HBO do-cu-series ‘Telemarketers’ third installment reveals the telemarketing industry’s success and how it created the billion-dollar telemarketing industry. This final installment shows the success of the telemarketing industry intertwined with the political system, law enforcement, and artificial intelligence.
The ‘Telemarketing’ series is produced by Josh Safdie, Benny Safdie, David Gordon Green, and Danny McBride and presents the shady world of telemarketers on screen with filmmaker Sam Lipman Stern and Pat Pespas.
Lipman-Stern and Pespas met while working in the Civic Development Group (CDG) which was the biggest telemarketing fundraiser company in the United States in the early 2000s. The duo had started filming their workplace during their time there as the workplace was far from ordinary.
CDG employed many ex-convicts as their employees for call centers. These employees would call citizens presenting as workers from charities or nonprofits to ask for donations. The company did not care about any drug use or chaos occurring in the office.
‘Telemarketers’ first two episodes showed the scam CDG company was running by calling donors and convincing them to donate in the name of charity. 10% of this donated money would go to the said charity donors were donating while the rest were pocketed by CDG.
In 2010, CDG would face a lawsuit for Consumer Protection that was the biggest in U.S. history for cheating donors of their money in the name of charity. Yet similar copycat organizations would still continue this model of defrauding citizens of their money.
Robert Rowan, detective of Clifton Police Department says, “These organizations are operating just on the borderline of illegality. They disappear and reappear under a different name. It’s pretty hard to track them down once the money is donated, it’s very difficult to get it back.”
Pespas and Lipman-Stern were determined to take this industry down earlier by revealing the inside info of the industry. But this project was delayed in 2012 as Pespas disappeared while filming. The two filmmakers reconnected in 2020 and realized the telemarketing industry has gotten wilder with AI incorporation that can impersonate voices. This led to resuming their filming showing present-day telemarketing scenes in the series. Lipman-Stern says, “It’s more wild West than ever. There’s less regulation, more phone calls, and more money. It’s crazy right now.”
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