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Career Suicide in Three Easy Steps

Update:  At the request of the Flickr member whose illegitimate use of others' photos prompted this story, I've deleted his name from this post.  (He asked nicely.)

A short blog post by Vancouver web developer and photographer Kris Krug caught my eye back in February. He accused a fellow Flickr user [name deleted] of claiming credit for photos Krug had taken.

End of story, I thought, but a cease and desist letter last week from a lawyer demanding that Krug delete the blog post set off a blogstorm that will last a lifetime. See Krug's post, [Name deleted] Stole My Photos and Now is Sueing ME!?!

If [Name deleted] wants to pursue a career in the creative arts, journalism, or any other field that requires a reputation, he'll need to either change names, or turn this into a selling point for his future.

The Google Juice involved in raising awareness of his apparent plagiarism is so powerful, this story will probably always be at the top, or near the top, of an Internet search for his name.  He will always be "the photo plagiarist who tried to sue his victims." See Thomas Hawk, Diane Ensey, Chris Garrett  and Jeff Nolan on the subject.

Assuming he decides to try to resurrect his name (not a lot of evidence yet, except a couple of apologies), [Name deleted] will need to be very clear, vocal and consistent with his apology, and throw himself on the mercy of the blogosphere that has allowed him to so publicly tarnish his name.

The assault on this guy's reputation was massive. Bloggers were very deliberate about including his name in the headline of their posts, to ensure they would show up in a search for the name. People on Flickr and on Digg related their efforts (including addresses and phone numbers) to contact him, his freelance clients, his web hosting company and others, to spread the news about his transgression..

Pretty harsh, maybe, but right in line with the summary career assassination that would have taken  place if he was a journalist.

Tags: reputation, photos, legal, apology, kriskrug, lawsuit, creative commons

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Anally Retentive PR at its Best (Worst)

As if we needed another example of a company getting all shirty about its intellectual property, Paramount fired a legal salvo at a fan site that leaked a photo of a film (perhaps that's too artsy a term) due for release this summer.

The Movie Blog's John Campea describes Paramount's blunder here and refers to the situation again here, conspicuously not mentioning the film in question (that would sort of help Paramount with their promotions, wouldn't it?).

Chris Thilk joins the informal blog boycott of coverage of the film on his Movie Marketing Madness blog. These are all blogs that normally help generate that all-important opening week buzz that can make or break movies financially.

Mack Collier comments:

"Paramount didn't see John as their marketing partner, they saw him as their enemy. And because of their actions, now that's exactly what he is."

The studio claims it was all a mistake, but one wonders whether they would have apologized if the bloggers in question had less traffic...

Reminds me of the fan site that was hit by a cease and desist order a few years ago.  Hank Mishkoff persevered in court, and showed how heavy-handed legal maneuvers can backfire against companies.

Link via NewPR

Tags: movies, film, hollywood, cease and desist, rights, promotion, publicity, mistakes, blunders

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Damn! Spammer/Spyware Jerk Only Has to Pay $4 Million

I've never met him, but I hate Sanford Wallace.

In the mid '90s, I had just talked my spouse into an e-mail account and was helping her figure out how it could help her writing career.

That's when Sanford Wallace entered our lives, and started peppering her with the same e-mail every day. (Photo from O'Reilly Media site.)

I laugh when I compare that one intrusion with the dozens of spam messages one of my public-facing e-mail accounts gets hit with daily. Today I shrug them off without pausing. But that first spam attack by Wallace felt like the time our house got broken into. It felt personal, and abusive.

Our ISP was no help. I don't remember what finally worked in getting rid of that daily message from the spam king.

Now Wallace has been hit with a $4 million penalty for his spyware intrusions. All I can say is, the penalty is a decade late, and the penalty isn't nearly high enough.

Tags: spam, security, spyware, sanfordwallace, bastards

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An Incredible Business Opportunity from a Nice Dutch Lady

After years of receiving dubious e-mails from various government figures, relatives of royalty, and lawyers with lofty connections in Nigeria, I've received a legitimate business offer from a very nice woman in the Netherlands.

It seems Maryann Jacob recently discovered a metal box with $15 million in U.S. currency, and wants my help in stealing it from a customer of the security company that she works for.

Normally I wouldn't want to get involved in something like this, but it appears Maryann hasn't been happy in her job, and wants to pursue life as a public figure. Sounds like a legitimate reason to me.

Maryann has asked me to keep this confidential, until we can get our hands on the money. I'm asking you, my blog readers, to keep this under your hats. Once I have succeeded in this "risk-free" endavour and have my 40% share, I'll make an announcement about where the party is going to be. It promises to be quite a blow-out!

If you receive a similar e-mail from Ms. Jacob, please delete it, or report it to the authorities. I'm already providing assistance freeing up the money, so there is no need for you to pursue the matter. Besides, it's quite possible that you might be motivated by greed to help out this disgruntled employee. My motives are much purer.

For similar "offers", see the Crimes of Persuasion site.

Tags: scams, humour, nigeria, 419scams, fraud

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Big Surprise: People Who Share Tunes also Pay for Music

A Canadian Recording Industry Association report tells us what common sense has told us all along - people who take the time to download and share music files are also likely to buy music. Copyright lawyer and e-freedom advocate Michael Geist analyses the report. Unlike other research reports mentioned by CRIA, this one includes full details about the questions asked, and the answers received.  It paints a much more balanced picture than the usual fear-mongering stats claiming musicians will never make money again.

Says Geist:

"In summary, CRIA's own research now concludes that P2P downloading constitutes less than one-third of the music on downloaders' computers, that P2P users frequently try music on P2P services before they buy, that the largest P2P downloader demographic is also the largest music buying demographic, and that reduced purchasing has little to do with the availability of music on P2P services.  I've argued many of these same things, but now you don't have to take my word for it; you can take it from the record labels themselves."

What the report doesn't mention is that many music fans have been actively boycotting music companies for years because of their failure to embrace online distribution of music. I suspect if the music companies had been in the vanguard  (instead of being dragged kicking and screaming into online music distribution), their sales would have stayed steady or increased, despite file sharing.

Tags: CRIA, music, filesharing, downloading, sales, research

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Boing Boing Tracking Down Canadian "Lawyer"

Cory Doctorow is hot on the trail of someone using a Rogers e-mail address, who is purporting to be a Canadian lawyer. The writer's inability to spell "lawyer", "Queen's Counsel" and "libel" was the first tip-off that "Don Deveny" might not be a real lawyer.

After checking with various provincial law societies, Doctorow found no such lawyer registered, and is turning up the heat with research into the person who owns the e-mail account that was used.

I'm dying to see how this story ends.

Lesson: You're not as anonymous as you think you are.

Trivia:  Queen's Counsel is a designation granted by a law society, denoting that someone is a senior lawyer with an excellent reputation. It doesn't come with any extra powers, and has been superseded in some provinces.

Tag: boingboing impersonation bogus blogs lawyers

PR Briefs - News Items Dec. 29, 2005

Colin McKay - Is Traditional Public Opinion Polling Dying a Slow Death?

Colin McKay - Abramoff, Op-eds, and the "Invisible" Hand of the Free Market
Business Week and others reveal payments for editorial mentions of a lobbyist's clients in op-ed pieces placed by think-tank analysts.

Scott Baradell - Media Orchard Presents: The 10 Worst Spins of 2005

David Weinberger - Microsoft Word: 20 Years and Still Wrong
David Weinberger marvels that he still can't perform some basic image placement functions in Word, despite 20 years of refinement of the standard word processing program. (With some help from his blog readers, he figured out how to solve the particular problem he was complaining about, but what happened to the good old days when WordPerfect let you view its commands and delete the ones that were causing problems?).

Another take on Word:

Uriel Wittenberg - A Tool for Thought Declines
A long-time Word user complains about the dumbing-down of certain capabilities.

Shel Israel - Edelman, the Missing Linker
The co-author of a new book on blogging takes the CEO of the world's largest PR firm to task for never linking to others in his influential blog. A much-discussed item in the PR blog world this week.

Recording Industry Vs. the People - Mom Fights Downloading Suit on her Own; (lawyers' blog explains RIAA process); 

P2PNet.net - How the RIAA Gets its Victims

Tom Friedman - The Other Side of Outsourcing, a look at job outsourcing to India, on YouTube by a New York Times correspondent (streaming video)

Canada's Do-Not-Call Telemarketing List

Legislation for Canada's do-not-call list was passed in November, but it will take almost two years for the telemarketing regulations to be put into effect.

Says Canwest News:

"Last-minute changes to the Telecommunications Act, passed just before the federal election was called, will let Canadians add their phone numbers to a national do-not-call list. Telemarketers are prohibited from calling numbers on the list, and face a hefty fine if they do otherwise.

"Too bad it will take nearly two years for the law to take effect."

Industry Canada reports:

"Once the list is operational, Canadians who do not wish to receive calls from telemarketers will be able to add their telephone number to a single centralized list that telemarketers will be required to download regularly and respect. Both the United States and the United Kingdom have similar systems.

"Penalties of up to $1,500 per offending call for individuals and up to $15,000 per offending call for corporations would be imposed for telemarketers who fail to respect the list. Funding to operate the list will be obtained on a cost-recovery basis from telemarketers themselves."

The number of exceptions to the legislation is troubling for Ottawa law professor Michael Geist:

. . .(The) reality is that the bill has devolved into an embarrassing shell of its original self, rendered practically useless under the onslaught of lobby groups determined to thwart any attempt to limit their ability to call consumers at all hours of the day.

The exemptions include registered charities, political parties, newspapers, survey organizations and companies that people have an existing business relationship with, says Canwest.

Potential iTunes DRM Security Issue

You could see this one coming a mile off.

CNet News' Dawn Kawamoto is reporting a security company warning of a flaw in Apple iTunes security. (In an update, she notes it affects only iTunes 6 for Windows.)

Says privacy rights advocate Cory Doctorow:

I'm not surprised. An objective of good security is to protect users from attackers who want to prevent the user from controlling her computer. DRM -- like that in iTunes -- is a system for allowing remote parties (e.g. entertainment companies) to enforce their policy on your computer. Once you design the system to let anyone apart from the owner to control it, you open up the possibility that someone other than the owner will end up controlling it.

On Slashdot, the skeptical readers will wait until they see more proof that the "flaw" poses an actual threat.

Lego Loses Patent Fight - Must Rely on Creativity, Marketing

A recent decision by the Supreme Court of Canada confirms that Lego has no patent protection here as it fights to keep market share. Having had its patent expire, Lego was trying to argue that the shape of the blocks' connecting knobs are distinct and should be treated as a kind of trademark.

But Lego has already been acting like a company that has to outdazzle its competitors, and has been emphasizing tie-ins with Star Wars, Spiderman and other movies in recent years, in an attempt to differentiate itself from Canadian competitor Mega Bloks.

The Montreal-based Mega Bloks is meeting the marketing challenge with tie-ins of its own (including Spiderman). The company says it "has a presence in 14 countries and sales in over a hundred."

Internet and e-commerce lawyer Michael Geist praises the ruling, saying it shows that Canada's top court understands the balance between giving the patent-holder a head start in the market, and a perpetual stranglehold. Says Geist:

"With regard to patents, the court cites with approval language from several years ago that states "patent protection rests on a concept of a bargain between the inventor and the public.  In return for disclosure of the invention to the public, the inventor acquires for a limited time the exclusive right to exploit it.

"On the trademark side, the court also notes the limitations to trademark, stating that "trade-marks law is not intended to prevent the competitive use of utilitarian features of products…In Canada, as in several other countries or regions of the world, this doctrine is a well-settled part of the law of trade-marks.  In the law of intellectual property, it prevents abuses of monopoly positions in respect of products and processes."

For those who speak Lawyer, here is the actual ruling.

See a Fast Company 2001 article on how Lego has struggled to find its niche, despite having owned the niche for decades (via Boing Boing).