Singer sent to Prison
A singer, a person who provides fake references or testimonials for a business opportunity fraud, involved in the Cashlinks fraud was sent to prison yesterday.
"Jason Kowal, was sentenced today for conspiracy to commit mail fraud in connection with his activities at Cash Link Systems Inc., of Hollywood, Florida. Kowal, of Dania, Florida, was sentenced to a term of 70 months' imprisonment, 3 years of supervised release, and was ordered to pay $1,828,370.61 in restitution."
Singers are a key element in any franchise, business opportunity, or distributorship fraud because of the role they play in allowing social proof to influence the investor's decision making.
Singers are fake references provided by the criminals to the victims. Like all singers Jason Kowal was not a distributor and simply lied for pay, providing false testimonials.
Singers are also known as shills. In one rather poor choice of fake testimonials, the criminals tried to use the Attorney General of Texas as a shill for their opportunity. They were caught.
The FTC's new proposed Business Opportunity Rule would make the use of shills or singers illegal. It also produced a guide on endorsements and testimonials used in advertising.
But why do testimonials work? We have all seen these one name testimonials on blatantly fraudulent websites touting some herbal remedy or new money making scheme. Nobody pays any attention to them, do they?
Shills work because canned laughter works. Nobody likes canned laughter, we all say we hate it. But the scientific evidence is that the we all laugh louder and longer when canned laughter is present. We are primed to laugh. Shills, singers, and other testimonials prime us to act as if we were wildly successful, even as we know it is all nonsense.
Technorati Tags: mail fraud, franchise business opportunity, business opportunity fraud, singers, southern district of florida, hollywood florida, states postal inspection service, postal inspection service, r alexander, social proof, postal inspector, united states attorney, link systems, united states postal, distributorship, dania, acosta, restitution
