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Tag: Andy Bowdoin

  • ROLLER-COASTER: AVG Forum Closes, Reopens, Closes

    UPDATED 2:03 A.M. EDT (July 4, U.S.A.) In the past few days, the AdViewGlobal (AVG) forum has closed, reopened, and closed again. The actions occurred in the wake of complaints from members who have been pleading with the company to provide understandable explanations and to stop blaming participants for AVG’s seeming inability to explain itself.

    In a bizarre communication, AVG advised members that the initial forum closure had occurred because posts by some members were contributing to the confusion of other members. Nearly 50 posts were deleted, members said.

    The forum later reopened briefly, with a disclaimer that suggested the company would ban members who misbehaved and contact their Internet Service Providers to report them. The act led to questions about whether AVG was trying to chill legitimate criticism and manage the operation by instilling fear within the rank-and-file, which never has been provided an audited financial statement by the firm and yet was told the company was healthy even as it was suspending payouts. The forum closed again a short time later, amid an announcement that Donna Rougeau, who defined herself as an AVG subcontractor and had emerged as the face of the company, had left the beleaguered surf firm.

    Previously, AVG had threatened media outlets with copyright-infringement lawsuits if they published information that originated inside the confines of the AVG “private association.” By implication, the threat also extended to members who shared information outside association walls, putting members in the strange position of not being able to share news — good or bad — unless they were willing to risk getting sued.

    Some members viewed the threats as a strong-arm tactic. AVG’s name recently appeared in a racketeering lawsuit filed against AdSurfDaily President Andy Bowdoin, although the company has not been named a defendant in the case.

    AVG, which earlier had announced a new payout plan and then withdrew it when members said it left more questions unanswered than answered, advised members that it would re-release the plan in bite-sized chunks over an unspecified time period.

    Members immediately complained that the company had implied they were too stupid to understand a plan that was published all at one time, suggesting that the company’s real problem was that it had sent one mixed message after another.

    Mixing Politics And Business

    AVG purports to be a professional advertising and communications firm that, although based in Uruguay, derives its authority from the U.S. Constitution and the Florida Constitution. The AVG “Articles of Association” reads like a political document, not a business document.  AVG, for instance, appoints an association “Protector.”

    Among other things, AVG declares, “We proclaim the freedom to choose and perform for ourselves the types of advertising and marketing enterprises.” (Sic.)

    One interpretation of the document is that AVG has declared its own American subcountry and will pick and choose the laws it intends to follow.

    Such incongruities are part and parcel to AVG’s corner of the autosurfing universe. The firm has close ties to AdSurfDaily, whose own universe is dominated by equally inexplicable behavior.

    At least one member of ASD declared himself a “sovereign” in court documents not related to the ASD case, purporting that he enjoyed diplomatic immunity and answered only to Jesus Christ.

    The ASD member, Curtis Richmond, has a history that includes being charged and convicted of contempt of court for threatening federal judges. Richmond also has been ordered to pay damages to victims in a RICO case in which several individuals declared themselves members of a sovereign “Indian” tribe and filed claims for astronomical damages against public officials in the performance of their duties.

    Members of the tribe placed financial judgments — one in excess of $200 million — against the public officials. The officials successfully sued the tribe members under racketeering and mail-fraud statutes, and a federal judge ruled that the tribe was a “complete sham.”

    When Richmond began to file pro se pleadings in the ASD case, an AVG forum operated by some of the Mods and members of the Pro-AdSurfDaily Surf’s Up forum declared him a “hero.” Federal prosecutors, however, argued that Richmond’s pleadings — and others that streamed in using a Richmond litigation blueprint — were delaying refunds for victims of Andy Bowdoin and ASD.

    Dissing The Doubters

    AVG’s loyalists long have compounded the company’s problems by dissing doubters on AVG’s forum and on a now-closed AVG forum once operated by some of the Mods and members of the ProAdSurfDaily Surf’s Up forum, casting doubters as simpletons, “plants” or turncoats. Members did not take kindly to scoldings from representatives of a company that was holding onto their money and not revealing the names of its “Management Team.”

    AVG now concedes it is owned by George and Judy Harris. The surf firm still has not identified managers. AVG purportedly has 30 founding members, and it is widely believed that most — if not all — of the founders came from AdSurfDaily, which is in trouble for wire fraud, money-laundering, selling unregistered securities and operating a Ponzi scheme.

    It is believed — though it has not been confirmed in public records — that the U.S. government has seized several bank accounts of AVG members who also belonged to ASD.

    At the same time, other AVG loyalists have taken the PR fight to Blogs and websites that raise questions about AVG, but only have managed to add to the company’s mounting PR problems.

    While AVG was announcing an apparent shift in business models as it apparently was holding onto vast sums of members’ cash collected under an earlier business model, one AVG advocate said a person who questioned the firm could benefit from “penis enlargement.”

    We used “apparently” above because AVG publishes no audited financials and expects members to accept its assertions as an article of faith. It’s the same thing that got ASD President Andy Bowdoin in trouble.

    Two days ago — in what we believe was an accidental forwarding by an AVG supporter who put our email address in a database after contacting us through our Contact form — this Blog was copied with an email message from an AVG member who reported to another member that he had posted here and called us “chickenshit.”

    The other member responded by calling us a “spineless coward” — and happens to be a promoter who once pitched Noobing, a surf program that had positioned itself as an excellent choice for people with hearing impairments.

    AVG’s message is impossibly tangled, and the resulting confusion is not exclusively about how the company is addressing Ponzi concerns. The core incongruity is that the company purports to be a professional advertising and communications firm, but butchers one message after another, re-plumbs the message after being criticized by members — and then butchers the re-plumbed message.

    AVG’s inability to settle on a message and explain its business model without ambiguity — as well as its awkward bids to maintain secrecy and suppress criticism — have angered some members and managed to keep the company in the news for weeks. Some of the messages simply cannot be reconciled because of the firm’s obvious ties to ASD.

    Why AVG’s Ties To ASD Matter

    AVG previously listed George and Judy Harris on the website as “Trustees” of the AVG offshore “private association,” but now says the Harrises own the company.

    George Harris is the stepson of AdSurfDaily President Andy Bowdoin. George Harris is the son of Bowdoin’s wife, Edna Faye Bowdoin. Judy Harris is the wife of George Harris. George and Judy Harris, Andy Bowdoin and Edna Faye Bowdoin  are named in a federal forfeiture complaint filed in December as people who organized illegal conduct and benefited from it.

    Andy Bowdoin and Edna Faye Bowdoin also are named in a lawsuit in Florida as the parties responsible for operating a massive pyramid scheme that fleeced investors, including senior citizens. Andy Bowdoin also is named a defendant in a racketeering lawsuit filed by ASD members who seek class-action certification.

    Andy Bowdoin has not responded to the RICO complaint, which was filed in January. Earlier this week, the plaintiffs in the RICO case described AVG in court filings as a new iteration of ASD and autosurf schemes, listing employees and staff ASD and AVG had in common, including George Harris.

    Andy Bowdoin identified George Harris last year as head of ASD’s “real estate division” in front of an audience of hundreds of people.

    Federal prosecutors say Andy Bowdoin signed a proffer letter in the forfeiture case and acknowledged ASD was operating illegally when the U.S. Secret Service seized tens of millions of dollars from the company last year.

    Bowdoin initially contested the forfeiture. In November, a federal judge issued a devastating ruling, saying ASD had not demonstrated it was a legal business and not a Ponzi scheme at an evidentiary hearing in the early fall.

    ASD had specifically requested the hearing. The judge granted its petition to conduct the hearing in the interests of justice — of making absolutely certain that the ASD side of the Ponzi story would be told in court and considered on the merits — and federal prosecutors did not object.

    About a month after the judge’s ruling, prosecutors filed a second forfeiture complaint against assets tied to ASD. This complaint named George and Judy Harris as beneficiaries of ASD’s illegal conduct, alleging that George Harris and Edna Faye Bowdoin had opened a bank account and funded it with illegal proceeds from ASD, and that George Harris later used more than $157,000 of the opening deposit to pay off the mortgage on the Tallahassee home he shares with Judy Harris.

    Illegal proceeds from ASD also were used by George and Judy Harris to purchase an automobile, prosecutors said. The complaint also alleged that Andy Bowdoin had a history of collecting money through surfing schemes and that large sums of the money later would disappear.

    To explain ASD’s inability to pay, Bowdoin said that Russian “hackers” had stolen $1 million from ASD and that an unspecified amount of other money also had gone missing because of script problems, prosecutors said.

    But Bowdoin never reported the thefts because he did not want the scrutiny, prosecutors said. They added that he paid an employee of ASD to surf for Bowdoin’s son, so the son could benefit from ASD “rebates” while performing no actual work.

    Prosecutors alleged that Bowdoin started a new iteration of ASD, moving members’ holdings from one venture to the next, while paying off his obligations to his initial investors with money that came from new participants: a textbook Ponzi scheme.

    The same types of concerns now are being raised about AVG.

  • Questions AdViewGlobal Members Might Want To Ask The ‘Management Team’ As Surf Sinks Into Cash-Out Abyss

    AdViewGlobal (AVG) has announced the suspension of cash-outs and a decision to make an 80/20 program mandatory. AVG members should ask the “management team” if there is any possibility that any of the following three things happened.

    1.) Money paid to AdSurfDaily members by ASD ended up in the AVG system. (For example, a member got paid by ASD, and then later moved the money to AVG. Or, alternatively, an ASD member sold ad-packs directly to ASD downline members, deposited the money in his personal bank account, and later moved the money to AVG.)
    2.) “Founders” and insiders of AVG used fictitious paper profits that once existed in ASD as their capital contribution to AVG.
    3.) Founders/insiders of AVG took a disproportionate share of AVG’s early revenue and cashed out their fictitious ASD profits — in whole or in part — through AVG .

    Here is why these questions are important:

    1.) ASD’s visible cash and other assets were frozen by the U.S. government in a wire-fraud and money-laundering investigation, but other cash that once resided in ASD’s bank accounts had made its way into the bank accounts of ASD members. It also is known that some ASD members collected money directly from customers for the purchase of ad-packs, and then deposited the money in their personal bank accounts and used ASD’s internal system to move the ad-packs to the purchasers. Money from No. 1 (above) is money laundered twice, which means it is doubly dirty. If it was unclean when it resided in ASD, it is doubly unclean inside AVG.

    2.) Money from No. 2 above doesn’t really exist, which means AVG created value where none existed and had non-founders/non-insiders fund the value — as ASD allegedly did with its ASD Cash Generator iteration.

    Looking at it another way, AVG could have used the theoretical value of money now held by the government in the ASD case — and also the fictitious paper profits — to fund the launch of the company, passing the real cost off to non-insiders/non-founders.

    3.) Money from No. 3 above would mean founders/insiders paid themselves disproportionate shares before anyone else got paid, thus plundering the company.

    The autosurf landscape is littered with stories about plundering. To explain suspended cash-outs, ASD President Andy Bowdoin once claimed script problems were to blame. Meanwhile, Bowdoin claimed Russian “hackers” had stolen more than $1 million from the company.

    Bowdoin never filed a police report — not even to report a purported theft in excess of $1 million, prosecutors said.

    The reason one has to consider each of the possibilities above is that AVG suspended cash-outs after collecting money for 5+ months, then made 80/20 mandatory, while also changing the maturity dates for “page impressions” from 150 to 180 to 210 days.

    As one of our readers pointed out, the situation AVG currently confronts is like the situation a bank would confront if it advertised CDs and couldn’t fund redemptions on their maturity dates.

    Customers would buy the CDs, expecting a return in 150 days. On cash-out day, the bank would tell customers that it couldn’t fund the redemptions, hoped to be able to fund them by adding two months to the maturity date in anticipation of new revenue — but, in any case, when customers went to cash-out two months later, they could take only 20 percent of the money they were owed and were told they must keep 80 percent of their money in the system.

    Financier Allen Stanford faced a similar problem with CDs earlier this year on the Caribbean island nation of Antigua, and has been indicted on Ponzi and fraud charges. Prosecutors said he created the mirage of value by employing a series of accounting tricks.

    There is a fourth possibility to consider with AVG: Not all founders/insiders were created equally and that the people closest to the money cherry-picked some of it for themselves, and then told the other founders/insiders that AVG simply wasn’t generating enough revenue or that “bad members” had siphoned off cash.

    Putting it in the context of the ASD case, did Russian “hackers” really steal more than $1 million — or was it simply more convenient to blame them to cover up theft and insider dealings?

    Here is another possibility: No one at AVG stole anything, no one paid themselves early, the founders/insiders kept all their money in the company — and AVG simply flopped because it couldn’t generate enough cash.

    A few things could be in play in this scenario. AVG, for example, could have relatively few customers willing to pay for its “advertising” services — and that the existing base of AVG’s “advertisers” willing to spend money is too small to support the weight of the liabilities or even a break-even line.

    It also is possible that the banking system “caught” AVG early and choked off its access to wires and the money supply, thus starving the company.

  • Bank Of America Seeks Oral Argument In ASD Aiding-And-Abetting Claim; Files Dismissal Motion

    Andy Bowdoin: Still a no-show in RICO case
    Andy Bowdoin: Still a no-show in RICO case

    Bank of America has asked U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer to hear oral arguments in its bid to be dismissed as a defendant in a lawsuit that alleged it aided and abetted a Ponzi scheme operated by alleged racketeers associated with Florida-based AdSurfDaily Inc.

    Federal prosecutors seized at least $79.8 million from 15 bank accounts controlled by ASD President Andy Bowdoin or Golden Panda Ad Builder President Clarence Busby, saying the funds were the proceeds of a criminal enterprise that engaged in wire fraud, money-laundering and the sale of unregistered securities.

    Three ASD members sued Bowdoin, Busby and ASD attorney Robert Garner under federal RICO statutes, claiming the men had engaged in racketeering  — including indictable offenses — with unnamed others.

    Bank of America was not named a RICO defendant. Rather, the bank was accused of aiding and abetting the RICO defendants in a fraudulent scheme.

    The bank said the plaintiffs had failed to show that it had aided or abetted the RICO defendants in any way, repeating an earlier assertion that “banks are not guarantors” of their customers’ conduct.

    “No law holds that a bank could be held liabile for conducting legitimate business activities with an entity that, as it turns out, also happens to be committing a fraud against others,” the bank argued. “Nor can there be if banks are to conduct business.”

    The lawsuit was filed in January. In April, plaintiffs Mike Collins, Frank Greene and Natures Discount Inc. amended the complaint, alleging that Bank of America employees were moonlighting as ASD employees in Florida while ASD was commiting fraud in plain sight.

    Collins, Greene and Natures Discount said that a “majority” of employees of Bank of America’s branch in Quincy, Fla., also worked for ASD, including the branch manager.

    Bank of America, however, said moonlighting was “lawful” conduct.

    “The alleged moonlighting activities of Bank of America employees did not occur within the scope of duty of the employees’ employment with Bank of America, and Plaintiffs do not allege that they did,” the bank argued.

    “This conduct, as lawful as it is, cannot be imputed to Bank of America,” the bank continued. “Regardless, Plaintiffs alleged no facts demonstrating which Bank of America employees knew that ASD’s conduct was fraudulent, how they learned this, when or how they intentionally aided the scheme in some way.”

    Bowdoin is the sole defendant in the RICO case not to have responded to the complaint. Prosecutors said he signed a proffer letter in the federal case and acknowledged ASD was operating illegally.

    In January, Bowdoin submitted to the forfeiture. He changed his mind in late February and began to file pro se motions, chiding prosecutors by saying his filings “should really get their attention.”

    Bowdoin promised to hold a conference call to update members nearly three months ago, but he has not done so. He also did not inform them of the proffer letter prosecutors said he signed or explain why he has not responded to the RICO complaint filed nearly five months ago.

  • News And Notes: Surf’s Up Poster Calls For ‘Militia’ To Rise Against Government; BizAdSplash Urges Members Not To Contact MasterCard Vendors

    NEWS: A member of the Pro-AdSurfDaily Surf’s Up forum says he is willing to “Bear Arms in line with the Bill of Rights” and storm Washington, D.C., if a “militia” can be formed.

    In a separate thread, the poster said the government ruined his life last year when it seized assets tied to the Florida autosurf firm and that he is ready to fight to the “DEATH.”

    “If anyone from the US Government reads this,” the poster said, “yes[,] look out because you are now my enemy. May God Bless Andy [Bowdoin] and all ASD members. I’m done with working within the system. I will destroy the entire US Government if that is what it takes to serve justice for ASD members.”

    The incendiary remarks were contained in two threads, one of which was titled “Letter from Andy.” A poster within the thread had criticized Bowdoin for not conducting a conference call he had promised nearly three months ago in a letter to members published at Surf’s Up, opining that Bowdoin should get “jail time.”

    In response to the post critical of Bowdoin, yet another poster appealed to the Surf’s Up Mods to cleanse the forum of “rats.” A Mod assured the poster that, if the purported rat again posted “negative garbage” about Bowdoin, the offending post would be deleted.

    The Mod said nothing about the “militia” post.

    NOTE: In court filings in a racketeering lawsuit against Bowdoin, ASD attorney Robert Garner and Golden Panda Ad Builder President Clarence Busby, one of Busby’s pleadings defines him as a minister of 30 years’ standing and uses the abbreviation “Rev.” at least 120 times.

    Golden Panda has ceded to the government more than $14 million it had gathered in only days last summer as the so-called “Chinese” version of ASD. In the months that followed, a new, Busby-connected surf known as BizAdSplash (BAS) opened, touting an offshore location.

    Early promoters identified Busby as the owner, but others defined him as a consultant.

    As a marketing proposition, identifying Busby in any capacity of authority at BAS was odd regardless of any title he held, in no small part because he consented to the forfeiture of Golden Panda’s assets in September, saying he had relied on ASD’s assertions that the program was legal.

    Only in the incongruous world of the autosurf could a man responsible for a stunning, $14 million loss of investor funds be positioned as a marketing plus.

    Work-around?

    One seized Golden Panda account contained precisely $6 million, according to federal prosecutors.

    Choosing his words carefully in a sworn court filing in August, Busby said none of the Golden Panda money came from Bowdoin or ASD, that Busby had provided an unspecified amount of “seed” capital from his real-estate business and that Golden Panda “obtained all other start up money from 34 founders.”

    Amounts Busby provided personally or obtained from the “founders” weren’t disclosed in Busby’s filing.

    Busby’s filing, however, did not rule out the possibility that one or more “founders” provided capital from “profits” paid to them by ASD and deposited in their individual bank accounts and that “profits” then were forwarded to Golden Panda.

    Nor does it rule out the possibility that Golden Panda seed money from one or more “founders” flowed to the company after the “founders” deposited checks from individual ASD downline members in the “founders’” private bank accounts, shifted a corresponding amount of “ad-packs” to ASD downline members by using ASD’s internal system, and then forwarded the desposit amount or portion thereof to Golden Panda, instead of ASD.

    Busby said a prosecution claim that a “majority” of Golden Panda’s funds came from ASD was “false.”

    There have been numerous reports that ASD prospects paid sponsors directly for ad-pack purchases, that the sponsors deposited the money in their individual checking accounts at their local banks and then used ASD’s internal system to transfer ad-packs to the individual prospects.

    The approach was pitched as a work-around, because ASD was having trouble posting payments from individual members and getting them started in the “rebate” program, which was purported in advertisements to pay 1 percent a day or 30 percent a month.

    Given this scenario, it is possible that huge sums paid by ASD “rally” attendees were deposited into the private bank accounts of individual ASD promoters and that the deposits were routed directly to Golden Panda, instead of ASD.

    “Neither Bowdoin nor ASD provided any capital,” Busby said.

    Busby’s claim about Golden Panda’s seed money would be true — at least in a technical sense — if any of Golden Panda’s “founders” also were ASD promoters who deposited money from ASD downline members directly in the promoters’ back accounts, transferred a corresponding amount of ad-packs to the members using ASD’s internal system, and then forwarded the funds to Golden Panda, instead of ASD.

    It is known that at least one of Golden Panda’s “founders” was a highly visible ASD promoter who helped the company organize rallies at which millions of dollars were collected. It also is known that some ASD prospects who attended the rallies paid sponsors directly for “ad-pack” purchases and that the sponsors deposited the money in their individual checking accounts and transferred a corresponding amount of “ad-packs” to the prospects by using ASD’s internal system.

    It is possible that a significant chunk of the money seized from Golden Panda originated with one or more “founders” who initiated private ad-pack transactions with individual ASD downline members, deposited the sums in their personal checking accounts and forwarded the funds to Golden Panda.

    ‘Chief Consultant’

    Busby now has officially been declared the “Chief Consultant” of BAS, in a news released marked a “must read” at the BAS website.

    Unlike Busby’s court filings in the RICO case, the BAS news release does not identify him as a minister or use an abbreviation such as “Rev.” It simply identifies him as “Clarence Busby.”

    Busby was enjoined by a federal judge in the 1990s from breaking securities laws, after he was implicated in three prime-bank schemes by the Securities and Exchange Commission. The government took mercy on Busby, waiving certain financial penalties and not interfering in a bankruptcy petition he filed.

    In the BAS news release, Busby assured members that BAS had “spent a tremendous amount of time and thousands of dollars on economists, attorneys and other professionals and with their advice have built this company in a very responsible manner.”

    Busby did not identify the economists, attorneys or other professionals. Nor did he mention the past encounter with the SEC or the current litigation involving ASD and Golden Panda Ad Builder. Busby did, however, provide an inspirational quotation from auto tycoon Henry Ford.

    Mum’s The Word

    Elsewhere on the news pages of BAS, the company urged members not to contact vendors associated with its use of MasterCard with any questions about the BAS program. The information appeared under a bright red headline titled, “URGENT INFORMATION FOR MASTERCARD USERS.”

    “At Biz Ad Splash, we have worked very hard to develop great relationships with some of the finest international banking services available,” BAS said. “We continually strive to maintain a good standing with these institutions in order to provide the best services possible to the Customer/Associates of Biz Ad Splash.”

    Last year, ASD announced that it was finalizing a deal with a company known as Praebius Communications that would result in a cash infusion of $200 million. ASD withdrew the news release after members responded by contacting Praebius in a bid to confirm or deny the deal.

    Some ASD members were infuriated that other members actually questioned the claim, describing even rational doubts as an act of disloyalty.

    In its MasterCard news release, BAS openly discouraged members from contacting any vendors to get answers to questions.

    “[W]e strongly urge our Biz Ad Splash Customer/Associates not to contact these vendors with questions concerning withdrawal requests or Biz Ad Splash card deposits,” BAS said.

  • Judge Gives Plaintiffs More Time To Respond To Robert Garner In AdSurfDaily RICO Case, But Says They Missed Filing Date For Response To Golden Panda’s Clarence Busby

    EDITOR’S NOTE: This story about filings in a racketeering lawsuit against AdSurfDaily President Andy Bowdoin, ASD attorney Robert Garner and Golden Panda Ad Builder President Clarence Busby also includes an update on a lawsuit filed last year against ASD by Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum. The information is under a subhead below.

    Although U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer yesterday granted a motion plaintiffs filed for more time to respond to Robert Garner’s motion to be dismissed as a defendant in a racketeering lawsuit, she advised the plaintiffs that they had missed a May 26 filing deadline to respond to Clarence Busby’s motions to be dismissed as a defendant.

    Collyer ordered the plaintiffs to show cause why Busby’s motion should not be granted, giving them until June 19 to do so.

    Busby was the president of Golden Panda Ad Builder. Garner was an attorney for AdSurfDaily.

    The judge had denied a motion by the plaintiffs earlier this week for more time to respond to Garner’s dismissal motion for “failure to cite good cause.” The plaintiffs filed an amended motion, which Collyer granted yesterday.

    A response to Garner’s dismissal motion now is due July 9. Attorney’s for the plaintiffs said they agreed to examine “whether or not to voluntarily dismiss [Garner] from the proceeding” prior to the new filing deadline.

    Earlier in the week Collyer denied motions by the plaintiffs to formally add two attorneys to the case, for “failure to confer with all opposing counsel.”

    ASD President Andy Bowdoin also is a RICO defendant. He has not responded to the lawsuit.

    In a separate case filed by the government last year against assets tied to ASD and Golden Panda amid allegations of wire fraud, money-laundering, selling unregistered securities and operating a Ponzi scheme, prosecutors seized more than $65 million from Bowdoin-controlled bank accounts  and more than $14 million from Busby-controlled accounts.

    Busby, a minister who also is in the real-estate business and was implicated by the SEC in a prime-bank scheme in the 1990s, submitted to the forfeiture in September.

    Bowdoin submitted to the forfeiture in January, but now says he changed his mind after meeting with a “group” and wants to re-contest it. Golden Panda amassed the $14 million sum in only days, and ASD amassed the $65 million sum in only weeks.

    Busby’s attorney — Jonathan W. Emord of Clifton, Va. — said in court filings that claims against “Rev. Busby are precluded by the United States’ civil forfeiture action under the doctrine of res judicata.

    “Plaintiffs are barred from relitigating issues resolved against Busby on behalf of the United States and all residents, citizens, and taxpayers concerning matters adjudicated which are of public interest,” Emord argued.

    In essence, the argument holds that, since Busby already has submitted to the forfeiture of funds and the government is establishing a mechanism for refunds, the RICO litigants already have a remedy.

    Garner, meanwhile, argued that the court lacks jurisdiction over him in the case. He is representing himself in the RICO action, although court filings suggest he also has paid professional counsel working behind the scenes.

    Florida Case Against Bowdoin At Standstill

    Why Bowdoin hasn’t responded to the RICO lawsuit is unclear. Also unclear is why there has been no public action since Jan. 6 in a lawsuit filed against Bowdoin and his wife, Edna Faye Bowdoin, by Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum.

    Federal prosecutors said in April that Bowdoin had signed a proffer letter in the federal case and acknowledged that ASD was operating illegally. Proffer letters sometimes mean that the one who proffers has agreed to provide the government information that is helpful in the prosecution of others.

    After signing the proffer letter, Bowdoin submitted to the forfeiture in January. Several weeks later, in late February, Bowdoin consulted with what he described as a “group” and began to file pro se court pleadings in the federal case.

    One day after Bowdoin signed his first pro-se pleading on Feb. 25, the AdViewGlobal (AVG) autosurf introduced members to Pro Advocate Group, which says it can help people practice law without a license and help companies form “private membership associations.”

    AVG now is operating as such an association.

    Pro Advocate Group, which also pushes a “legal defense” for taxpayers and “private medical associations,” is associated with Karl Dahlstrom. Dahlstrom was convicted of securities fraud and sentenced to 78 months in federal prison in the 1990s.

    Prosecutors said he bought automobiles with investors’ funds — something Bowdoin is accused of doing.

    AVG has close family, management and promotional ties to ASD. Two of Bowdoin’s family members –  George Harris and his wife, Judy Harris — are trustees of the AVG private “association.”

    George Harris is the son of Bowdoin’s wife, Edna Faye Bowdoin.

    AVG, which earlier had disclaimed any ties to ASD, now describes itself as a full-fledged advertising and communications company with a host of services.

    But the company has not explained how having ties to Bowdoin family members, friends and promoters is helpful for business, given twin forfeiture cases by the government against assets tied to ASD, the RICO case filed by ASD members and McCollum’s Florida case.

    In December — in an action separate from an August forfeiture filing by the federal government and McCollum’s August lawsuit — federal prosecutors filed a second forfeiture complaint against assets tied to ASD.

    Among other things, the December complaint alleged that Edna Faye Bowdoin and George Harris opened a checking account with nearly $180,000 in illegal proceeds from ASD. George Harris used more than $157,000 of the deposit to pay off the mortgage on the Tallahassee home he shared with his wife, prosecutors said.

    George and Judy Harris also acquired an automobile with illegal proceeds from ASD, prosecutors said.

    Last year, Bowdoin announced to ASD members that “Ponzi” allegations in the Florida case had been dropped. The announcement caused ASD members to race to online forums to share the good news, but proved to be false.

    McCollum’s office issued a statement denying Bowdoin’s assertions, saying Ponzi allegations hadn’t even been brought against ASD in Florida.

    Rather, McCollum’s office said, the state had accused ASD of operating a Pyramid scheme.

  • FOLLOW-UP: The Headline Flap Over Our AVG Story

    EDITOR’S NOTE: We published a story Wednesday that some members of AdViewGlobal (AVG) assert is unfair. At issue — particularly from a poster who uses the handle “CORRECTION!” — is the headline that accompanied the story.

    Another poster, “Pistol,” isn’t sympathic to the autosurf business and says he doesn’t suffer fools gladly on either side of the issue, but also raised a concern about the fairness of the headline. Meanwhile, other posters say the headline is fair. One of the issues is whether an AVG prospect can bypass AVG and purchase ad-packs directly from sponsors.

    Here is some background, and our response to the concerns. We’ll start by republishing a comment Pistol made. Pistol’s reference to the “200% thingy” below is a reference to an AVG matching-bonus program.

    The 200 percent program was advertised to have a June 29 expiration date, but AVG suddenly changed the expiration date to June 5. AVG members and prospects said they were concerned about not being able to get money to the company in time to qualify for the bonus, and an AVG promoter outlined a strategy by which members and prospects with “big bucks” could get the bonus by paying sponsors directly.

    Pistol: It doesn’t seem to me that the sponsor in question is suggesting that sponsors should give/sell members adpacks/page impressions from them (the sponsors) but rather a quick and easy way that they can help new members get funds available so that they can buy adpacks directly from AVGA thereby qualifying for the 200% thingy.

    OUR TAKE: During the first FOUR steps of what is described as the sponsor’s bid to provide a “quick and easy way” for prospects to buy ad-packs “directly” from AVG, the sponsor:

    1.) Gathers money from the prospect and makes a private agreement with the prospect that the final recipient of the funds will be AVG and that the funds will be used to purchase ad-packs.
    2.) Deposits the funds in the sponsor’s local bank.
    3.) Causes a wire to be sent to an offshore payment processor or sends a check via overnight mail to the offshore payment processor.
    4.) Waits for the payment processor to receive the funds and credit the sponsor’s account.

    That’s FOUR steps — or FIVE, if you count the private agreement as a separate step — so an argument that positions this as a purchase made “directly” from AVG isn’t a very compelling one.

    This deal cannot happen as the promoter describes, absent a private agreement between the sponsor and the prospect and subterfuge aimed at the local bank. Moreover, it can’t happen without use of the bank’s wire facility or use of a banking instrument, and it necessarily must involve the offshore processors because the prospect can’t wire funds to AVG directly.

    There’s that word again — “directly.”  With the exception of the prospect’s direct payment to the sponsor, there is virtually nothing direct about this transaction.

    At this point, the prospect’s bank thinks he is doing business with the sponsor, the sponsor’s bank thinks he is doing business with the prospect, and the payment processor thinks it is doing business with the sponsor.

    ONLY the prospect and the sponsor know that AVG is the intended final recipient — and they haven’t told anybody, FOUR or FIVE steps into the process.

    Additional Steps

    In the next step, the sponsor tells the offshore payment processor that AVG is the intended recipient, but the payment processor doesn’t know the prospect is hidden in the deal or is choosing not to know. The prospect’s role is to give money to the sponsor, so he can use the sponsor’s bank to get the money to the offshore processor in an environment that is conducive for AVG and most advantageous for the prospect.

    The payment processor obliges the sponsor and wires the money to AVG, but the transaction still is at least TWO steps away from completion, because the money or the value thereof somehow has to get back in the hands of the real customer, the prospect.

    So, the sponsor funds his AVG account, so he can use AVG’s internal system to get the money or the value thereof to the real customer, the prospect, for the purchase of ad-packs.

    A sale made “directly” through AVG? Hardly. This process is at least SEVEN steps removed from a direct transaction with AVG and perhaps as many as EIGHT. This sale cannot occur — and the prospect cannot get the 200 percent bonus — unless the prospect pays the sponsor directly. The sponsor is getting paid directly for the purchase of ad packs.

    Here, a person might want to ask why the prospect in search of a matching bonus before a deadline passes just can’t send the money to AVG directly and have it credited immediately. That’s the question some AVG members are asking right now. In fact, they asked it as soon as the sponsor laid out the strategy, and some AVG members are complaining out loud about money procedures that appear to be convoluted and complex.

    A person also might want to ask why AVG isn’t using PayPal, and instead is using the offshore surfing favorites: SolidTrustPay and StrictPay. PayPal does not touch this kind of business because it is fraught with secret agendas.

    Worth Noting

    It’s worth pointing out that some of the government personnel involved in the AdSurfDaily (ASD) case also were involved in the successful prosecution of e-Gold, which basically was accused of looking the other way while it processed payments for people who were laundering money.

    ASD, a Florida company federal prosecutors say once used e-Gold and engaged in wire fraud,  money-laundering and the sale of unregistered securities, has close ties to AVG.

    AVG, for example, lists ASD President Andy Bowdoin’s stepson — George Harris — as a “Trustee” of the AVG “private association.” Judy Harris, the wife of George Harris, also is listed as an AVG “Trustee.”

    A home and a car prosecutors say George and Judy Harris acquired with money from ASD was seized as the proceeds of a criminal enterprise in a December forfeiture complaint filed by the Feds.

    One of the issues in the e-Gold case was secret money transactions, and look what’s happening in the strategy outlined by the AVG promoter: The banks don’t know that the prospect and the sponsor just worked together to get funds to a final beneficiary unknown to the bank — AVG — and the processor doesn’t know the prospect is hidden in the deal or may be choosing not to know.

    Incongruous Messages

    AVG purports to be headquartered in Uruguay, has servers that resolve to Panama, receives money from offshore processors in Canada and Panama, but issued a news release this week with a dateline of Tallahassee.

    Many of our readers probably noticed that AVG didn’t use the words “Uruguay” or “Panama” or  “offshore” in its news release, but then immediately sent members an email purported to have originated in Uruguay — to celebrate a news release with a Tallahassee dateline.

    It’s a message hopelessly at odds with itself. It is particularly incongruous because AVG also now claims it provides professional PR services — but just look at what is happening:

    AVG can’t reconcile its own message. It is creating the appearance that it is in Tallahassee when it wants to look clean and proper — indeed, some people now say it is selling legitimate services priced from $30,000 to $200,000 — but it’s in Uruguay when it wants “advertising” rotator cash from folks who need to believe the Securities and Exchange Commission can’t touch them offshore.

    How do those competing notions come into balance? And why would a company that says it can command legitimate fees of up to $200,000 from clients not be running like a man on fire to exit the autosurf business? Incredibly, one promoter said today that AVG’s plan is to remain in the surf business and use the fees it collects for legitimate services to fund the surf.

    In the strategy outlined by the promoter, where is the money that started out at a local bank now? Uruguay? Panama? Florida? Elsewhere? And what routes will it take in the form of payouts to get back to members so it becomes spendable in their hometowns?

    The Headline Flap

    As many of our readers know, “CORRECTION!” is none too happy about this headline, which appears on this Blog.

    AdViewGlobal Promoter Says Prospects Can Bypass Company And Purchase Ad-Packs Directly From Sponsors To Ensure They Get Credited With 200 Percent Match Before Deadline

    CORRECTION repeatedly has demanded a retraction, although he has not identified himself as an AVG spokesperson or person in position of authority at AVG to bring a concern to our attention and ask for a clarification or a retraction. At the same time, CORRECTION will not answer basic questions about AVG’s business practices or provide evidence of verifiable income streams to refute concerns AVG is selling unregistered securities and operating as a Ponzi scheme.

    Let’s take the headline sections one at a time:

    /AdViewGlobal Promoter Says/

    Yes, it was an AVG promoter who shared the strategy of prospects paying sponsors directly and engaging in a process that involves at least SEVEN steps and ultimately results in the purchase of ad-packs. (AVG calls ad-packs “page impressions” or “viewer impressions.”)

    /Prospects Can Bypass Company/

    Yes, the prospect bypasses the company and pays money directly to the sponsor, under the strategy outlined by the promoter. The only thing AVG does in this transaction is make sure the electrons settle in the proper places when told to do so.

    /And Purchase Ad-Packs Directly From Sponsors/

    Yes, the sponsor is selling ad-packs directly because he directly collects the money for the ad-packs, routes the money offshore, causes it to be delivered to AVG, funds his own AVG account with his prospects’ money, and then causes AVG to redistribute the funds or the value thereof to complete the sale. In this case, the sponsor is more directly involved in the sale of ad-packs than AVG itself.

    /To Ensure They Get Credited With 200 Percent Match Before Deadline/

    Yes, this whole strategy was published because someone wanted to know the quickest way a person with $10,000 could get the money to AVG before the deadline to qualify for the 200 percent match.

    The promoter said it was a way to take care of the folks with “big bucks.”

  • BREAKING NEWS: Judge Denies Plaintiffs’ Motion In AdSurfDaily RICO Case For More Time To Respond To Garner Dismissal Motion; Bowdoin Still A No-Show

    A federal judge has denied a motion by the plaintiffs in a racketeering lawsuit against AdSurfDaily attorney Robert Garner for more time to respond to Garner’s motion to be dismissed as a defendant.

    Judge Rosemary Collyer said the plaintiffs had failed to cite “a good cause” to grant the delay.

    Meanwhile, Collyer also denied motions by the plaintiffs to let two additional attorneys enter the case, saying the plaintiffs’ attorneys failed “to confer with all opposing counsel” as required by a Local Rule.

    How things will proceed is unclear. The plaintiffs’ answer to Garner’s dismissal motion is due tomorrow. They had sought a delay until July 6.

    Garner’s RICO co-defendants include ASD President Andy Bowdoin and Golden Panda Ad Builder President Clarence Busby.

    Bowdoin has not responded to the lawsuit, which was filed in January and amended in April.

  • Garner May Have Paid Counsel In AdSurfDaily RICO Case

    UPDATED 5:42 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) In a flurry of activity in the racketeering lawsuit against ASD President Andy Bowdoin, ASD attorney Robert Garner and Golden Panda Ad Builder President Clarence Busby, the plaintiffs in the case have formally added two attorneys and filed a motion for more time to respond to Garner’s motion to be dismissed as a defendant.

    Filing pro se despite the fact he is an attorney, Garner earlier asked U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer to dismiss him as a defendant, arguing the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia had no jurisdiction over him.

    New court filings by the plaintiffs suggest Garner has retained paid counsel and that his attorney has agreed to give the plaintiffs until July 6 to respond to Garner’s self-filed dismissal motion. The response had been due tomorrow.

    The formal move by the plaintiffs — all of whom are ASD members — balances an earlier move by Bank of America to add two attorneys to its legal team. The bank is a Non-RICO defendant in the case.

    Bowdoin, Garner and Busby engaged in racketeering with unnamed others, and Bank of America aided and abetted the scheme, the plaintiffs alleged.

    Bowdoin still has not answered the RICO complaint, which was filed in January and amended in April.

  • BREAKING NEWS: Prosecutors Seek Final GP Forfeiture Order

    Federal prosecutors have asked U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer for an order that would finalize the forfeiture of more than $14 million seized from Golden Panda Ad Builder last year as part of the AdSurfDaily case.

    Golden Panda, whose president was Clarence Busby, amassed the amount in only days. The final sum, taking credits and offsets into account, was $14,048,598.07.  The government seized five Golden Panda accounts in all, including one that contained precisely $6 million.

    If Collyer signs the order, it would mean that the government gets final possession of the money. It also would mean that the government would be one step closer to implementing a refund procedure for for members who certified they were crime victims.

    A timeline for the full implementation of a refund program is far from clear because ASD President Andy Bowdoin and various pro se litigants are still fighting the forfeiture.

    More than $65.8 million was seized from Bowdoin accounts, including three accounts that contained the exact same amount: $1,000,338.91.

    Bowdoin’s largest account contained more than $31.6 million. Another Bowdoin account contained more than $23.7 million. A third Bowdoin account contained more than $4.99 million. (An additional $107 would have made it an even $5 million.)

    Ten Bowdoin accounts were seized in all.

  • AdViewGlobal, Promoters Trade On Names Of Forbes And Other Publishers To Trumpet Surf Firm’s News Release

    A promotional email sent today by the AdViewGlobal (AVG) autosurf hotlinks to servers from Forbes.com, the Washington Business Journal and The Business Review.

    The email reproduced logos of the publishing companies, pulling the images off the companies’ individual servers and creating the impression that the companies were endorsing the controversial surf firm. URLs that identify the servers are contained in code hidden on the page. The code is visible when viewing the properties of the email.

    Separately, individual AVG members used a Forbes logo and links to Forbes to promote the surf. AVG issued a news release through PR Newswire today, and Forbes published the PR Newswire feed. Forbes’ logo also appeared on a forum frequented by AVG members.

    It was not immediately clear if Forbes, the Washington Business Journal and The Business Review had authorized use of their logos or the hotlinking, which consumes bandwidth at the expense of the companies.

    In the email, AVG did not link to the PR Newswire URL for the news release. Instead, the surf linked to a Forbes URL that republished the PR Newswire feed.

    AdSurfDaily (ASD), a surf firm with close ties to AVG, was accused last year of operating a $100 million Ponzi scheme from a former flower shop in Quincy, Fla. Promoters claimed that ASD President Andy Bowdoin had received a special award from the White House for business achievement, but Bowdoin actually was a convicted felon who received an award from the National Republican Congressional Committee for campaign contributions, prosecutors said.

    Some ASD members also claimed Google had entered into a partnership with ASD, but the claim proved to be a click-fraud attempt in which ASD members were encouraged to click on ads so ASD could earn fees.

    Meanwhile, AVG announced that it was ending a 200-percent, matching-bonus program on June 5, twenty-four days earlier than advertised. The surf previously told members the promotion would end June 29.

    AVG has advertised matching bonuses as high as 250 percent. During a 200-percent promotion, a promoter claimed $5,000 spent with AVG turned into $15,000 “instantly!”

    The surf purports to be headquartered in Uruguay, but today’s PR Newswire release carried a dateline of Tallahassee. The promotional email AVG sent said the email originated in Uruguay.

  • Is It A ‘Ghost?’ Top 5 Reasons To Avoid AdViewGlobal

    EDITOR’S NOTE: There are plenty of reasons to avoid the AdViewGlobal (AVG) autosurf, not the least of which is that the government views the autosurf business model as foundationally corrupt. Autosurf operators and promoters are subject to prosecution under federal securities, wire-fraud, mail-fraud, money-laundering and racketeering statutes, and the surfs typically operate as Ponzi schemes. They also are subject to prosecution under state laws.

    Readers should not infer that numbered items in the Top 5 list below are ranked in order of importance. Some of the information below is being published for the first time today.

    1. AVG may be operating as a “ghost” enterprise. Research suggests that AVG, which purports to be headquartered offshore, may be using at least one U.S.-based company to funnel money to itself through complex wire transfers. The owner of the company filed a corporate bankruptcy petition in 2004 for a separate company he owned. In 2005, the owner filed a personal bankruptcy petition, listing nearly $1.4 million in liabilities and only $3,500 in assets.

    The 2005 bankruptcy petition listed the owner’s address as an apartment, specifically using the abbreviation “Apt.” The apartment address, however, appears to have been the address of a UPS Store that once operated as a Mailboxes Etc.

    A former business partner of the owner committed suicide in 2002, after members sued the former partner amid concerns that a large sum of money was missing from a co-op venture. Prior to taking his own life, the man made inquiries about banking in Switzerland and the Caribbean, according to court filings.

    One of the key selling points of AVG is its purported offshore location. The company claims to be headquartered in Uruguay. Its servers resolve to Panama. Regardless, the company has used “gmail” addresses from U.S. based Google to communicate with members and perform certain customer-service functions.

    A company with close ties to AdViewGlobal uses the address of this Florida office building.
    A company with ties to AdViewGlobal uses the address of this U.S. office building.

    Research suggests a company with which AVG has a close association is headquartered in a modern office building in the United States. The building was constructed in 2003. Office functions and conferencing can be rented by the hour. Two large airports are nearby, and a major Interstate highway is situated one mile from the building.

    We are declining to publish the address of the building or identify its specific geographic location. We have confirmed through public records and other sources, however, that the company lists an address at the building, that the business has made inquiries about international wire transfers and that two international financial-services companies have established a tie to AVG and blocked wire transactions because of the AVG tie.

    2. Two forfeiture cases against AdSurfDaily and a RICO case are still active. AVG launched in the wake of two forfeiture actions brought by the government against assets tied to AdSurfDaily and a racketeering lawsuit brought against ASD by individual members. AVG has close family, management and promotional ties to ASD (see No. 3 below), and the multiagency federal probe into ASD’s business practices is ongoing.

    It is known that the U.S. Secret Service, the Internal Revenue Service and the U.S. Department of Justice are involved in the investigation, and it is believed that the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service and the Securities and Exchange Commission have at least peripheral involvement. At the same time, it is known that the office of Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum is involved in the probe, and it is believed that other Florida agencies also are involved.

    It also is known that various state attorneys general, state banking regulators and state securities regulators have knowledge about the ASD case.

    Your AVG sponsor or his or her upline sponsor could be a target of the ASD investigation, which means you could be doing business with a person the government views as a participant in a criminal enterprise. Forfeiture complaints were filed against assets tied to ASD in August and December. The government views ASD as a criminal enterprise. All money collected by ASD and all “profits” derived from ASD are viewed as the proceeds of a crime.

    Meanwhile, the RICO complaint brought by ASD members in January alleged that ASD was engaged in racketeering with unnamed co-conspirators. Some of the alleged co-conspirators may have ties to AVG.

    3. AVG’s “association” structure does not insulate it from prosecution. AVG has shifted to an “association” structure, apparently on the theory that the “association” approach can immunize members from prosecution for violations of state and federal law. Such associations may say their power is derived from the U.S. Constitution. They may publish statements that resemble a loyalty oath and frequently are associated with tax schemes. Even by the incongruous standards of the surf world, AVG is setting a new standard for weirdness.

    The AV Global Association (AVGA) is now listing Judy Harris as its “First Trustee.” Harris, the wife of George Harris, replaces Gary Talbert in the role of “First Trustee.” George Harris, the stepson of AdSurfDaily President Andy Bowdoin, is the “Successor Trustee.”

    What this means, literally, is that AVG is linking itself to Bowdoin family members identified by the federal government as the beneficiaries of illegal conduct by ASD, after earlier disclaiming any affiliation with ASD and during an active criminal investigation.  What it means as a practical matter is unclear because the situation is so bizarre it almost defies description.

    Talbert, who is not a Bowdoin family member but is a former ASD executive who filed a sworn affidavit on ASD’s behalf in the August forfeiture case, resigned suddenly March 20 as AVG’s chief executive officer. Three days later, on March 23, AVG announced its bank account had been suspended. AVG has never provided a clear explanation of either event. Talbert’s name now has been removed as an AVG “Trustee.”

    Property owned by George and Judy Harris, including a car and a home in Tallahassee, Fla., was seized in the December forfeiture complaint, which alleged the $157,000 mortgage on the Harris home was retired with illegal proceeds derived from ASD.

    There has been no public action in the December forfeiture case since the filing of the complaint. Neither George nor Judy Harris has filed a claim to their home. Neither George nor Judy Harris has filed a claim to a car prosecutors alleged was purchased with illegal proceeds derived from ASD.

    4. At least one proffer letter exists in the ASD case. In April, in their final response to a series of responses to Andy Bowdoin’s pro se pleadings in the forfeiture case brought in August, prosecutors revealed that Bowdoin had signed a proffer letter. Proffer letters sometimes mean that the one who proffers is willing to provide the government information that is helpful in the prosecution of others.

    Bowdoin never told ASD members about the proffer letter. Nor did he tell them about the December forfeiture complaint, which includes extremely specific allegations. Bowdoin waited until March to tell members he had decided in January to submit to the forfeiture of tens of millions of dollars seized in the August complaint.

    Bowdoin’s first public comments on his January decision to submit to the forfeiture came in the form of a Bowdoin letter published in March on the pro-ASD Surf’s Up forum. In the letter,  Bowdoin triumphantly announced he had changed his mind about submitting to the forfeiture — while ignoring the fact that he never told members about the December complaint or his January forfeiture decision. In essence, Bowdoin blamed his former paid counsel for the trouble he was in and said the federal government was prosecuting ASD illegally.

    In his letter, Bowdoin chided federal prosecutors, saying his pro se pleadings “should really get their attention” and urging members to write to President Obama, members of Congress and Fox News personality Glenn Beck.

    At 74 — and a convicted felon from a 1990s securities scheme in which 89 separate instances of fraud were alleged in Alabama — Bowdoin urged his supporters to tell anybody who cared to listen that he was a victim of an out-of-control government. In July 2008, just days before the government seized tens of millions of dollars from ASD, Bowdoin plunked down nearly $50,000 to purchase a new Lincoln, according to the December forfeiture complaint.

    A month later he sent his Alabama victims a check for $100, according to the St. Petersburg Times, a Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper. The Lincoln alone cost more than the remaining restitution due the Alabama victims.

    Even though Bowdoin told ASD members in March that he would hold a conference call soon to explain what was going on, the conference call never materialized. And Bowdoin still has not told members about the proffer letter he signed.

    5. General confusion about AVG. One AVG member observed that the firm’s explanations about its business practices have been about as clear as “mud.”  Among the current issues are a failed attempt last week by the company to launch a new website, a denial by a company AVG said was facilitating offshore wire transfers that it had any business relationship with AVG, confusion about AVG debit cards and why some AVG members seem predisposed to cheer for the company as though members were taking part in a religious revival.

    Loyalists, meanwhile, continue to maintain that AVG members have a duty not to talk about the company in public, insisting that members adhere to “association” rules.

    Some AVG members say they want to use a spreadsheet to educate prospects about potential earnings, but others say spreadsheets are one of the things that led to trouble for AdSurfDaily. At the same time, members are trying to stop other members from using the word “investment” when discussing AVG, apparently believing that calling AVG an “advertising” company instead of an “investment” company somehow would insulate AVG from the prying eyes of the government.

    Such attempts at forced wordplay not only provide no protection, they also provide evidence of what investigators call “consciousness of guilt.” Indeed, there would be no reason to insist on the forced use of language if promoters didn’t recognize the legal danger they were in — and calling AVG an “advertising” company does nothing to change the simple fact that AVG and surfs that use similar models are vulnerable to charges of selling unregistered securities as investment contracts. The surfs cannot pass a simple test (“The Howey Test”) that became a threshold securities test and litigation benchmark 63 years ago, in 1946, when Harry Truman was President of the United States. The Howey case was on the books 15 years prior to the 1961 birth of Barack Obama, the current President, and 23 years prior to the first moon landing in 1969.

    In recent days, some AVG members have been reluctant even to mention the name “AdSurfDaily,” instead referring to the embattled surf with close AVG ties as the “company.” The paranoia is palpable.

    One problem with paranoia — and it is a problem AVG is experiencing — is that it does not translate well among people who have no reason to be paranoid. Many entry-level surf participants, for example, don’t understand that they’re being recruited into a wink-nod enterprise. They ask reasonable questions, but are met with paranoid responses and prompts to be less open and more secretive, which only accents the paranoia among those who know there actually is something to be paranoid about — chiefly, that virtually all autosurfs operate as Ponzi schemes and that the government could shut them down without warning at any moment.

    One AVG member instructed “international” members of AVG to insert “NA” in a debit-card application when prompted to supply a Social Security number, an instruction that only heightens concerns about money-laundering and wire fraud.

    A triumphant AVG announcement about a new debit card the surf intends to offer was met with a thud when some members found out later that the card came with a $30 fee. Loyalists, however, said members should embrace the fee because it creates a new profit center for the company. Other members are complaining that at least one of AVG’s debit cards seems to limit withdrawals to $100.

    AVG promoters, meanwhile, continue to lean heavily on exclamation points — rather than straightforward speech — to make their case for the company. An announcement about an AVG conference call was accompanied by three exclamation points:

    “Join Us For Exciting Updates!!!”