Linthicum Enterprises: What Is This?

Alright, ATS. I know this sounds really familiar to the "Curious about black card" thread, one which myself and Schism helped to debunk as a hoax. But something happened to me last night which I just can't ignore. I have absolutely no idea what to make of it.

Last night, I was supposed to meet an old friend of mine for coffee. His name is Michael Olson, and he's probably the best bass player in northern CO. Six months ago, he was diagnosed with MS, and at the age of 39, he nearly can't walk. He needs either a cane or a walker to help him get around. As a result, he is having to turn down students and gigs because of health and mobility issues. We were going to meet at 7:30 to discuss him calling me in to take gigs and students from him at a cafe in Ft. Collins called the Sunflower, inside of a co-op farmer's market of the same name.

Earlier, I was at another coffee shop I frequent called the Alley Cat. It's basically a bohemian paradise, and anyone under the age of 25 almost never goes in. At around five, I was hanging out at the counter when an older guy wearing business attire came in with a briefcase and notepad. He looked at me and asked if my name was Charles. I said "No, sorry, my name's Alex. Are you here to interview someone?" to which he replied yes. I make a few seconds of small talk with him about weather, and then he was on his merry way.

When I arrived at the Sunflower Cafe, it was closed, and the checkers in the market section did not see Michael enter or leave. (He's a pretty distinctive guy, so I doubt they would have forgotten him within twenty minutes.) In the same complex of businesses was a Starbucks. I thought maybe Mike went there upon finding out the Sunflower was closed. So I walk over to the Starbucks, and to my surprise and dismay, he's isn't there. But guess who is? Business guy from the Alley Cat! (His name turned out to be Bob.)

He shouted my name and waved me over. He was now accompanied by another older guy who identified himself as Doug. This is the convo (to the absolute best of my memory).
Bob: Alex! How's it going?
Me: Uhh... fine. Did you ever find Charles?
B: No, I didn't. It looks like you're searching for someone yourself.
Me: Yeah... (I explain who Michael is and why I'm meeting him)
B: Oh, so he's giving you gigs so you can make some money.
Me: Uhm... I suppose. (i don't look at playing gigs this way)
B: Well, we're in the business of helping people make money. Why don't you have a seat?
Me: Uhhhrr.... alright.

Me: So what is it you guys do?
B: Oh, uhh... we help people make money. Through the Internet.
Me: Oh, so you're like a marketing firm? Or advertising?
B: Well, we uhh...
Doug: We do a lot of different things.
B: With a lot of different people. Our network is very wide. Doug, who would be a good contact for Alex here?
Doug: Jeremy.
B: Yes, Jeremy. He's a drummer. Good drummer. About your age, too, alex. In fact, he works over at the Guitar Center.
(I know everyone in the drum department at the GC in Ft. Collins, and there's no Jeremy. So I test him.)
Me: Oh, I might know him. What does he look like?

B: Oh, he's....
Doug: About your height...
B: Yeah. Um... long... ish... blonde hair...
Doug: Great drummer though. Good contact.

Et cetera. Basically, I prodded these guys for about a half an hour and got absolutely NO straight answers from them. I asked many specific questions about what they did, and was met with the same ambiguous responses. They asked for email and phone, and I gave them a dummy account that I use. (No phone number, of course). But they gave me a card (which I can scan in a heartbeat if needed).

Linthicum Enterprises
Doug Linthicum
866-462-4705

and on back:

970-667-3725 h
970-231-5014 c

I don't know who these guys are, but they scared the pants off of me. Any thought

Sounds like a snake oil salesman to me. Check out one of his other businesses...
www.idea-scapes.com...

"How quickly can I get this chumps money in my pocket."
Odd though that you couldn't find your friend, but they found you.
Have you been able to check up on you friend, to see if he's all right?
A quick google search turned up two threads from ATS, and some music guys.
www.theboysandme.com... THere's that link.
I think you did exactly what you should have personally, keep away from them if you can. Try to find this "Jeremy" they mentioned.

reply to post by JoshNorton

Wow, nice find. Looks reeeal convincing - I'd definitely call him if I needed a cheap christmas display installed.

Yeah, I don't know. I'm almost tempted to arrange another meeting and really figure out what's up. Creepy stuff, though. What the hell does he even do?

Is this the guy:
opensource.sys-con.com...

Editing to add web address of a company call Linthicum Enterprises:
linthicumenterprises.com...

"Linthicum Enterprises" is different to "Linthicum Enterprise" (by one 's') but... is it a match?

[edit on 15/5/2008 by Recouper]

Can you scan the card for us? I would not go meeting them up in any kind of private setting, but I bet you know that already. If you meet with them again, go buy a $10 voice recorder before you do, and try to pry them some more. They could very well be anybody, but they sound very snakey, and if its not some kind of scam, I wonder what they are really trying to get at.

Update us with anything further, in the mean time, I will do my best to scratch around.


Update: Here a link to his personal profile. I will set up an account to see if I can learn more. Doug Linthicum

Update 2: I made an account and took a look at his profile. For those of you who do not wish to do this, here is a copy and paste job of his personal profile.

Doug Linthicum Entrepreneurial Technical Writer

Fort Collins, Colorado Area


Current Information Developer at Avaya Inc.
Past Learning Products Engineer at CoCreate Software, Inc
Learning Products Engineer at Hewlett Packard
Education The George Washington University Recommended 1 person has recommended Doug

1 co-worker
Connections 15 connections
Industry Writing and Editing
Public Profile www.linkedin.com... SummaryTechnical writer with vast experience in creating user-focused software documentation like Online Help systems and electronic user and programming manuals.

Specialties:
Single sourcing using FrameMaker, WebWorks, XML.

Expanded profile views are available only to Business account holders. Upgrade your account.

Contact SettingsInterested In:
consulting offers
job inquiries
expertise requests
business deals
reference requests
getting back in touch


[edit on 15-5-2008 by schism85]

Here are some more links:
Avaya IP Agent R7 Registration

Here is the wiki link to Avaya:
Avaya

And here is a list of participants to the web confrence, I was checking for a Robert or a Charles, but I could not find one.:
participants



Edit: Typo


Update: Ok. I think I may have found your bob, let me explain on how I found this first.

I typed in Doug's name and Avaya and came up with this link:Doug

Now I think we all can agree that this is the same guy. Further inspection of Doug's profile reveals that he used to work at the Hewlett-Packard Company. This is a copy and paste of a recommendation of a friend on his profile:

Product Marketing Engineer at Hewlett Packard
Roberta and I worked together for many years at Hewlett Packard. In her current business Roberta is a forward-thinking strategist for personal marketing plan development. She draws out important details from you that the average person tends to forget and then presents that information in a manner most likely to draw the attention of the reader. Her work brings great results in timely fashion. August 9, 2007


So I type in Robert Avaya and came up with this link:Robert Vissat

Then I searched the name and found he also used to work at the Hewlett-Packard Company on here:Zoom Info

Now just scroll down untill you see his name.

Here is a little icing. This is an article or a profile on Robert Vissat. Notice the begining of the last paragraph. They refer to him as Bob. Heres the link: Bob Vissat

I don't know what all this means, but at least Bob now has a last name.

Also on the Linthicum Enterprises website that someone posted above, when you click on the link that says login it redirects you to an error page that reads "There was a problem with the Member information you entered. Please try again, or contact the person who invited you to this site."

It seems this site is invitation only. (the plot thickens)


Hope all this helps. I will continue to pry in a little while.



Update: Bob Vissat seems to be from the Massachusetts branch of Avaya. This seems to contradict what I have found. Maybe there isn't a connection.

Sorry for the extra long post but I figure there is no reason to keep posting. Anyways here is Marv's profile, looks like he used to work at Hewlett Packard Company too. Here is the link:Marv's Profile






[edit on 15-5-2008 by schism85]

Wow, nice job man.
I can definitely scan the card.
This whole thing is crazy... so we've got a crack team of ex-HP engineers doing something secret. The plot is getting swampy at this point.
Maybe I'll call them tonight.

Thanks. I would surely give them a call, but get an alias first, with a fake address.