I've had several inquiries lately about Omegatrend, an MLM active in Australia and Malaysia. Here is some information I received from a former distributor, David Gerard.

In the late '80s, Amway tried controlling its Australian network more than it had. This pissed off a lot of the directs, in particular Loren and Sandra Watts, who had achieved Diamond and had more or less built the Australian network. They ended up splitting from Amway and taking a lot of the directs with them. Amway took them to court and lost.

They now operate in Australia and Malaysia, and are looking to overseas expansion.

The idea is to have an MLM owned by (a few of) the distributors, and with more transparency and accountability to the members. Loren Watts worked closely with the Department of Consumer Affairs to construct an MLM that would be legally sound.

I can't say it made a lot of difference. A lot of the culture and jargon (and redefinition of the English language) has carried over from Amway, and the stuff about Amway on http://www.ex-cult.org/ rings true about Omegatrend. It's an MLM: a pyramid scheme not of money, but of effort and dreams.

I was in it '92-'93; I dunno what it's like now, but I can't see it being a whole lot different.

It did give me a good source of self-improvement materials - one of the Books Of The Month, 'The Magic Of Thinking Big' by David Schwartz, was what basically hooked me, and remains a personal favourite. OTOH, one hardly needs to join an MLM to read worthwhile books.