Life was good for Werner Erhard until his family and some staff members were interviewed by 60 Minutes. The story that went to air subsequently blew away the facade for good, exposing the truth for all to see. Werner Erhard was anything but the success he presented himself to be.

You might say that the impact was devastating. Better still, Erhard could tell that the impact of the upcoming story was going to be devastating. In the weeks prior to the broadcast he sold his training company to a group of his staff members and subsequently left the country.

Getting a hold of the story has been near impossible. You certainly can't get it from CBS' archives as it isn't available due to "legal hold". It did surface on YouTube at one stage, but was quickly removed before it had time to be noticed.

The transcripts of the 60 Minutes episode have been available for years .... until now.

In the past days the whips have begun cracking over the heads of the CBS lawyers, who in turn have been churning out legal nastygrams to any web site carrying a copy of the transcript. 1991 was such a long time ago, but the copyright infringement is suddenly uber-important and the transcript is now being lawyered off the interwebs. [Technical note: CBS really do have a legitimate claim to the copyright, so the removal request really is a straight forward matter. It's theirs. Nothing worth getting emotional about.]

So ... what is happening here? Is free speech diminishing? Is the ground being swept clear for the foretold return of Werner Erhard? Do we now need another hero?

Fear not ... Wikileaks to the rescue. Our friendly fun-loving freedom fighters have posted the transcript of the story and have hoisted it high for all to see. Better still, you can also watch the video, possibly for the first time since it was originally broadcast 18 years ago.

Check it out here:
http://wikileaks.org/wiki/Suppressed_CBS_News_60_Minutes_on_Landmark_cult_leader_Werner_Erhard,_3_Mar_1991

John

PS. Anyone want to place bets on the current happiness level of Landmark General Counsel (big-wig lawyer dude) Art Schreiber? Legends tell of chairs getting thrown at Microsoft. Some choose to curse "those meddling teenagers". What ever it is that Art does, I'm sure it will create quite a racket. [Boom! Boom!] "Thank you, thank you. I'll be here all week. Try the veal."

Fuckin-A, man.

theres the book..long outa print
OUTRAGEOUS BETRAYAL...THE STORY OF WERNER AND EST

a similar thing happened with MSIA and JON ROGER
theres a great book...LIFE 102
blows the cover off MSIA

after the author PMW died i hear MSIA bought the rights to book to supress it.

The Book on John-Roger of MSIA is

Life 102: What to Do When Your Guru Sues You

Many libraries still have copies of that book.
Maybe someone has scanned that book as a PDF, and then uploaded it on the internet already.

Over time, much of the suppressed older material will hit the internet.

Quote
John Fox
Life was good for Werner Erhard until his family and some staff members were interviewed by 60 Minutes. The story that went to air subsequently blew away the facade for good, exposing the truth for all to see. Werner Erhard was anything but the success he presented himself to be.

You might say that the impact was devastating. Better still, Erhard could tell that the impact of the upcoming story was going to be devastating. In the weeks prior to the broadcast he sold his training company to a group of his staff members and subsequently left the country.

Getting a hold of the story has been near impossible. You certainly can't get it from CBS' archives as it isn't available due to "legal hold". It did surface on YouTube at one stage, but was quickly removed before it had time to be noticed.

The transcripts of the 60 Minutes episode have been available for years .... until now.

In the past days the whips have begun cracking over the heads of the CBS lawyers, who in turn have been churning out legal nastygrams to any web site carrying a copy of the transcript. 1991 was such a long time ago, but the copyright infringement is suddenly uber-important and the transcript is now being lawyered off the interwebs. [Technical note: CBS really do have a legitimate claim to the copyright, so the removal request really is a straight forward matter. It's theirs. Nothing worth getting emotional about.]

So ... what is happening here? Is free speech diminishing? Is the ground being swept clear for the foretold return of Werner Erhard? Do we now need another hero?

Fear not ... Wikileaks to the rescue. Our friendly fun-loving freedom fighters have posted the transcript of the story and have hoisted it high for all to see. Better still, you can also watch the video, possibly for the first time since it was originally broadcast 18 years ago.

Check it out here:
http://wikileaks.org/wiki/Suppressed_CBS_News_60_Minutes_on_Landmark_cult_leader_Werner_Erhard,_3_Mar_1991

John

PS. Anyone want to place bets on the current happiness level of Landmark General Counsel (big-wig lawyer dude) Art Schreiber? Legends tell of chairs getting thrown at Microsoft. Some choose to curse "those meddling teenagers". What ever it is that Art does, I'm sure it will create quite a racket. [Boom! Boom!] "Thank you, thank you. I'll be here all week. Try the veal."

Happiness level? On a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being most happy ...

I'd wager around a 0.5.

Will be most interesting to see what happens next.

But what would an est-zombie say to him?

John

How many days will pass before he cries his standard Werner Erhard "victim story" to try to get it taken down from Wikileaks?

Landmark have been trying to do media propaganda to try to rehabilitate Werner Erhard's image, which of course also completely failed, as in this terrible hoax of a mockumentary.

Transformation: The Life and Legacy of Werner Erhard (2006) Robyn Symon
[forum.culteducation.com]

Quote
The Anticult
How many days will pass before he cries his standard Werner Erhard "victim story" to try to get it taken down from Wikileaks?

Landmark have been trying to do media propaganda to try to rehabilitate Werner Erhard's image, which of course also completely failed, as in this terrible hoax of a mockumentary.

Transformation: The Life and Legacy of Werner Erhard (2006) Robyn Symon
[forum.culteducation.com]

Werner Erhard will be at the "NeuroLeadership Summit" in Los Angeles, California on October 27-29, 2009:
[www.neuroleadership.org]
Perhaps this is more part of the - how you put it, "media propaganda to try to rehabilitate Werner Erhard's image..." ?

Didn't Werner have some outstanding tax issue that prevented him from returning to the country?

Anyway, couldn't help myself but look up the registration of the neuroleadership.org domain name in case it was an LGAT front group such as the Hunger Project. I think there is a 60 Mins story out there someone on The Hunger Project too.

The domain is registered to a "Lisa Rock" who is located in Sydney, Australia. Kinda interesting for an event that is in Los Angeles. Maybe she gets to deduct her airfares as a business expense?

Actually, as it turns out, Lisa is a "life coach". See here. I wonder if she has ever done est / Landmark? She's the general manager of Results Coaching Systems. She also owns mybrainatwork.com plus another 3 domains. These life coaches sure do live on the self-hype, whereas a tradesmans worth (for example) is self evident.

Anyway, pardon me for the google-fu tangent.

John

Quote
John Fox
Didn't Werner have some outstanding tax issue that prevented him from returning to the country?

Anyway, couldn't help myself but look up the registration of the neuroleadership.org domain name in case it was an LGAT front group such as the Hunger Project. I think there is a 60 Mins story out there someone on The Hunger Project too.

The domain is registered to a "Lisa Rock" who is located in Sydney, Australia. Kinda interesting for an event that is in Los Angeles. Maybe she gets to deduct her airfares as a business expense?

Actually, as it turns out, Lisa is a "life coach". See here. I wonder if she has ever done est / Landmark? She's the general manager of Results Coaching Systems. She also owns mybrainatwork.com plus another 3 domains. These life coaches sure do live on the self-hype, whereas a tradesmans worth (for example) is self evident.

Anyway, pardon me for the google-fu tangent.

John

Your question was:
Didn't Werner have some outstanding tax issue that prevented him from returning to the country?"

No, the issue was not one of an outstanding tax matter but rather a large unpaid legal claim due a plaintiff who had sued Werner Erhard.

From the lawsuit
Ney v. Landmark Education and Werner Erhard, Werner Erhard and Associates
[www.culteducation.com]
W E & A and Erhard were not personally served, nor did they appear in the district court or on appeal. A default judgment for $501, 970 was entered against them...

Now I am not sure what that default judgment for $501, 970 would be today, adjusted for inflation and interest, but it would be a bit more than it was at that time.