No matter how much you believe in the 'Lyoness' Utopia, you can never achieve it.

In 1945, whilst most, contemporary mainstream commentators were unable to look beyond the ends of their noses, with a perfect sense of irony, George Orwell (1903-1950) presented fact as fiction in an insightful 'fairy story' entitled, 'Animal Farm.' He revealed that totalitarianism is merely the oppressors' fiction mistaken for fact by the oppressed. In the same universal allegory, Orwell described how, at a time of vulnerability, almost any people's dream of a future, secure, Utopian existence can be hung over the entrance to a totalitarian deception. Indeed, the words that are always banished by totalitarian deceivers are, 'totalitarian' and 'deception.' Sadly, when it comes to examining the same enduring phenomenon, albeit with an ephemeral 'Capitalist' label, most contemporary, mainstream commentators have again been unable to look further than the ends of their noses. However, if they followed Orwell's example, and did some serious thinking, this is the reality-inverting nightmare they would find.
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Readers please note that, as a result of well-informed complaints to Carrefour in France and Lego in Denmark, both these reputable European companies now no longer do business with the 'Lyoness'  racketeers ( Jan 7th, 2013).

I have recently been asked some classic questions about the so-called  'Lyoness Income Opportunity' :

• How can 'Lyoness' be a fraud, when it is partnered with the world's largest companies? 

• If people were just giving their money to 'Lyoness,' then perhaps it would be a fraud... but since they are buying gift tokens and getting a cash-back discount, surely it can't be a pyramid fraud?

Now if readers just stop for a moment to think, the word, 'Lyoness,' has been taken from various traditional myths surrounding the legendary 'King Arthur,'  in which 'Lyonesse' is the name of a Kingdom that is supposed to have sunk beneath the Atlantic Ocean deep in the mists of time. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyonesse .

In the Utopian 'Lyoness Income Opportunity' kingdom, the self-appointed ruler, Hubert the Rich, has told his poor, but loyal, subjects that in order that they can also become rich, out of the kindness of his heart, he has formed alliances with the world's largest companies. 

In the adult world of quantifiable reality, Hubert Freidl is a narcissistic little liar who has created a labyrinth of corporate structures which he has then used to buy gift vouchers from hundreds of legitimate commercial enterprises (large and small). Therefore, 'Lyoness' has never been acting in direct association, or partnership, with any authentic business, it has merely been a customer. 



That said, by withholding key-information, Hubert Freidl has effectively-stolen the names and reputations of countless famous (and not so famous) brands around the world in order to commit fraud and also to prevent the victims of that fraud from facing reality and complaining. 

When examined in splendid isolation, the 'Lyoness' cash-back scheme does appear to be lawful. However, membership of the scheme has not been 'free' (as has been widely-advertised). On the contrary, in order to join the 'Lyoness' scheme, members of the public have been obliged to buy an initial quota of gift card/vouchers (several hundreds Euros / $).  In reality, the cash-back scheme has been the entrance to a classic, dissimulated closed-market swindle or Ponzi scheme. In this, a significant minority of existing 'Lyoness' members (with access to independent funds) have been deceived into investing in ever-larger quotas of gift card/vouchers (several thousands Euros / $) on the pretext that if they duplicate a proven plan and recruit their friends and relatives to buy the same ever-larger quotas of gift card/vouchers, and their recruits then duplicate the same plan, ad infinitum, eventually they will arrive at a point where they will have thousands of recruiters multiplying beneath them in the organization, enabling them to earn hundreds of thousands of Euros/$ annually in commission payments, without any further effort. 

There are various commentators on so-called 'Multi-Level Marketing Income Opportunities' who have recently posted lengthy reviews of the so-called  'Lyoness Income Opportunity.' 

http://behindmlm.com/companies/lyoness-us-review-cashback-and-investment-returns/

No matter how linguistically and mathematically complex the presentations (or even attempted explanations) of the so-called 'Lyoness Income Opportunity,' self-evidently, the only money flowing into the economically-incestuous 'Lyoness' pyramid, is coming from a never-ending chain of investors (arbitrarily, and falsely, defined as 'Independent Business Representatives' ) who are condemned to occupy its lower levels. Indeed, for the insignificant minority of grinning schills to have arrived at the profitable summit of the 'Lyoness' pyramid, the overwhelming majority have been required to remain as deluded, de facto slave recruiters in its unprofitable base. At the same time, all these persons' losing-investments, made on the false expectation of receiving future reward, have been laundered as 'lawful sales based on value and demand.' Furthermore, since profits have been generated from, and sales-tax paid on, these ultimately unlawful transactions, by the various companies who have sold 'Lyoness' their gift vouchers, the bosses of 'Lyoness' have actually lured legitimate businesses and governments into deriving substantial benefit from a serious fraud.

The common-sense questions which (if put to Hubert Freidl by intellectually-rigorous  journalists, law enforcement agents, legislators, etc.), would begin to uncover the absurd, but nonetheless pernicious, nature of 'Lyoness,' are as follows:

• Since the organization's instigation, exactly how many people around the world have signed-up with 'Lyoness,' and exactly how many of these alleged 'Independent Business Representatives' have got back more money than they paid in?

• What quantifiable evidence can you supply which would prove that the so-called 'Lyoness income opportunity' has had any significant and sustainable revenue other than that deriving from a never-ending chain of losing participants?

Classically of an 'Income Opportunity / Prosperity Gospel' cult instigator, Hubert Freidl has sought to overwhelm his 'Lyoness' subjects emotionally and intellectually by steadfastly pretending that progressive initiation into his own secret mathematical/economic knowledge (coupled with total belief in its authenticity and unconditional deference to the authority of its higher initiates) will defeat a negative force of impurity and evil, and lead to future exclusive redemption in a Utopian existence (where no inhabitant works, but everyone is prosperous, happy and free). By making total belief a prerequisite of redemption, 'Lyoness' adherents are drawn into a closed-logic trap (i.e. failure to achieve redemption is solely the fault of the individual who didn’t believe totally). The so-called 'Lyoness Income Opportunity' is typical of cultic pseudo-science which is always essentially the same hypnotic hocus-pocus, but peddled in an infinite variety of forms and combinations (‘spiritual’, ‘medical’, ‘philosophical’, ‘cosmological', ‘extraterrestrial’, ‘political’, ‘racial’, ‘mathematical’, ‘economic’, ‘New-Age’, 'magical', etc.), often with impressive, made-up, technical-sounding names. 

'Lyoness' has been tailored to fit the spirit of the times and to attract a broad range of persons, but especially those open to an exclusive offer of financial salvation. Obedient 'Lyoness' adherents (who hand over their cash) are granted ego-inflating ranks and titles, 'Premium Members', etc., whilst non-initiates are referred to using derogatory, dehumanizing terms 'losers', etc. Although initiation can at first appear to be reasonable and benefits achievable, the so-called 'Lyoness Income Opportunity' gradually becomes evermore costly and mystifying. Ultimately, it is completely incomprehensible and its claimed benefits are not quantifiable. The self-righteous euphoria and relentless enthusiasm of deluded 'Lyoness' proselytizers can be highly infectious and deeply misleading. They are totally convinced that their own financial salvation also depends on saving others.

David Brear (copyright 2012)