Greenough Ads launched in early 2014 and names a Samuel Thomas Gillespie as the owner of the company on their website.

The Greenough Ads website domain (“greenoughads.com”) was registered on the 3rd of December 2013 and provides an address in the UK. According the Google, “Tollgate House” in Cardiff, Wales is a “waste transfer station” in the middle of an industrial lot.

No further information Gillespie is provided, with the Greenough Ads website only offering up the following vague marketing spiel:

My Name is SAMUEL THOMAS GILLESPIE the head of a team of admins running these Great Home base website which is an hybrid (sic) Program with four powerful sustainable incomes plans.

I myself was unable to find any further information on Gillespie in association with the MLM industry.

Due to the obviously fake address used, broken English on the Greenough Ads website and generic anglo-saxon sounding admin name used, I’m going to raise a red-flag and suggest that Gillespie does not exist.

It’s a common enough approach for scammers operating out of Asia (typically India) to register companies in the UK with bogus details.

As always, if a MLM company is not openly upfront about who is running or owns it, think long and hard about joining and/or handing over any money. [Continue reading…]

There is no information on the Worldwide Solutionz website indicating who owns or runs the business.

The company does have a “Who are you?” section in their FAQ, but it only provides the following vague marketing copy:

WorldWide SolutionZ is an umbrella company combining the best and most innovative elements of on-line and off-line business to allow anyone with the initiative and desire to seek financial freedom to fulfil their dreams, through a range of cutting edge, unique business initiatives.

The Worldwide Solutionz website domain (“worldwidesolutionz.com”) was registered on the 28th of July 2012, and names a Ruan Van Niekerk-Venter as the domain owner. An address in Johannesburg, South Africa is also provided.

On his LinkedIn profile, Niekerk-Venter (right) credits himself as a “systems administrator” at Golder Associates (non-MLM). There is no mention of Worldwide Solutionz and I was unable to find any further MLM history, indicating that Worldwide Solutionz is Niekerk-Venter’s first MLM venture.

Read on for a full review of the Worldwide Solutionz MLM business opportunity. [Continue reading…]

Fusion Shopping Network launched in early 2014 and are based out the US state of Wyoming. Heading up the company is Dr. Frank R. George, who serves as Fusion Shopping Network’s CEO and President.

Fusion Shopping Network seems to have originated from a previous venture titled “Fusion Entertainment”. According to a now defunct Fusion Entertainment blog (“fusionentertainmentllc.com”), back in February of 2013 Fusion Entertainment began to ‘work with top Comp plan software company (and) top MLM legal counsel‘.

Fusion Entertainment LLC is an Arizona domiciled Limited liability Company. It is currently owned and operated solely by Management. The Company is also advised on the Network Marketing side by a leadership council that includes some of the industry’s best and hardest working leaders.

It’s main business is currently the development of a new online auction and discount shopping site using a network marketing strategy for sales and marketing. We are developing a strong and innovative compensation plan that will attract many thousands and products and services that will attract millions.

In addition, we are partnering with some of the world’s best compensation plan consultants, networking software designers and others to create an extremely strong corporate structure and customer service program.

The end result of Fusion Entertainment’s efforts would appear to be the Fusion Shopping Network, with the following additional information provided on the company website:

Fusion Shopping Network is a Wyoming domiciled Limited Liability Company with headquarters in Cheyenne, Wyoming. It is a privately held Company with all Units (shares) currently held by Management. It was formed in 2013 following a divestment from Fusion Entertainment LLC, which was formed in 2010 out of Amethyst Technologies, Inc., an Arizona Type “S” Corporation formed in 1995.

Note that some of the above information was pulled from the Fusion Entertainment LLC website Google cache, indicating that the site was only recently taken down. Why the Fusion Entertainment LLC website was pulled is not immediately clear.

Prior to Fusion Entertainment the business was called “SpyderBids LLC”, which looked to be an attempt to cash in on the MLM penny auction craze at the time.

As for Frank R. George (right),

Dr. George is a “serial entrepreneur” and has been referred to by investors as a “rainmaker.” He has over thirty years of experience including multiple successes with launching and growing private companies, extensive regulatory compliance experience plus a strong understanding of private equity and other forms of business funding.

While he holds a Ph.D. in Neuroscience and Genetics, he prefers to call it a degree in “thinking” and has used his talents and skills in several arenas over the years.

There’s no MLM related information in George’s Fusion Shopping or Fusion Entertainment corporate bios, and I was unable to find any further information online. Presumably Fusion Shopping Network is Frank R. George’s first MLM venture.

Read on for a full review of the Fusion Shopping Network MLM business opportunity. [Continue reading…]

TelexFree has recently been attempting to make inroads in Europe. In addition to heavily promoting the investment scheme throughout Russia, the company’s affiliate investors have also targeted western European countries.

Anticipating Europe to be a primary source of new investor funds with which to pay out existing investors with, TelexFree are even going so far as to hold their next conference in Madrid, Spain this weekend.

Fortunately all this Ponzi pimping hasn’t gone unnoticed, with at least one police department in the UK issuing a public warning against what they refer to as a “scam”. [Continue reading…]

It’s getting rather difficult to keep up with the continuous changes Phillip Ming Xu keeps making to his global Ponzi empire. After regulators around the world began to target Xu and his WCM777 Ponzi scheme late last year, he changed its name to Kingdom777 and hid behind the skirt of newly appointed CEO, James Tenorio.

What became of Tenorio remains unclear. He published one update on the Kingdom777 website in January, after which rumors claiming he’d abandoned the post began to surface. I was never able to confirm this information, however it seems Tenorio has since gone into hiding as there has been no communication from him since.

That left Ming Xu back in charge, and with Kingdom777 barely over a month old, it appears he’s gone and changed the name of his scheme yet again. [Continue reading…]

There’s been somewhat of a recent trend in MLM to collectively refer to affiliates and retail customers as just “customers”. No doubt the brainchild of a PR firm and compliance team conceived in a dank basement somewhere, the idea behind the constant use of this marketing tactic is to infer that affiliate customers equate to retail customers.

With affiliates being participants in the business opportunity this couldn’t be farther from the truth, but it doesn’t stop some MLM companies from trying. One such example is Empower Network’s David Wood.

In a series of Facebook posts today Wood, totally channeling the “there no difference between affiliates and retail customers” vibe, made some rather interesting suggestions to Empower Network’s affiliate-base. [Continue reading…]

Whilst it’s true that World Ventures don’t directly financially compensation you for bringing others to the business itself, you still have to bring others to the Rovia business to get anywhere in the compensation plan. And this, despite being a third party recruitment is still recruitment dependent MLM.

–BehindMLM World Ventures Review, March 2011

Just under a year ago the Norwegian Gaming Board announced that they had launched an investigation into World Ventures. At the time the investigation was revealed, this is what I wrote:

Concerned that World Ventures might be a “pyramid” and in violation of Norway’s “Lottery Act”, the Norwegian Gaming Board issued a press release yesterday stating

(The) Gaming Board has established a supervision of the company World Ventures’s activities in this country. We shall consider the Company operates in violation of Lottery Act which says that the pyramids are illegal.

Lottery Act § 16 states that it is forbidden both to create, operate, participate in or distribute pyramids.

The Act defines the pyramid as “pyramid sales system where the consideration paid for the opportunity to earn income, mainly because the other offices of the system, and no sale or consumption of services or other benefits.”

Looking at World Ventures’ compensation plan, it’s pretty much a given that they are going to fall foul of the Lottery Act’s pyramid scheme definition.

Nine months later and the Gaming Board’s investigation has concluded.

The verdict?

World Ventures is an illegal pyramid scheme. [Continue reading…]

Prosperity Cash Machine launched in late 2013 and is headed up by Julie Wilson and Paul Stevenson. There’s no official mention of the two on any company documentation, but their names frequently appear as credited owners on the company’s “testimonials” page:

In a September 2013 email sent out to Prosperity Cash Machine affiliate DeMarcus Davenport (who describes himself as a “leader who joined at the top”), Julie Wilson (based out of Ireland) offers some further insight into the company:

Hi DeMarcus,

I am the owner and I am 100% transparent and accessible to the members. I don’t have a bio online as such, however I have 100’s of people that I’ve worked with over the years and would happily vouch for me. I was the owner of CashLines LLC (not to be confused with ‘The Cashline’) similar to Prosperity Cash Machine, but not quite so powerful as it had a lower entry cost. That program was very successful until Zeek Rewards took everyone’s attention away with the lure of passive earnings.

Anyhow, I prided myself on being at the forefront and making sure support was top-notch and everything was running smoothly. Out of 1000’s of people in the program, we only ever had 8 refund requests and I put that down to good communication and support.

In the next couple of days the conf calls will start and it will be ME on the calls so that those that do not know me already, can get to know me. I don’t need to call you for anything important, but am more than happy to do so!

Yes, you can bring in people and you don’t need to restrict it to a few leaders, but large groups will need to hold off for a week or two. What I am doing for the leaders just now is creating an online spreadsheet so that they can keep a track of things in their team. Everything is being tracked very closely from this end too.

Best Wishes
Julie

I wasn’t able to find any specifics on CashLines, as per Wilson’s own words it was comparable to Zeek Rewards, a $600M Ponzi scheme shutdown by the SEC in 2012. Wilson writes Prosperity Cash Machine is “similar” to Cash Lines LLC, so that should give some idea of the types of schemes Wilson owns and operates.

Prior to launching Prosperity Cash Machine, Paul Stevenson (based out of Europe) was promoting ISN Coins (numismatic coins) on Youtube:

The “ISN Power Team” video provides instruction on ‘the fastest and most profitable way to build your (ISN) business‘ by, as per the August 2013 video screenshot above, advising viewers to recruit three new ISN affiliates, who recruit three new affiliates, who recruit three new affiliates and so on and so forth.

Whereas Julie Wilson appears to be seasoned at launching Zeek Rewards comparable schemes, Prosperity Cash Machine would appear to be Paul Stevenson’s first attempt at running a company.

Read on for a full review of the Prosperity Cash Machine MLM business opportunity. [Continue reading…]

FreeLife International launched in 1995 and are based out of the US state of Arizona. Initially marketing products in the nutritional supplements, weight loss and personal care niches, today FreeLife focuses on products containing goji juice.

Heading up FreeLife International on the executive side of things is Ray Faltinsky (right), who serves as CEO and Co-Founder with Kevin Fournier (FreeLife’s President).

Although the first decade or so appears to have been smooth sailing for FreeLife, the last decade has seen the company face two major counts of controversy.

In 2007, following an undercover investigation by CBC, Freelife came under scrutiny for making claims it’s goji products contained anti-cancer and anti-ageing properties.

FreeLife’s former spokesperson, Earl Mindell, has made several unfounded claims about health benefits of the company’s brand of goji juice, including that it has anticancer and anti-aging properties.

Mindell’s involvement with FreeLife was subject of a CBC hidden camera investigation in January 2007, questioning the unsupported anticancer properties of Himalayan Goji Juice and validity of Mindell’s Ph.D. qualification (which was later proved invalid and removed from Mindell’s biography on the FreeLife website).

Claims that undetermined constituents of goji may have a beneficial effect on cancer derive from preliminary evidence of cancer cell inhibition in vitro (i.e. in a dish).

There is no scientific evidence such effects occur in vivo (i.e. when consumed). H. Leon Bradlow, coauthor of a study that Mindell cites as support for this anticancer claim, says that his original research does not, in fact, prove that goji has any anticancer properties.

To the best of my knowledge no regulatory action took place regarding Mindell’s claims, however in 2009 Freelife again found itself in the headlines after a class-action lawsuit was filed against it.

The lawsuit, filed in Arizona, alleged the company made

false claims, misrepresentations, false and deceptive advertising and other issues regarding FreeLife’s Himalayan Goji Juice, GoChi, and TaiSlim products’.

Freelife settled the lawsuit April 2010, making a donation to an “educational organization” and promising to ‘take steps to ensure that its goji products are not marketed as “unheated” or “raw.”‘

More recently, Faltinsky and Fournier have launched L’Dara International to market an anti-ageing serum. Commencing business operations in late 2013, it appears L’Dara is yet to gain any traction.

At the time of publication Faltinsky and Fournier preside over both companies, which are believed to operate independently of eachother. It is noted though that both companies list the same corporate address in Arizona on their respective websites.

Read on for a full review of the FreeLife International MLM business opportunity. [Continue reading…]

A phoenix is a mythical bird that, upon dying, resurrects itself from the ashes of its former self.

Rippln went down in flames last year, following the revelation that the company had failed to secure new investment and was being sued for trademark infringement by Ripple Labs. More thermo-nuclear apocalypse than phoenix, nonetheless and despite months of non-communication and evacuation orders from top affiliates, Rippln now appears to want to resurrect itself.

Well, at least if a recent affiliate email is to be believed. [Continue reading…]