Latest 'Pay To Be On 'Public' TV' Scam Involves Football Coach Jimmy Johnson
from the 'leading-edge' dept
A few years back, we wrote a series of articles about an operation called Vision Media TV (and a variety of other rapidly changing names, including WJMK, United Media, World Progress Report, and Great America HD, among many others). The basic "business" of this operation was to get a semi-famous TV personality to be the "host" of a TV show, then go around pitching gullible businesses that it was a legitimate TV show on "public broadcasting TV" or "national public television" and that they wanted to do a profile on that small business. The scam was you just had to pay a "small fee" (usually upwards of $20,000). Oh yeah, and the claims of being on TV were somewhat dubious as well. Among the "hosts" we had mentioned back then, there had been Joan Lunden, Walter Cronkite (!?!) and Hugh Downs -- all three of whom backed away after they were called out for participating in a scam. You can see a legal filing from a few years ago that goes through this scam in rather great detail.The scam continued to morph. A few years ago, under the name "In Focus," it was "hosted" by Martin Sheen, until that got called out and was shut down. Then it was "Outlook with Ben Kingsley." But the basics of the scam were the same. The semi-famous or famous "host" obviously just comes in for like a day of reading intros on a cheap TV set, and then they show a "profile" on the company who paid big bucks. The claims of being on "public TV" are massively exaggerated to downright bogus. The NY Times did a big expose on this scam back in 2008. NPR did a detailed takedown in 2010. PBS itself has put out a warning to people not to believe the claims from these ever-rotating operations about their shows being on "public television." It notes that it has no association with any such show and PBS never solicits money from organizations to be on TV.
But it keeps morphing, as evidenced by the Martin Sheen and Ben Kingsley versions, both of which happened long after those stories.
The latest version uses the same basic playbook -- and this time the "talent" is famed football coach Jimmy Johnson, and the show is called "Leading Edge with Jimmy Johnson." The reason I know about this is because the somewhat clueless folks who work there decided to pitch Techdirt/Floor64 to be on the program (apparently unaware that we'd written about scammers like themselves before):
My name is Barbara Rock, I'm the assistant to Mr. Bill Thomas who is the Sr. Producer for Leading Edge on National Public Television. If you're not familiar with the program, it's an interstitial news break that airs prime time in the U.S. on National Public Television just after The Nightly Business Report.Note the careful word choice. "National Public Television," not PBS (though, a neat attempt to confuse with National Public Radio). Also, whoever is behind "Leading Edge" also is doing some fairly dodgy SEO work. They've registered a ton of domain names like "leadingedgeseriespbs.com" (and .org and .biz and many more) trying to imply an association with PBS that isn't really there. According to the Washington Post article linked above, they did the same with the Martin Sheen show, with numerous sites using combinations of "Martin Sheen" and "PBS" in the URLs, but with small disclaimers elsewhere saying they're not associated with PBS. That article also notes that the actual contract terms say that the videos "will be distributed" to "public Television stations in all 50 states," with potential "estimated viewership and reach for one year [of] 60 million households."
The reason for my contact Mr. Thomas will be producing a few segments for our upcoming season highlighting innovative breakthroughs and solutions that are changing the way we live and work, and our research department has forwarded to Mr. Thomas a general profile on Floor64 as a possible invite to the program for this segment.
If you have a few minutes one day next week, Mr. Thomas would like to discuss this with you in more detail, to learn more about Floor64 and to see if the organization would be a good fit for this segment.
Yes, again, carefully ambiguous language. By saying "distributed" it just means they'll send them out -- not that anyone will air them.
I sought more information from "Barbara Rock" and she was rather straightforward in admitting that we would have to pay -- though she insisted that it wasn't a fee to be on the show, even though it clearly was:
For starters this is not a “pay-for-play” where we would be asking Floor64 to buy airtime. As a matter fact Public TV does not sell commercials. An interstitial news break is the 5 min. between programs on Public Television. The only costs associated is a pre-production/underwriting fee of $18,900 plus travel. In addition to being featured on The Leading Edge program Floor64 would also receive a fully produced 5 min. corp. demo and a fully produced 1 min. commercial that would air primetime on CNBC 50 times in the markets of your choice. All production and distribution is included in the fee.Again, note the careful choice of words. You're not "buying airtime" -- just "pre-production, underwriting." Real TV programs don't do that. She also followed up on the claim about PBS/public television saying:
Our program airs across the country on Public Television, some of which are PBS affiliated, however our segments run on all Public TV stations not just the ones that are PBS affiliated. Our presenting station is KRCB in San Francisco.So she claims they run on "all Public TV stations" which is clearly a bogus claim. Furthermore, if you click on that KRCB link, the URL suggests it was once about "Leading Edge" but now takes you to a "page not found" link, so if KRCB ever did show Leading Edge, that appeared to have gone away. I asked Barbara about this missing link, and she apparently decided I was asking too many questions, refusing any further responses. I also reached out multiple times to KRCB's senior executives, Nancy Dobbs and Larry Stratton, both of whom refused to respond to email and phone requests for comments. I'm not sure why, but that certainly seems fairly sketchy.
However, before Barbara stopped responding to me, she did offer two examples of companies that had participated in the Leading Edge series as enticements as to why I might be interested: GigaOm and DocuSign. Now, I know folks at GigaOm, and they're not ones to be taken in by a scam like this. But, indeed, there they are, featured on the Leading Edge site.
No matter what, this seems like another version of the same old scam, tricking businesses into paying big bucks for questionable claims of being on "public television" on a show hosted by some celebrity. Indeed, if you do a search, you can find a bunch of businesses in press releases about how "Leading Edge with Jimmy Johnson" will "host an upcoming segment" on whatever it is that business is doing. Hopefully, with a bit more attention, Jimmy Johnson will back away from this, the same way Walter Cronkite, Hugh Downs, Joan Lunden, Martin Sheen and Ben Kingsley did in the past. But, of course, it seems likely the deal will just morph and be back with another semi-famous "host" soon after.
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Filed Under: ben kingsley, company profiles, jimmy johnson, joan lunden, martin sheen, pay to play, public tv, walter cronkite
Companies: docusign, gigaom, great america hd, in focus, krcb, leading edge, outlook, pbs, vision media tv, wjmk, world progress report
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GigaOm with a DCMA?
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Cold Call Research FAIL
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For $5k I can put you on TV 24/7!
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Here's the thing. You personally are not going to be able to sell someone else's property. It takes someone with a license in real estate to do that. This tells you, you aren't going to be making that money. Someone with the license is.
The connotation of "flipping" tells you they are after someone else to finance them. You're the go between and unlikely to make any money but more likely to spend a lot of time of your own not to mention out of pocket expenses such as fuel and vehicle maintenance. It's billed as someone else paying for it. Who else is there but the owner/potential buyer. So they are looking to jack the prices for their profit while screwing the local yokels.
It sounds just like another version of this scam.
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probably legal "on paper"
It's not unlike the gaggle of companies that prey on aspiring artists and entertainers, selling them "professionally produced" photo or video sessions that they claim will get distributed to the bigwigs in Hollywood (which if true, would likely just go straight to the trash unseen).
But carefully read the contract they make everyone sign, and it becomes obvious that the whole scheme is little more than hot air, as they don't actually promise anything.
While it would seem that only the truly gullible and naive would ever fall for such a pitch, desperate people do desperate things -- and rarely bother to read the fine print of contracts.
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Re: probably legal "on paper"
"It's not unlike the gaggle of companies that prey on aspiring artists and entertainer"
Indeed, and those are scams as well. In fact, as you point out, those are the same scam as this, just tailored for a different demographic.
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Everything old is new again
As far as I can tell they just buy lists of small/medium business owners and CEOs and call them with the same pitch.
As soon as someone tells me they're calling from a TV studio, I have learned to just automatically say that we never do paid placement. They usually hang up at that point.
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Re: Everything old is new again
It can be quite fun!
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Who would want to be on something like that?
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CNBC ad?
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CNBC ad?
The only costs associated is a pre-production/underwriting fee of $18,900 plus travel... a fully produced 1 min. commercial that would air primetime on CNBC 50 times in the markets of your choice.
I'm not in the business but that sounds cheap - $378 per run. Which makes me think there really is no CNBC ad, which would make this fraudulent. Or maybe "CNBC" is not Cable National Broadcast Corporation, but a rinky dink public access channel somewhere.
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Oh, take a look at this...
By which I mean the html source...
>login in javascript
I guess that's par for the cause...
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Re: Oh, take a look at this...
For those few who don't understand, it's hard to find a less competent way to implement a login function than this. It shows you the required user and password values in plaintext right in the code.
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A very old story
While the resulting videos are eventually offered up to stations, I'm not aware of any who use them.
No legitimate public TV organization in the US will ask an organization to pay for the privilege of being profiled within a program. (Note that I'm not talking about underwriting messages, but actual editorial content.)
One tip-off that these folks don't even understand the medium they're trying to sell is that they cite an interstitial break on public TV as being five minutes. A typical PTV break is just over three minutes; "The Nightly Business Report" mentioned above runs a consistent 26:46.
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Jimmy Johnson scam
It was introduced to me as champions of industry.
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Has SOUL SHERPA (R) Patient Advocacy Been Scammed?
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Re: Has SOUL SHERPA (R) Patient Advocacy Been Scammed?
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Re: Re: Has SOUL SHERPA (R) Patient Advocacy Been Scammed?
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Champions of Industry - Jimmy Johnson Scam
Looks as though they are targeting Kickstarter and other crowd funding sites looking for people or small companies who are willing to do whatever they can to get publicity for their products or services. We were contacted as Champions of Industry almost verbatim to the article however, the guy on the phone did not speak fluent enough to be a TV producer in my opinion. Their Google street view location also appears to be a rent an office suite or desk type of place. Not a TV studio as one would think.
I have not used my real name or URL here because now it is my turn to scam them... I plan on playing there game and wasting as much of their time and money as they intended for me. I will sign their contracts with fake names and arrange times for taping and make sure they know the check is in the mail. lol...
Thank you Tech Dirt for this article as it saved us a lot of wasted time and money however, a trip to Florida would of been nice especially with all the snow here in November... lol...
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"Champions of Industry"
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"Born Again Crooks"
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Public TV Scam
The script was almost word for word what you have posted. So I'd say, Bewared of Darth Vader.
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This is still going on under the website: http://enterprisestv.com/
Again this semi legit scam is still running under http://enterprisestv.com/ with Kevin Harrington
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And there's a new one
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Latest Enterprises TV Scam
Just wanted everyone to know they are still pulling this scam.....be wary of any production or offers coming out of Florida.....seems to be a good state to do these kinds of things. Possibly because seniors seem to me easily hoodwinked....don't know why.
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Innovations with Ed Begley Jr.
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Re: Innovations with Ed Begley Jr.
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Public Television or PBS?
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Kathy Ireland TV Show
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Don't call me; I'll call you
This is a sales call in disguise. I've had many of them over the years by various businesses (including the one backed by Corbin Bernsen), and they all seem to originate from Florida AND frequently have generic-sounding business names that can disappear in a sea of Google search pages. I've responded to them in the past but never spent much time before my BS-o-Meter would go off.
Despite my high skepticism, I actually considered one of these groups a few years ago because their package was more realistic, meaning, they weren't implying get-rich-quick results due to a well-known television personality. I spent many hours contemplating investing in their "production services" -- even to the point of sending them several samples of my product -- but eventually decided they were shady. Their lovely demeanors turned ugly when I told them the deal was off because I found their whole arrangement suspicious. The current group contacting me is probably another iteration of the former. As others have mentioned, many of these businesses are the same moving target when they get sued, close the business, and resume practices under another name.
For cold-calling salespeople, my answer is always NO. If I want a service, I will seek it. Even if they're calling on behalf of a semi-famous tv personality.
Thank you for articles like this and the commenters on them. When I searched Kevin Harrington, positive-leaning links filled the first pages of search. I had to dig down to find articles like this one. I hope others being contacted by any of these groups will find this and consider whether their "investment" is worth it.
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PBS does NOT air this
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NOT A SCAM
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Re: NOT A SCAM
Did you read the article and the links?
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Re: NOT A SCAM
Also, this is how people are fooled by a scam. The web site says it's legit so it must be right??!!?? No, the web site is not going to tell you "by the way we don't actually get your program on PBS". Of course everything looks above board if you only look at the scammer's web site.
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Re: NOT A SCAM
In order to succeed in business, you need to develop a brand and while this is what they claim they can help you with, they themselves always keep reinventing their operating companies so as to keep a clean BBB rating, name of show, and spokespersons. There is not one good reason why a show would not want to create a consistent brand unless there was a reason to stay one step ahead of unhappy clients from keeping their complaints from reaching prospective new companies.
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Got the call too
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Smells of scam, not sure how these people live with their lives.
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Nothing wrong with paying for Advertising
It appears some of these companies might clearly be unethical in their practices, however there are several others that after researching them, provide a high quality product and have great reviews.
From my experience with a well know PR firm in Chicago, nothing is free. Yes, we found our clients 'free' editorial media opportunities but they were paying us to do so for them. Additionally, if they wanted the rights to use the 'free' media we found them, they had to pay the production company a licensing fee for it depending on where and how it was to be used.
We used to outsource corporate video production which ranged anywhere from 15-20k for a 10-minute video which was strictly for internal or trade show use (non-broadcast). These 'pay to play' companies are in essence offering a lot more for the same or not that much more money.
Again, as long as both parties know the terms and are in contractual agreement, what is the harm?
-AF
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Re: Nothing wrong with paying for Advertising
It's probably a case of the letter of the contract being fulfilled, while in the approach and negotiations, they are using deceptive tactics. I think this can still be fraud - you can't lie about a deal, hope the other person doesn't read the contract carefully, and then nail them after they've signed it.
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https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=126056182
http://help.pbs.org/support/solutions /articles/5000673367-i-ve-been-contacted-by-a-tv-producer-who-claims-that-he-will-feature-my-company -in-a-national-public
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Re: Liars and scammers
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PR Report- Shady Telescammers asking for money
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Re:
They are also doing Laurence Fishburne Behind the Scenes AND In Depth.
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We received a solicitation and my partner responded to the email with interest. After the pitch, we shortly received an email of the agreement requesting $27k inclusive of the travel costs paid in 3 installments. I then started the google rabbit hole when I specifically googled one of the previous companies showcased on their website and it showed up as Information Matrix instead of Behind the Scenes. That then led me to various scam related articles including this one. They go to great lengths to fill up the searches with their PR announcements, etc so the cursory searches turn up nothing. Years after this article is written, they are doing the exact same thing with minor changes to their actors and documentation but at the end of the day, they are still scamming. We told them were weren’t interested after doing some research and to not solicit us again. Other names that seem connected are Bill Hough (search name and Boca Raton) and possibly James Batmasian who is the largest commercial property owner in Boca Raton.
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