"Multilevel marketing is not and never has been part of Harvard Business School's curriculum or research agenda. Documents claiming that a study here has developed criteria for gauging successful opportunities in this area and for tracing four stages of growth in a network marketing company have no basis in fact whatsoever.

Unfortunately, the people who are making these false statements and sending out these fabricated materials are using the Harvard name, reputation, and logo to entice customers to their organizations and to promote their own self-interest and profits. In this marketing campaign of misinformation, the buyer must indeed beware."

Not Taught at Harvard: Multilevel Marketing

By Stephanie N. Merta
Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal

When it comes to endorsements, there are few more sterling names than Harvard, as in Harvard University and Harvard Business School. But when the endorsement has no basis in fact, Harvard gets it's hackles up. Of particular concern these days is the increasing number of claims that the business school endorses multilevel marketing in which distributors earn commissions on products that they or their recruits sell.

"If the registrar's office had a dollar for every call we've had over the years over whether Harvard Business School teaches multilevel marketing or has studies on it, we could throw a very nice Christmas party," reads one internal business school memo. "This claim is harder to kill than a dandelion."

What was once a nuisance now looks like grounds for potential defamation or libel lawsuits, says Frank J. Connors, a Harvard lawyer. Some handouts, for example, now claim - falsely - that Harvard has conducted "extensive research in the network marketing industry," and that the business school calls multilevel marketing "a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity."