Winter, 1996-97
During the winter of 1996-1997, four or five other websites dealing specifically with the Amway business were born. Several other sites with broader fields of interest also included material about Amway. During the rest of 1997, many new anti-Amway sites appeared on the internet. Some were just one or two pages of personal experience.
However, several web sites, most notably Amway: The Untold Story, began publishing summaries of legal suits against Amway, and the complete text of court pleadings in many instances. Suddenly the content of a number of suits was being publicized, and the similarities among the cases became obvious.
Judging by its actions, Amway was becoming alarmed about the amount of information critical of both the corporation and the motivational organizations which was being published on the internet. In a complete about-face, the corporation changed its policy, allowing -- in fact, encouraging -- distributors for the first time to establish "personal home pages" on the internet. Their rules governing content of these pages were strict, and links were allowed only to the corporate web site, the ADA Board website, and upline organizational sites which had been approved by Amway. Amway promoted these personal home pages in letters to organizational leaders, and in their monthly distributor magazine, the Amagram.
In the course of preparing their case against Haugen and Amway, the P&G attorneys discovered Schwartz' web site, and contacted him. According to Schwartz, "they did what good attorneys should do. They found a source of information and they took advantage of it." Eventually, P&G paid Schwartz a modest consulting fee and reimbursed him for the cost of photocopies he provided to them.
During the course of the Utah P&G lawsuit, Amway subpoenaed Schwartz in an attempt to determine the nature of his relationship with P&G. Mr. Schwartz gave a lengthy deposition, and Amway was granted extremely limited access to Schwartz' hard drive. The Utah judge then sealed the deposition, a matter entirely out of the control of Mr. Schwartz.
Later, Amway tried through both the Oregon and Utah courts to gain further access to the hard drive. Both courts turned down Amway's request. In a letter to the Oregon court at this time, Amway stated that they were looking for possible causes for action against Mr. Schwartz.
