This American Life on Wake Up Now MLM

Reader @Missouri posted a comment about this recent This American Life feature on Wake Up Now, yet another MLM company.

Listening to the This American Life reporters talk about the Wake Up Now pitch, I heard a familiar refrain. In fact, if I replaced the name Wake Up Now with any number of MLMs that I’m familiar with, I would be hard pressed to tell the difference between all of these companies. Wake Up Now distributors had the same vague descriptions of what their company actually did, the same negative viewpoints on jobs, the same ignorance regarding the “success” rates in their business, and the same starry-eyed look when talking about those who “made it” in the business.

My New Year’s wish for those people in MLMs today is for them to go to the opportunity meeting of twelve other MLM companies operating in their area. I want them to take notes on what’s similar and what’s different from their current MLM. Do they think the other companies are legit? Or do they think these other companies are economic cults, as Robert Fitzpatrick calls Wake Up Now in the podcast? If so, why is their MLM not one too?