Sorry, John! I have never been a member of WGI or Aspiritus, although I have been subjected to a couple of recruitment attempts.
However, I have studied the pyramid scam in some detail, and I have friends and co-workers who have lost money on it.
More than 200 000 people are estimated to have lost money on WGI in Norway, and the names WGI and Greg Kennedy are mud here.
That is probably one of the reasons why the WGI scammers chose to change the name to Aspiritus, let Greg Kennedy run it from she shadows, and insert the new figurehead Steinbruchel.

As to living in the past, I think it is very important to know the past history of people who want you to invest money in their projects.

Why Mr Cook has chosen to work for Aspiritus, I cannot say, but he may have been lured by money, or the WGI/Aspiritus bosses, who are accomplished liars, may have managed to conceal the fact that Aspiritus is WGI with a new name.
To deny that Aspiritus is the successor to WGI, is a strategy they cling desperately on to, without convincing very many who know the facts.

Aspiritus claims that "Aspiritus N.V. is not associated with WGI"

FACTS:

Four of the board members of Aspiritus were previously involved in WGI, and Gregory James Kennedy still has a controlling interest in Aspiritus:
The board of directors of Aspiritus are:
Chief Executive Officer/ Chief Financial Officer– Jost Steinbruchel
Operations Director – Greg Young
Marketing Director - Conall McSorley
Company Secretary – Simon Hade
Director – Jan Buess
Director – Paul-Andre Jacot
Chairman (Non Exec) – Greg Kennedy

- Greg (Gregory James) Kennedy was chairman and principal owner of WGI, and he essentially still owns and controls the scheme, because his company Pacific Delta Investments Ltd. (which previously ran WGI) still owns between 65 and 70% of Aspiritus. This has been verified by Norwegian newspapers/media who have reviewed the "takeover" documents
http://www.hegnar.no/hegnar/newsdet.asp?id=179243&;cat=103
(In Norwegian, Hegnar Online financial website)
- Greg Young was previously President and CEO of WGI.
- Conall McSorley was previously press spokesman of WGI, dishing out the most inventive lies about why members were not receiving their money.
- Jost Steinbruchel is stated to be the leader of an outside group of businessmen who supposedly started Aspiritus and bought WGI's assets.
However, Steinbruchel has been involved in the WGI scheme since around 2001, when he acquired a sizeable ownership interest in an obsure Canadian mining company called Caesars Explorations Inc., which later changed its name to Great Southern Enterprises Corp.
http://www.mine.mn/Placer_Stockfile_Caesars_Exploration.htm
In 2004, Great Southern Enterprises Corp. was officially stated to be the "parent company" of WGI.
http://www.wgimalaysia.com/wgi_company.html (you may need The Wayback Machine for this one)

The products are essentially the same: Gambling marketed by MLM (or alternatively, a pyramid scheme masked as a gambling site). Only significant difference is that the stock market geme in Aspiritus sells four types of virtual (worthless) shares, while SMG in WGI had only one.

The promotors of Aspiritus are very much the same as the WGI promotors.
A shining example of this is Ms Shirley "70challenger"/"bryconn", who probably made the complaint leading to deletion of posts by S Holmes.
Shirley "70challenger"/"bryconn" has been a very active WGI and Aspiritus promotor since August 2004, spamming many web forums with promotional posts for WGI/Aspiritus. You can easily verify this by doing a Google search with keywords either "70challenger" or "bryconn".
She even continued promoting WGI after Canadian WGI promotors had been found guilty of illegal pyramid selling in December 2004, i.e. in direct defiance of §55 of the Competition Act of her own country (Canada), and in defiance of a court decision clearly stating that WGI was an illegal pyramid scheme.

Even many prominent WGI promotors openly state that Aspiritus is a renamed version of WGI.
A notable example is MLM author Pete Billac, who was advertised as key speaker at the first Aspiritus recruiting meeting in USA (11 June 2005 in Las Vegas).
At Pete Billac's web site http://www.petebillac.com/index2.htm , the heading of his WGI/Aspiritus book web page is:
"Aspiritus N.V.
(formerly World Games Inc)
By Pete Billac"

 

 

 

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Well another scam if you ask me, because WHY WOULD SOMEONE GIVE YOU MONEY FOR FREE???!!!!! it just ain't logical...i hope that noone will suffer because of this - they usually have a sort of thing that yuo have to pay just a litlle bit in advance and than you'll get LOOOT's of money, but then you get nothing and you relaize that you only lost some money!!

greetz

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Well, I have been with this company and its predecessor since 2003, and I haven't lost any money yet. Besides, The Bank of Norway has issued records which shows that approx. 300 million N.Kroner has been paid out to more than 5000 members in Norway alone. Must be pretty crowded on top of this alleged "pyramid"....

WGI faced many challenges in several countries around the world. Why? Because the authorities obviously want to protect one of the biggest dairy cows they have - the national lotteries etc. Other legitimate MLM companies (lotion, potion and powder companies) didn't get that much attention because they didn't deliver a product that was in direct competition with their own interests. I say that because the payplans don't differ that much. The verdict that S.Holmes refers to in Australia was instigated by another commonwealth country - Canada - to have WGI's operations shut down. WGI was off limit to the residents of Australia at the time anyway.

Why don't you ask Rod Cook himself if he is indeed associated with a pyramid scam, or go to http://s10.invisionfree.com/ASPIRITUSnews/index.php to ask other members if they feel that they have been scammed...?

John
www.cashflowrevolution.com

 

 

 

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Gambling isn't a very good way of earning money.. You lose most of the time and win only about less than 10% of the time. Imagine if everyone won a lot. The company would be out of business wouldn't it?

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Knowledge is power....

You are correct. Over the long haul you lose as long as you play in regular casinos that only offers you one-time-bonus-baits to get you signed up as a customer...

Our Company is the Premiere Provider of Online Entertainment, including Casinos, Stock Market Game, Sports Wagering, Peer-to-Peer Betting, Bingo, Live Poker rooms, Weekly Sweepstakes and Global lottery. Among all 2000+ online gaming providers, Aspiritus is the ONLY one to let YOU become a part of the "House". Through profit sharing, the company will give you and members of your network a commission on all gaming activities, whether you Win, Draw, or Lose! The higher the turnover, the higher the commission! This is totally unique in the gaming industry! This is what sets us apart form the rest; Instead of spending money on traditional marketing, Aspiritus rewards you when you contribute to the profits of the company. The other guys spend millions of $$$ to get and retain customers. There is no loyalty, as the customers just move on to the next one to offer a sign-up bonus. We give them a bonus every time they play...!

By the way. Gaming is the biggest money machine on the internet today, and it keeps growing at a staggering rate. The proof is in the pudding:

http://www.bettingmarket.com/stock.htm

The quickest way of getting to know the Aspiritus concept is by viewing the following presentation and business overview:

https://www.aspiritus.com/resources/multime...h/aspiritus.swf
https://www.aspiritus.com/resources/multime...essOverview.pdf

P.S. People continue to fork out $$$$$$ all over the world on lotteries where the odds are so remote that there is a higher chance of you dropping dead 15 minutes after you bought the ticket...

John
www.cashflowrevolution.com

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I would rather save my money and it would probably equal out, but the prizes are so big that once, you hit the jackpot you are rich. It all depends on luck. Luck is always better than skills. It is for the fun of it imo, feels great to win.

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It is interesting that you, as a pusher of Aspiritus, admit that World Games Inc. (WGI) was in fact the predecessor of Aspiritus.
This is because Aspiritus itself claims "Aspiritus N.V. is not associated with WGI."
https://www.aspiritus.com/aboutAspiritus.do
Aspiritus has actually stressed many times that their members and promotors must not make statements that can be interpreted as saying that Aspiritus is the successor to WGI or a renamed version of WGI.
The claim that "Aspiritus N.V. is not associated with WGI" is acually the major selling point of Aspiritus, because they want to appear as a legitimate internet gambling company, and the history of WGI and Gregory James Kennedy, with numerous lies & broken promises, pyramid convictions and missing payouts to members, is extremely damaging to this appearance.

Naturally, external observers of this scheme do not believe the "Aspiritus N.V. is not associated with WGI" hoax, and neither do former WGI members who lost the money they had in their WGI accounts and were given worthless Aspiritus "units" in return.
From the posting by "play4profits" it is apparent that not even Aspiritus pushers believe that "Aspiritus N.V. is not associated with WGI" is true, although they are required to pretend that it is true.

It is true that around 5000 Norwegian WGI members, who had entered the scheme early, received considerable sums of money from WGI, mainly in 2002 and 2003. As could be expected from a pyramid scheme, WGI used this fact actively in their recruitment efforts.
However, WGI had (by its own claims) around 250 000 members in Norway, and most of these members lost the money they put into WGI, when payouts from WGI became increasingly difficult from early 2004 and then stopped completely in August 2004.
1 - 2% of the members making great profits, and the remainder losing, is not atypical of a pyramid scheme.
It is believed that WGI targeted Norway because our pyramid legislation was very outdated and Norwegians are relatively wealthy (and perhaps somewhat gullible).
It has been estimated that WGI took in more than 1 billion NOK (125 million Euro) from its Norwegian members, so Greg Kennedy & Co. lined their pockets well with Norwegian money.

The reason why the Bank of Norway have detailed data on WGI payouts, is that Norwegian tax authorities investigated all Norwegians who had received payouts from WGI. The tax authorities found that approximately half of the Norwegians who had received payouts from WGI, had failed to declare this in their tax returns, probably believing that these payouts could not be traced.
These members were slammed with severe punitive taxes, and in several cases with criminal charges for tax evasion.
The most prominent example of this is former WGI and Aspiritus "World Leader" Tor Anders Petterøe, one of the five top Norwegian promotors of WGI. In June 2005, his home and office was raided by police and tax authorities, and he is facing criminal charges for tax evasion.


It is true that WGI faced many legal "challenges" over the world.
Here is a list of WGI convictions:

Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, September 2004:
Gregory James Kennedy and his company WorldPlay convicted of operating "an illegal pyramid selling scheme" (WGI).
The court decision was confimed by the full federal court in an appeal trial in May 2005.
In fact, this trial was started by the Australian Consumer and Competition Commission (ACCC). The scheme, originally called Virtual Games Global (VGG), had been banned from operating inside Australia in 2002.
http://www.findlaw.com.au/news/default.asp...d=21545&site=LE
http://www.accc.gov.au/content/index.phtml...ionItemId=16940
Greg Kennedy & Co responded to this case by moving WGI to the mailbox company Pacific Delta Investments Ltd, located in the tax evasion and money laundering paradise British Virgin Islands.

Örebro, Sweden, March 2004:
A woman convicted of promoting an illegal pyramid or "chain-letter game", which is the Swedish legal term. In this case the court clearly ruled that WGI is an illegal "chain-letter game".
http://www.lotteriinsp.se/li_templates/Page____840.aspx (Swedish lottery inspectorate, in Swedish language)
http://www.dn.se/DNet/jsp/polopoly.jsp?d=1...ousRenderType=1 (Swedish major newspaper Dagens Nyheter, in Swedish language)

Calgary, Alberta, Canada, December 2004:
Six of the lead Canadian promoters of World Games Inc. (WGI) plead guilty to operating and promoting an Illegal Pyramid Scheme, and were convicted.
A Canadian arrest warrant for former WGI vice president Quentin George is still in effect.
http://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/scams/pyramid_warning_e.htm
http://www.lotterypost.com/news-102404.htm

Lahti, Finland, September 2005:
19 WGI promotors (one Norwegian) convicted of operating or participating in an illegal pyramid scheme, and of illegal money-collecting. 7 were sentnced to suspended prison sentences and fines, the remainder were fined. They were also sentenced to have illegaly earned pyramid income confiscated by the Finnish State, a total of 250 000 Euro. The court clearly ruled that WGI was an illegal pyramid scheme.
http://www.kaleva.fi/cf/juttu.cfm?j=504276 (in Finnish language)


The Board of Aspiritus N.V.:
Four of the board members of Aspiritus were previously involved in WGI, and Gregory James Kennedy still has a controlling interest in Aspiritus:
The board of directors of Aspiritus are:
Chief Executive Officer/ Chief Financial Officer– Jost Steinbruchel
Operations Director – Greg Young
Marketing Director - Conall McSorley
Company Secretary – Simon Hade
Director – Jan Buess
Director – Paul-Andre Jacot
Chairman (Non Exec) – Greg Kennedy

- Greg (Gregory James) Kennedy was chairman and principal owner of WGI, and he essentially still owns and controls the scheme, because his company Pacific Delta Investments Ltd. (which previously ran WGI) still owns between 65 and 70% of Aspiritus. This has been verified by Norwegian newspapers/media who have reviewed the "takeover" documents
http://www.hegnar.no/hegnar/newsdet.asp?id=179243&;cat=103
(In Norwegian, Hegnar Online financial website)
- Greg Young was previously President and CEO of WGI.
- Conall McSorley was previously press spokesman of WGI, dishing out the most inventive lies about why members were not receiving their money.
- Jost Steinbruchel had ownership interests in Caesars Explorations Inc., which later changed its name to Great Southern Enterprises Corp., which was stated to be the "parent company" of WGI


Conclusions:

Aspiritus is the successor or renamed version of World Games Inc. (WGI)
Aspiritus is still controlled by WGI boss Gregory James (Greg) Kennedy and his cohorts.

Courts in several counties have convicted WGI promotors and declared that it is an illegal pyramid scheme.

The leopard will not change its spots. Stay away from the Aspiritus scam!

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Why do you have to repeat yourself S Holmes? It is obvious to anyone reading this that you are on some kind of vendetta against G.Kennedy. I can assure anyone that Aaspiritus is NOT a pyramid scheme. WGI may have been borderline in some countries due to the sign up bonuses we had in that company.

The only bonafide pyramid scheme I have ever participated in, happened 20 years ago. There where no products and the only way to move up the "ladder" was to recruit others which would move you closer to the top. When you finally reached the top, you were paid off and you disappeared from the scheme. The Aspiritus concept cannot even come close to this annology. There is no need for Aspiritus to use these kind of methods. Why? Because gambling and gaming is the biggest business by far online today! Using our superior product line as a cover to scam people would be rather short lived. Aspiritus has plans to be here for many years to come...

P.S. To suggest that Rod Cook doesn't know who and what he is associated with, is downright stupid. This guy know exactly what he is dealing with. Period! Did you even have a look at his wesite...!?!?!?

http://www.mlmwatchdog.com/

John
www.cashflowrevolution.com

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It seems that John "play4profits" is repeating himself as well, by harping on about how Rod Cook is a guarantee for Aspiritus (successor to WGI, according to "play4profits") being a legitimate MLM company, although it is still owned and run by the old pyramidsters from WGI.

I have looked at Ron Cook's mlmwatchdog site before, and I took a new look at it now. I also noticed that Mr. Cook hires himself out as a consultant at 300 US$ to MLM companies.

From Mr. Cook's web site, I noted that he has identified a number of MLMs as pyramid schemes or Ponzis, which is commendable.
As a side issue, I also noted that he is among the MLM crowd who attacks the FDA repeatedly because he believes that "the FDA is in the pocket of big medicine companies because they will not allow MLM companies to market Noni juice (and similar nutritional supplements) as a cure for all illnesses" (my slight sarcasm here).

As to identifying pyramid schemes, I did note that Mr Cook had never identified WGI as a pyramid scheme, in fact he has never even mentioned it on his web site, despite convictions (which all explicitely condemn WGI as an illegal pyramid scheme) against WGI and its promotors in courts in 4 countries, and despite pyramid warnings from several regulatory bodies, e.g. RCMP in Canada and ACCC in Australia.
The only reference I could find to WGI or Aspiritus on the mlmwatchdog web site, was a propaganda mail or posting from a WGI promotor back in 2002, to which Mr Cook had never responded.

I therefore concluded that Mr. Cook took on a consultancy job for the WGI successor without knowing the true criminal history of the WGI pyramid, and without knowing that he was working for criminals.
It is easy to be fooled, especially by very accomplished liars like Greg Kennedy & Co.
However, the situation that Mr. Cook has done some consultancy work for Aspiritus, does not make Aspiritus a legitimate scheme, when one knows which people are behind it and their frauds and lies when running the WGI pyramid.


As to pyramid schemes in general, most people who have studied this phenomenon have noted that the old-fashioned "pure & simple" pyramid scheme is fairly rare these days, except for the "start, grow fast, implode early and escape without a trace" variants.

Today's pyramid schemes are usually camouflaged as "multi-level marketing" (MLM), and disguise themselves by selling (normally within the congregation) either hardware which is overpriced, poor quality or useless, or services like gambling, "investments" or other (usually bogus) financial services.
In many cases, these modern pyramid schemes also have a Ponzi (investment pyramid scam) element.
One example of this was the Norwegian-run "Plexpay" pyramid/Ponzi, which was stopped by the police in September 2005. Its computers and documents were seized by the police as evidence, and the scheme owner and CEO was arrested and is facing criminal charges for embezzlement (18 million NOK) and gross fraud (80 million NOK). Incidentally, this man was a member and very active "network builder" in WGI.

Unfortunately, the pyramid legistation in Norway was very outdated, and not adapted to modern style pyramids, so Norwegian police was not able to take action against the marketing of WGI because of its MLM disguise. Many Norwegians therefore lost money on WGI.


It should be noted that Aspiritus has a Ponzi-style element, the VirtuDAQ "stock market game".
In this "game", members use real money to buy "virtual shares" in 4 fictious "companies". Aspiritus imply that the "share" price will rise because of increased demand sue to obscure mechanisms like forced buys from members who "upgrade" their membership, an expected increased number of members, the expectation that the "share" price will rise (like a dog running around biting its own tail), and "dividend" generated by part of the "commissions" that are deducted when members buy/sell these "shares".
The similar stock market game in WGI collapsed completely in the first part of 2004.


Finally, if considering joining Aspiritus, one should remember that the company is registered in the tax evasion and money-laundering haven Netherlands Antilles.
This means that the company is not required to present publicly available, audited financial records, and that the details of the company, like organisation, business plans, shareholder registry and responsible personnel, are extremely strictly protected.
As a consequence, it will be very difficult to discover fraud, embezzlement or financial mis-management.
When the scheme folds, it will also be very difficult to recover lost funds or to prosecute the responsible persons.

By the way, the WGI/Aspiritus owner, Gregory James Kennedy, is reported to have built himself a private luxury refuge on a small island off Fiji, using vast sums "earned" from WGI.
http://www.scam.com/archive/index.php/t-732
It will be quite difficult for the law and angry creditors to reach him there ....

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This Is LOOSE money not "TO make money" MATTER.

All we know the reaL WINER AND THE REAL LOOSER IN THE GAMBLING MATTER.

They promise FEW CENTS FOR YOUR LOOSING LOT OF $$$$$$$. Even these cents are under conditions.

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