Latest name in this same tired scam is Public Television Distributors, Inc.  And their newest face is Martin Sheen. They are calling the show In Focus, but it is the same old song and dance, you pay big bucks for no guarantee of anything ever airing.
Additionally, they have purchased a staggering number of domain names, started a Facebook and a Google +, and even made themselves a Wikipedia entry in an effort to appear legitimate, but be assured, In Focus with Martin Sheen is a SCAM. Repeat, InFocus with Martin Sheen is a scam! Not a report on a scam, and ACTUAL scam. Do not give money to Public Television Distributors, Inc and their show, they guarantee you nothing as return on a more than $20,000 investment.

From The Desk of: Dr.Anthony Adams
NNPC Falomo Office Complex
P.M.B. 2701
Lagos - Nigeria.


Dear president/ceo,

Permission to remit US$5Million (Five Million US Dollars Only) into your company or private account. It is my pleasure to write and inform you of a transaction involving the above stated amount into a foreign account for safekeeping pending my arrival for the sharing with you as the account owner into which the money is remitted.

I am Dr.Anthony Adams, chairman tender board committee with the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), our duties include Evaluation, Review and Awards of contract. This money originated from over-invoiced contract executed for the corporation some years back. A foreign firm has long completed this contract and the contractor duly paid. I now seek if you would permit the surplus to be remitted into your account.

As a matter of fact, we are top government officials and we cannot acquire this money in our name, because we are not allowed to operate a foreign account while in service. This is why i am looking for a competent and honest company or individual abroad into whose account the sum of  US$5,000,000.00((Five Million US Dollars Only) will be paid into by telegraphic transfer (Bank Wire). Hence i am contacting you.

However, i would wish to receive your personal assurance that you would not betray me after the fund must have arrived your account. more importantly, you are to keep this transaction confidential, in order not to tarnish the confidence reposed on me and the officials  involved in this transaction.

You will be entitled to 30% of this money after the transaction, 60% for me, while 10% will be maped out for taxation and other expenses to be incurred. Every arrangement towards the successful completion of this transaction has been concluded. Please note that this business is 100% safe and risk free and i hope that the fund arrives your account in latest 5 banking days from the date of the receipt of the following information.

(1) Your name in full
(2) Residential address
(3) Contact telephone numbers
(4) Occupation
(5) Date of birth (age)

The above information will enable me apply for the payment into your account. Be informed that on completion of this business i will travel down to your country for disbursement and i will use part of my money to aquire and estate or landed properties.

Call me on my direct telephone number +2348028203485 for further clarification or email me at  anthonyadams1000@gmail.com

Thanks in anticipation of your cooperation.

Yours faithfully,
Dr. Anthony Adams
Tel: +2348028203485.

Our company just got hit by a scam, fortunately, we sniffed it out and walked away.  Same pitch about a great PBS production using Joan Lundgren.  Suddenly they wanted $25K up front.  Are you kidding?  Based on Boca Raton, FL.  

Beware of:
Biographies LLC
Zach Thompson
(561)353-9072x249  

Stay away!

Got a call today from a gentleman representing EcoPlanet TV. For $22,000 production costs they might do an episode on our school for public TV hosted by Hugh Downs.

They called from 561-338-7475

Has Vision Media TV Group assumed a new name ? World Progress Report?

This site currently says: "Website is Offline.  The Project has been currently discontinued."

I highly doubt that you have not received what was spelled out in your contract with us.....if you are even a real client. What company do you work for? Regardless of what these bloggers say, we do honor our agreements with our clients. If you have a legitimate question or concern, call us and we will take care of it asap. In over a year we have not seen ONE ACTUAL CLIENT say anything bad about us on this blog. You would be the first. If we are crooks, where are all the lawsuits against us? There should be plenty of them by now, if you go by what bloggers say on this site.

I received a call a few months back from a production company in Boca Raton, FL.  It's sounds very similar, but the show was called "American Milestones". www.americanmilestones.com. Are these the same people?

There is alot of bull said that will get you un  trouble ask Juluia Forte she has another lawsuit on her for posting

I guess that Vision Media didn't like the Lawyers that I set onto them. they removed not only the reference to my company from their pages (Was used without permission and is a trademarked name) but they removed the whole page with the company names that they supposedly did business with from their web page (With names like Sears, CBS and others) so, it looks like they're not wanting any more lawyers from corporations to contact them huh Mike??

Haha. Did you really use a gladiator quote!

nice way to get an isp or ip address...

Here is our scam email...

Enclosed are comprehensive materials regarding our documentary series hosted by Mr. Hugh Downs.  As we discussed, our series is uniquely designed as educational content for Public Television for invited guests.  Distribution for the project also includes commercial network airings on Fox News, CNBC, MSNBC, Voice of America and other equivalent networks based on your organization?s mission and message.  As part of the project we include an email narrowcasting campaign utilizing web streaming from your own website via a digital file and a call to action.  

We have three basic criteria by which we choose participants for this series:
1. A storyline that is educationally beneficial.
2. A targeted audience for the educational message.
3. A participant?s desire and ability to educate.

If you meet these criteria, and we invite you to participate on the program, we then have three requirements:
1. A one day structured onsite location shoot with interviews.
2. The Production Cost and Location Cost -
a. A $22,900 pre-production fee.
b. A one day one location travel expense if the story is shot outside of South Florida.
3. Adherence to time frames for the production cycle.

In the next few days we will be reviewing your organization?s story.  Once you have reviewed the information attached in this email, please contact me as soon as possible, as we rely heavily upon the economies of scale that accrue when our timelines are met.  We will be contacting you on the date we discussed to schedule the program.

To see video examples of our series online, and follow this link  http://www.insightptv.com/ and click on your respective industry on the left hand side of the site. There you can view sample programs.

The information contained in this email is also available online in our Special Invitation Area.  To view this information online click HERE, and then the arrows to turn the pages. The Project At A Glance portion will describe our conversation.

You will need a user name and password:  

User = guest
Password = 2010

Please over-night any information to:

Insight
Jesse Gietz, Producer
595 South Federal Highway, Suite 600
Boca Raton, FL 33432

Our program is approved as reliable educational content and advised by many upstanding organizations. Please take a moment to review some of our references by clicking on the link under our Content Advisers section.

We look forward to working with you.

Best Regards,

--
Jesse Gietz

Television Producer
Insight Entertainment

Direct: (561) 503-6106
Fax: (561) 431-3799

Glad I wasn't the only person thinking that!

wow glad to know they are scammers!  thanks for the heads up.

Note the Name Change!

By Ben Popken on February 5, 2010 2:40 PM

http://consumerist.com/2010/02/scam-productio ... s-scamming.html

This company is a scam.  Stay away, block this number

SOUNDS LIKE SOMEONE FROM THE INSIDE?????

IF THIS MANY PEOPLE THINK YOU'RE SCUM THEY CANT ALL BE WRONG. THREATS DON'T WORK EITHER, IT JUST EMBOLDENS HONEST HARDWORKING PEOPLE!

This is their new website.

http://www.vision-media.tv/

Everything I've heard of this company is scandalous.

Interesting ? I never heard of Vision Media until I came to this site and saw the link ?Vision Media sues 800notes?.  Now I?m prepared for their call.  This suit is nothing more than negative press for Vision Media.  Not very smart of them.

So i'm curious now that time has passed... how was your experience in total with them? Do you consider them upright and honest or scammers like everyone said?

I GUARANTEE you that this is absolutely 150% A SCAM, roping you into a $25,000 fee for 'production' expenses which costs them a mere fraction of that - this is where they make their money. Take it from me (someone who's been on the inside of this company & been privy to their unethical practices), I don't think there's an honest soul among them...  and they will say anything to get you to sign on that dotted line committing you to that $25,000 fee they want to hurry and collect from you (they get paid their commission upon first receipt of funds from you).

VT Media contacted our organziation and a past staff person paid 26K for the service.  After 15 months we still do not have a quality product and cannot get information from VT Media.

If you want a video, contact a local provider and you can cut the cost and headache.

Left a message on our business voice mail after hours. Was told they wanted to bring me on the Oxygen channel to talk about "fake skin care." Was told that Hugh Downs would be interviewing me. The director was Christian Rothschild. Was told to call back Karen Watts at 561-860-0562, his secretary.

Before I googled the number and found this, I did call back and it went right to voicemail twice.

Glad I found this...

My company actually used these guys and had a very positive experience. I did not find that they lied about anything, and we thought the production quality was excellent. Certainly there are lots of scammers out there, but these guys are legit. We also spoke with ad agencies, and duplicating the exposure would have cost a fortune.

If you ever get a call from a TV production company from the 561 or 954 area codes, immediately be skeptical.

In my previous marketing position with a highly visible fitness equipment company, these guys called at least every quarter for seven years.  Looking for "experts" and companies with a story that they might consider for the show.  Just got my first call from them at my new company.

What it takes to get on these shows -- which no one watches -- is a $25K - $30K payment to "cover production costs."  They also prey on CEO's, getting them all fired up and forcing the PR and marketing folks to participate.  It's just an outbound call center with telemarketers posing as producers, with an end result that you pay big for little play.

well- what happened?

More info to be aware of. Received a call from Linda GIBBS of "Business Trends" on my voice mail wanted me to call back at 754-367-1196. Same story as all the rest here. Message told me to go look at businesstrendstv.com. Took a look and it is an obvious shell site serving only one purpose - to send the URL to potential victims to get them to think the company is legitimate.
Funny thing is, the call came from 954-427-1802 and the caller ID said Ken Galligan. Just for fun, I googled Linda GALLIGAN and her name was associated with the company VT Media, which led me to vtmedia.tv Interesting that vtmedia.tv and businesstrendstv.com are the EXACT same site, but with a different business name as the title. Obviously these scammers have to keep changing their business name and last name to cover their wicked trails.

I've worked for television stations in top-ten U.S. markets for 30 years and have consistently heard these complaints about production companies soliciting "production expenses" upfront.  It definitely isn't how an actual network or a licensed station does business.  But there are many companies operating in the syndication market, and they're of course free to operate on any business model that works for them.  
Is it worth it, for the targeted subject getting these solicitations?  I wouldn't presume to say.  But like any other investment, you have to ask yourself if you can afford to get nothing in return if it doesn't unfold as promised.
And look out -- the threat to sue can be real.  
http://consumerist.com/5041813/so+called-pbs- ... -for-20-million