So true! Whenever we critics focused on the continuing lack of sales, and when we tried comparing the grossly inflated forecasts coming from Wave, with the insignificant revenue coming in the door--there was the opposition--the Wave Defensive Blitzkrieg, Big Defensive Line and Backfield with three pass rushers blitzing on every down.
There was almost no excess the Regime Headed by SKS that wasn't justified, verified and rationalized away by the self-appointed Wave 'experts.' The value of Wave's patents [next to nothing, if not nothing, IMO] were inflated by hype six million times its theoretical limit. As was the negligible value of buying Wave for its huge tax loss. [This one value was overblown by about a 100 factor]
When the criticism of the Sprague nepotism started to sting, after his two brothers, daughter, granddaughter and the equine instructor at White Horse Hill Farm/Wave Public Relations Specialists--along with assorted schoolboy chums put on the payroll--we were asked by the cult leaders, "Will any of that matter when Wave goes to $100?"
The question was asked as if it were both obtainable and possible [when it was neither].
This is the kind of excusing away of gross violations of good management and shareholder trust--but their leaders said none of it mattered--just think about how rich Wave is going to make you and spend your time dreaming up ways to spend all those millions instead of listening to those dreadful critics who are trying to get your shares on the cheap.
One of the holiest of the High Holy Wave priests was simultaneously one of the prime instigators of many of the false rumors that gave anxious supporters reassurance all was well, when it was really going to hell in a hand basket.
The truth was shut out and almost all those on that particular avenue of supportive expression went along with it--didn't want to be bothered by irksome flaws in the myth-dream. They wanted to see only blue skies and never be reminded of just how far-fetched their chances were of making any money at all, let alone getting rich.
Even the mildest and most legitimate criticism was labeled evil bashing with an agenda to ruthlessly sabotage the company.
How twisted is this? Those with the most intense agenda quickly accused any critic of having an agenda to harm Wave--even when it was clear the poster was simply repeating a sentence from an official Wave document--if it ran against the constantly-repeated drumbeat of optimism at all costs. [Ironic, isn't it? That optimism did come at the cost of all.]
So, after repeatedly misinterpreting danger signs as either nothing to worry about, or actually being proof of real success, now that Wave has crash landed, the crowd of the mis-led is thanking their leaders for deceiving them so thoroughly, so often and for costing them hundreds of thousands in some cases, millions in others. "Thank you for all you do."
The critics who were right all along are still the bad guys with every intention of destroying Wave so we could get their shares cheap.
Those supporters left standing after the Tuesday Wave crash landing are looking once again to these same leaders to help them find another 'investment' in which they can share their DD. [It takes the breath away.]
These are the same people who cheered the many meaningless PRs meant to sound as if Wave was rolling along picking up clients and customers right and left.
They loved all of Wave' s many cheap tricks, like giving themselves a 'national' security award and bamboozling a tech magazine to include it as if it were real. Posting non-existent jobs to make Wave sound legit and growing--and the supporters who would spin these fictional 'openings' into already-inked deals that would take Wave over $1,000/share.
They loved the guy at the pizza joint who denied being who he was--who announced Wave was the recipient, after an international search--to secure 50-60 laptops of the Papa Gino's fleet of 1500 at the time. Of course, he forgot to mention his stake in Wave, and his role in selling Wave to friends and making positive posts on the message boards. But the supporters covered for him and removed his old posts (the evidence).
Wave had all the markings of an outright scam, it gave off the reek of a fraudulent company and its executives sounded like scamsters talking about bulging pipelines that were bloated pipedreams, deals only needing signatures evaporating like spit in the Sahara. If it walks like a fraud, sounds like a fraud, smells...
OMG, there were so many signs of mgt misbehavior, ineptitude, dishonesty, self-dealing, clownage of every stripe--and through it all, the leaders claimed it was the exact opposite of what it was--or, if morale was low, "shhh, come close and let me tell you what a birdie just told me--the biggest tech firm in the world is about to grant Wave an exclusive license. Better buy right now or you will miss it! Wave is going to soar."
It was transparent as a 3-card monte street swindle at Times Square. But it swept half a billion bucks into the scurrying pockets of various Wave functionaries, friends and the financially-connected.
When Charles Ponzi was arrested for fraud in 1920's Boston, a crowd of loyal supporters tried unsuccessfully to free him from his police captors. They were so enthralled with the Ponzi Scheme and so certain it held bountiful riches for them, they wanted the fraud to continue.
And it did [I'm thinking Rivetz, here]--after Ponzi got out of prison he sold underwater swampland in Florida and promised 200% returns. He got caught. Deported, he came up with more schemes in Italy. [leopards don't change their spots.]
Somehow, this sounds really familiar.
Blue
