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.

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.

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."

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. I reached out to people from GigaOm, and was told it was a video that was recorded years ago, and not for "Leading Edge." However, their response does suggest that, perhaps, GigaOm got taken in by a different version of the scam a few years back. They told me that "the video was produced and licensed to Public Television for limited distribution through May 2013." However, GigaOm "did not have any knowledge it was being used by Leading Edge nor did we authorize or condone its use for this purpose." The company further said that it is looking further into the matter and may "take legal action to prevent it from being used by Leading Edge in the future."

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.

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

World Progress Report Promotes Program About 'Scams'; Helps Hide All The Complaints That It's A Scam

from the seo-tactics dept

We recently pointed out that the latest name for Vision Media TV appeared to be World Progress Report, and it appeared to be doing the same thing that it has been heavily criticized for by both the New York Times and NPR. Basically, it's the same deal: they hire a semi-famous retired news person (such as Walter Cronkite, Hugh Downs and Joan Lunden) and get them to film a generic "opening" to a "report" about some organization (usually a non-profit), with the claim that such programs will appear on "public television." Then they approach the non-profits about having a news segment done about them (heavily name dropping the current "star") for "public television." Then they drop the news that the organization needs to pay the "production costs," which run anywhere from $20,000 to $30,000. A poorly edited clip is filmed, which never airs on PBS. In fact, PBS has put a warning on its website specifically calling out the company under various names and suggesting if you're contacted by any of them to notify PBS so it can complain:

PBS wishes to clarify that it is not associated with and does not endorse, distribute programming for, review underwriting for or otherwise have any business relationship with the following production companies: American Artists Television, American Review TV, Business Break TV, Business Trends, Eco Planet TV, Event Media TV, Evergreen Entertainment, Family Television Studios, Food For Thought TV, Giving Back, Global Television Studios, Great America (with Hugh Downs), Healthy Path, Heroes of Hope, Infinity Media Group, Insights, Paradigm Media Group, Platinum Group, PMG, PMGTV, Roadshow Productions, United Media Communications Group, Vision Media, Vision Media Television, VM Television, VT Media, VT Media Productions, or World Progress Report (with Joan Lunden). PBS does not oversee the production or distribution of any programs associated with any of these companies.

If you are solicited by a production company that claims or implies an association with PBS, please notify PBS.

However, one of the oddities about World Progress Report was the fact that it was putting out a bunch of press releases promoting a program on "scams." While at first people thought this was just irony, Paul Levy notes that it seems to have the effect of burying any Google results that call World Progress Report a "scam."

By this new strategy, World Progress Report is loading up the search results both for its own name, and for its name combined with the word "scam," with reports about its supposed public television programming. As a result, the information that impartial critics are calling it a scam are being buried in a welter of search results for its own self-promotion.

Filed Under: scams, world progress report
Companies: pbs, vision media tv, world progress report

How Long Until Joan Lunden Disassociates Herself From World Progress Report?

from the anyone-want-to-take-a-guess? dept

Earlier this year, we wrote about the company called Vision Media TV, which was suing the site 800notes.com after people on that site had written reports about Vision Media TV, questioning its sales techniques. It seems that Vision Media TV would go around contacting organizations, heavily talking up its association with former TV newscaster Hugh Downs, and suggesting (heavily) that the TV broadcast it would put together for the organization contacted would air on "public television." Of course, to cover some basic "production costs," Vision Media TV just wanted a mere $20,000 to $30,000.

Investigations into Vision Media TV suggested that the questions raised by people at 800notes were reasonable concerns. The NY Times and NPR have debunked many of the claims from Vision Media TV, noting that PBS had clearly claimed that it has no association with Vision Media and that the promises from the company were questionable at best. From NPR:

They are promised the shows will be educational in nature and reach an estimated 60 million American households on public television stations across the country.

But the programs aren't documentaries; they're marketing segments that will cost the firms that are their subjects roughly $25,000 apiece. And the spots, created by Vision Media of Boca Raton, Fla., are likely to receive little airtime, if any, on local PBS member stations.

"They are selling something that they generally cannot deliver," says Garry Denny, program director of Wisconsin Public Television and a past president of the professional association of programming officials for PBS member stations. "In fact, they are probably not carried by any public television station around the country."

Officials at PBS and at PBS member stations in California, Colorado, Kentucky, New York, South Carolina and Virginia were all aware of the Hugh Downs spots. Yet not one knew of a concrete instance in which the spots featuring Downs appeared on their stations or those of others. PBS and its member stations say they adhere to guidelines banning marketing programming paid for by subjects of the programs.

From the NY Times:

The caller suggests that the production will be shown on public television and major cable news stations. But the initial pitch, foundation representatives said, does not mention that the production would cost the university or foundation $20,000 or more.

PBS, the national public broadcasting program provider, has had a warning on its Web site for the last three years that it "is not associated with and does not endorse, distribute programming for, review underwriting for or otherwise have any business relationship" with a list of productions companies that includes Vision Media Television.

Lea Sloan, vice president for communications at PBS, said this week, "PBS has no actual knowledge of carriage of any Vision Media programming by any PBS member station."

In defending 800notes against Vision Media TV's lawsuit, Paul Alan Levy dug up some interesting history on Vision Media TV, such as the fact that it had gone under a variety of other names, such as WJMK and United Media -- using other famous personalities including Walter Cronkite and Mike Douglas, both of whom ended up suing the company over being misled. Somewhere along the way, the company again changed its name to Great America HD. However, after more press attention, Hugh Downs disassociated himself with the company, with his representatives saying that his involvement hadn't gone very far, and that Downs was unaware of the company's practices:

On Tuesday, Rick Hersh, Downs' agent, said he had been unaware of Vision Media's practices. "It's not great for Hugh, the way that you portrayed them. We didn't know about some of the stuff you reported."

But Hersh said Downs' involvement was limited to a single day's shooting of generic introductions to the videos at a television studio in Phoenix two years ago. And Hersh said Downs bore no responsibility for how Vision Media sold the videos to clients or what they contained.

As Downs' appearance was contractually limited to public television, Hersh said, "We took comfort in relying on public television not to put something on the air that they didn't find legitimate and honest and straightforward."

Thankfully, the lawsuit against 800notes.com was dismissed, and the increased press attention, as well as the loss of Downs' support, meant trouble for Great America HD. However, Levy has continued to monitor the company and now notes that a brand new company, with remarkably similar content on its webpages and remarkably similar claims, has suddenly popped up under the name "World Progress Report," but this time the "celebrity" involved is former Good Morning America Host Joan Lunden. Levy also notes that apparently the folks behind World Progress Report have decided to be more proactive on their 800notes.com page, which has numerous posts from people talking up their wonderful experiences with the company, and quickly responding to comments that suggest this is a scam, by saying "there must have been a miscommunication."

Given all of this, and the history involved, I have to wonder how long it will be until there's some press attention on World Progress Report, and how long until Joan Lunden follows the lead of Downs, Cronkite, Douglas and others, and decides to disassociate herself from the company.

Filed Under: joan lunden
Companies: 800notes, great america hd, united media, vision media tv, wjmk, world progress report