inGenius Prep continued: David Mainiero (finally) responds

From: David Mainiero <d******o@gmail.com>
Date: Thu, Nov 7, 2013 at 3:19 PM
Subject: Your October 10th Post about inGenius Prep
To: outsidethelawschoolscam@gmail.com

To Whom It May Concern:

I have submitted the following as a series of comments on your October 10th blog post about inGenius Prep and me. I would appreciate if you ensured that it was posted.

I am very upset about what you have said, insinuated, and encouraged others to believe about inGenius and about me personally. It is very irresponsible blogging on your part, and it is unequivocally false

inGenius is not a scam. If you wanted to express your opinion that the price quoted to you was out of whack, I would have no problem with your post (except the fact that you conveniently omitted how you asked for the "soup to nuts" package and said "money would not be a problem"). I know you fashion yourselves as legal experts, and you probably do know a little bit about the law. Nevertheless, I can assure you that your comments are defamatory. In saying this, I don't mean to threaten you, or speak negatively about you or your blog (which, executed more responsibly, I believe would be a great source of information on an important topic). I do ask, however, that you take down this post immediately and issue some kind of retraction statement. It is extremely detrimental to me personally and to the company and is not based in any semblance of truth.

If you would like to post again about how you think that people should not use admissions counseling services, and use inGenius as an example, that would be more appropriate (although I would vehemently disagree with you).

You should consider the impact of the lies you have spread about me on my life and my livelihood. You should consider that you are not the master of the Internet, who can cursorily read a couple of blogs/articles and ascertain the truth. You should consider how you would feel if someone made such unfounded allegations on you, and how you would feel if you had no opportunity to get them recanted, or at least have the truth juxtaposed with that article.

Please read the post I have pasted below (pending approval) in your comment sections. If you have
the decency to speak with me about this over the phone, I would be amenable to doing so.

Regards,

David Mainiero


Above is the email I received a month after I first wrote about David Mainiero's inGenius prep company.  His comments (which I'll get to soon) were posted as he requested.

First of all, if this blog - if any writer on this blog - ever posts something actually libelous, it will be removed.  Just send us an email explaining why, give us the accurate information, and the material will be corrected, published, and we'll apologize.  This offer is always open.

But...

This blog will not cease to expose dubious, fraudulent, or criminal behavior directly or indirectly associated with the legal education system.  This blog will not stop calling things as we see them, highlighting those whose activities - while legal - are dishonest, unethical, or just downright shady or scammy.

So David, the ball is now firmly in your court.  Since you want to play jailhouse 2L lawyer with your thinly-veiled threats, your mild insults, your misplaced 1%er sense of superiority that oozes from your entire email, go for it.

Please explain, in detail, what was false.  You're crying "libel".  The burden is on you to prove it.  You want us to give you a Sharpie and let you redact an article on this site?  I'll gladly hand it to you, but you've got to tell me where I'm wrong.

In your email, and in your comments to my post, you don't actually state anything to counter any of my assertions.  You merely claim that it's all false, lies, and not based on any semblance of the truth, but you offer no proof whatsoever.  Merely saying that I'm lying isn't good enough, because I'm not - I'm calling out admissions consultants for what they are; companies that offer commonly-available advice and proofreading services for extremely high fees, and which base the "value" of their services solely on the prestige of the universities their employees attended (or in your case, still attend), implying that they have some kind of insider connection to improve the clients' chances of success.  But more than that, I'm drawing those conclusions from the information I have on hand - from your company's site, from wider research, from news sources etc.  I'm not sitting here writing fiction, which is what you're implying.

Here's the only admissions consulting advice that is honest:

1.  If you're smart enough to get into Harvard or another top school, you're smart enough to proofread your own application, and you're smart enough to find the "insider" information yourself by simply buying one of the countless $20 "how to get into top law schools" guidebooks freely available at Amazon.

2.  If you're not smart enough to get into Harvard or another top school, you should not attend law school.

End of story.  Anything above and beyond that, especially for hourly rates of $150 or packages costing thousands of dollars (or, in the case of your quote to "Peter", $3,749!), is - in our opinion - a scam.  And that word doesn't imply illegality.  The definition of scam is: "A dishonest way to make money by deceiving people."

And that's what you're doing.  You're deceiving people.  You claim that you never would, that you'd never take someone's money without vetting their chances of success and giving them clear warnings (which you actually never did give to "Peter", if you'd care to re-read your response to him - I believe you urged him to get started and contact you "ASAP").

I beg to differ.

In order for an applicant, no matter how unsuitable, to transfer thousands of dollars to you, there is no vetting whatsoever.  Let me show you.

Pretend I'm "Paul".  Í have an LSAT of 160, a GPA of 3.2, and I've dreamed of going to Harvard Law.  I find your site.  Here's the front page:

Cool.  Front page, your Ivy League admissions experts will help me get accepted to my dream school.  Sounds nice.  First click is on the "Law School" button.  And here's what I see:

When am I applying?  Right now - it's November and I'm in a rush to get in the next class.  Click two - "Right Now".

Oh my, that's Prestigious with a capital P!  I'm bombarded with the crests of Yale, Harvard and Stanford!  Do I want to talk to an admissions expert?  No way.  I want to click on the "get started now" link.  And I do, so that's just three clicks so far.  You're making this too easy.  Harvard, here I come!  So far, nothing has warned me that I'm wasting my time or money.

Options, options, options.  All "great opportunities" according to the site, so what the hell.  Let's go for pre-law advising.  Click four.

More choices, none of them cheap, but hey, it's my education and my future.  I want the best.  I'm using my fifth click to choose the "Platinum Pre-Law Advising" option.  Still nothing telling me I'm not in with a snowball's chance in hell.



I'm getting sooooooo excited!!!!!!!!  The text says that this is "The best pre-law advising in the world.  Period."  What can go wrong?  It's been encouragement all the way so far.  I've got to buy this right now.  And that's my sixth click.

And there's the Visa logo and the payment form.  You've got my money.  Seven clicks (eight if I had to confirm a payment.)  $3,499.  Not a hint of "perhaps you shouldn't do this."

What am I missing?

And that's just one example, David.  That's what bothers me.  Your entire business is set up around fancy crests and prestige-by-association, because there's very little actual expertise behind the curtain.  Look at your JD Admissions Team - twelve out of the eighteen consultants, a full 66%, are merely JD students.  What is their expertise?  Having gone through the process just once?  Or are you banking on the fact that people will assume that because your consultants got into Ivy schools, that they mysteriously know some kind of hidden secret that can be shared for a mere few grand?  Is this anything more than you and your buddies setting up a little sideline business for beer money during college?

Like I said originally, it's students scamming students.  At the very least, that's a fair conclusion judging from how you're operating.  $3,499 per year, for what?  Remember that your site allows people to send you that money without you describing your services even once.  I got to the payment page and still have no idea whatsoever what I'm signing up for, what you can offer me, and how it will benefit me.  It's vagueness, wrapped in prestige, all for a very lofty sum of money.

Could "Paul" get his money back?  Here's your terms of service:

Section 2: Payment and Services

inGenius prep Payment Plan

BY SELECTING THE INGENIUS PREP PAYMENT PLAN OR ANY PROMOTIONAL PAYMENT PLANS, THE CUSTOMER REPRESENTS THAT HE OR SHE IS LEGALLY BOUND AND OBLIGATED TO PAY THE FULL AMOUNT OWED ON THE SERVICE OR PRODUCT CONNECTED TO SAID PAYMENT PLAN.

The customer’s credit card on file will be charged automatically pursuant to the selected payment plan option.

If a customer fails to pay any amounts owed to inGenius prep in connection with a payment plan, inGenius prep reserves the right to pursue such unpaid amounts and that customer will remain liable to inGenius prep for all charges under this agreement and all the costs incurred to collect these charges, including, without limitation, collection agency fees, reasonable attorneys’ fees, and arbitration or court costs.

Section 3: Warranty, Refunds and Cancellation –

Refunds

Customers desiring a refund should contact the inGenius prep Customer Service department at info@ingeniusprep.com. Customers will not be granted refunds solely because they are not accepted to a desired school or institution. Customers requesting a refund for services rendered by inGenius or its Consultants will only be granted a refund for the most recent billing cycle (i.e., a Customer requesting a refund after 25 hours of services will only be granted a refund for the last 5 hours of services). Refunds are subject to the approval of inGenius. The decision to grant a refund will be made following a thorough review of the Customer’s application materials, a discussion with every inGenius Consultant who worked with the Customer, and a discussion with the Customer. The decision to grant a refund will be made consistent with the good faith, fair dealing, and best judgment of inGenius prep.

Uh oh.  "Paul" may be out of luck, especially as these terms and conditions are tucked away, far down at the bottom of the page, under a tiny little link.

But let's take a break for a moment.  Is there anything above that's not true?  Because embarrassing as it is, it's all right there on your website!

As was most of what was posted in my first article.  Taken from your site, your email, news stories about you.  I'm not plucking this stuff out of my ass, David.  So go back to my original post, read it, and then write to me explaining exactly where the lies are, because I'm just not seeing them.  We provide analysis (aka "opinion") based on our research too, so be careful to distinguish between fair opinions and "lies" upon which those opinions are based.  An unfavorable opinion is not a lie simply because you don't like it.

And as I mentioned earlier, you've got to do better than essentially saying "I'm a Harvard student, I'm better than you, so do what I say."  Because that 1%er attitude doesn't work here.  It doesn't work when law professors complain that we're calling them out for having no legal experience, no teaching qualifications, and producing some truly disgraceful "scholarship".  It doesn't work when law deans complain that the awkward facts about unemployment, debt, and twisted statistical games make them look like con artists.  And it doesn't work when law school admissions consultants don't like being called out for what they are - companies taking advantage of those who are desperate to succeed at all costs because of this crazy prestige-driven scam our higher education system has become.

Admissions consultants - including your company - operate as follows: they sell hopes of getting into top schools, knowing full well that (1) many want to chase that impossible dream, (2) a fraction will succeed, and – most importantly - (3) those who succeed would succeed without the services purchased, and those who fail will fail despite the services purchased.

And it's the third step that makes it all rather nasty, because as I've shown above, you've set up a system that will take anybody's money with no questions asked.  Just like low-end law schools, offering JDs to anyone with a pulse and who can sign their name to a student loan promissory note.

You're welcome to comment here.  We don't censor comments, as you can see from your extensive comments on my earlier post.  If you want to have your say, you've got it.  But what you don't have is any right whatsoever to shut down unfavorable analysis of your business just because you don't like having a little fair criticism.

And I'm sorry that it's hurting your business, but I've weighed that against the disgusting, widespread hardship faced by tens of thousands of law school graduates each year, many of whom are taken advantage of by law schools (and third party service providers) who prey upon them, offer false prestige, hide facts, take money and offer little in return.  You losing beer money from your side business is nothing compared to the hundreds of thousands of dollars in student loan debt that tens of thousands of law students undertake because some people see higher education as a way to make a profit.  Our job is to offer our take on issues relating to legal education, dig deeper than the thin layer of bullshit covering the surface, and provide our commentary and insight.  We're not industry "yes men", nor particularly vengeful.  We're just interested in stopping people making the same costly mistakes we did, and for every one of our voices urging caution, there's a thousand who are still screaming blindly that law school is a really great choice.

So please, comment away.  Email me.  Send me whatever information you have to show that I'm way off base.  I'll happily retract anything that isn't true if you can demonstrate that it isn't true, but you'll have to do better than just offering an alternative "opinion" on how you operate, the usefulness of admissions consultants, and the services you offer.  I've drawn some fair conclusions from my research, much of which is based upon information provided directly by you and your company, and at this point in time I stand behind them.  So no retraction, no removal of the post, and no apology.  You need to earn those.  And if you're a legit service providing demonstrated value, it should be easy.

I believe that only top law schools offer worthwhile access to legal careers, and if you can get people into Harvard who truly couldn't get in without your services, then good on you.  Sadly, I doubt seriously that you'd turn hopeless cases away, nor advise people to avoid lower-ranked law schools.  Care to elaborate?  Got any redacted emails giving this advice to your clients that you care to share with us all?  How do your consultants advise students who want to go to low-ranked schools?  Do you turn them away before they pay, or after?  And does anyone else have any dealings with inGenius that they'd like to share?  What advice did you receive?  Was it good, or merely proofreading services and fifth-hand info gleaned from the pages of "Law School Confidential"?

I'll retract one statement though.  I end the prior article with "He'll make a great lawyer."  Obviously, that was a lie.

(I've also made two other changes to the prior piece - first, I removed the word "scam" before "admissions consulting company" in the final sentence, and second, I removed the word "scammer" from the caption beneath your picture.  I think people can draw their own conclusions.)