Talk Fusion: A web-based pyramid marketing scheme.
Zach Eustace
We’ve all been there, trawling Facebook drunkenly late at night, friend requesting people who look amusing, or with “hilarious” names . Time passes, and as the sun rises, the shame sets in, and sleep offers an escape from late night depressive techno-activity.
The remnants of these sort of binges are easily brushed under the carpet., as the majority of the people in this connected world obey social norms and ignore the friend request from someone they don’t know from 5000 miles away (I like to think that Mr. Willy Phelan and Ms. Mo’ Spliff have the self-awareness to realize exactly what’s happened.)
Sometimes though, people want to be your friend. That’s when it gets worrying.
I awoke with a new friend, Mr. C, and he had left me a message.
“Greetings from Rayong, Thailand, good to be a friend with you. Make sure to find me on twitters and enjoy new interesting business opportunities.”, my new friend copy and pasted, as his bright yellow suit and hands clasped in celebration profile picture gave me an inkling as to why I had made his acquaintance in the first place.
As my LinkedIn profile states, I am always open to new business opportunities, and my interest had been piqued, and I discovered Talk Fusion. Mr. C’s profile had plenty of further information allowing me to proceed with due diligence.
According to their website, Talk Fusion are “The Unchallenged Leaders In Video Email” with many products in their portfolio including, but not limited to, Video Email which “Works on Mac or PC, ending the battle of cross compatibility!”, and whcich can be used for “Business or Personal- market your business or showcase the kids”. Showcase the kids, you say? Shut up and take my money!
Before we go further, it’s quite evident that something is not right here. Even before I can get to the bullet points where Talk Fusion promise me that I can “Be Everywhere- saving time and money!”, the soulless eyes of the diverse Stock Photo characters that fill my screen let me know that something is not right. Friendly stock photo faces are meant to make you feel safe, seeing them immediately puts me on edge.
The fact that their website nowhere encourages you to actually use these products, but rather talks about the business opportunities these products provide to you, makes me even more suspicious. I would give my right nut to send some “eye catching video e-mails” but all the website seems to want me to do is read about their groundbreaking “instant pay compensation plan”.
I am, it becomes increasingly evident, at the bottom rung of a nu-pyramid scene: a multi-level-marketing opportunity.
Before the internet and facebook, a savvy pyramid seller would have to leverage their contacts to find people willing to invest, but Facebook puts a world of rubes at your fingertips; selling a terrible product becomes a lot easier when your access to stupid people exponentially rises. The game done changed.
A quick hop, skip and a jump away is a facebook search for Talk Fusion, and there they are, thousands of would be entrepreneurs setting up their own poorly realized facebook pages, where I can hear more about the revolutionary Fusion Wall, the world’s first 3-D social network.
I’m torn: are these Talk Fusion-ers being preyed on, lured in with a promise of a lucrative future and equipped with only a cursory understanding of the internet? Or are they lazy opportunists searching for a get rich quick scheme, that would be no better if it was built on the much more scalable trapezoid model.
Mr. C seemed like a good guy, and I go to seek solace from my new friend, who will prove to me that there’s more substance to him than an outdated software suite and a hawkish desire to make money from the good people of the internet.
And then, I get to see my first ever Talk Fusion video e-mail, Mr. C has put it up on his profile for everyone to see. Embedded onto a garish purple gradient background, which itself is ornamented by pictures of dogs in party hats and sunglasses (one of Talk Fusions exciting template designs), is a video of Mr. C.
He strolls down a rural Thai road, and awkwardly expounds on the virtues of Talk Fusion in broken English: “We live in a computer world; people today they don’t want to receive a long mail, a short video is much personal”. I feel our friendship slip away as he continues: “It’s going round the world like a bushfire, it is everywhere, it’s fantastic! Money returns quickly!”
“I think many of you are wondering, wondering why I am walking”, his pace having visibly slowed as he nears his destination too soon, “Well, I am walking home to my computer to send video e-mails”
Of course you are Mr. C. Of course you are.
