to rot behind bars.