ORLY O'REILLY?
Well that was unexpected. O'Reilly has a little blurb about the Craigslist Experiment lawsuit:
Official Video FoxNews.com
http://www.foxnews.com/oreilly/. Click on the "is it legal?" link, then "sex ad shocker." Our segment is at 2:34.
[ craigslist published on 2008-08-12 | Comments (2) | Permalink (762) ]
Stepping Up The Action: When DMCA Isn't Enough
I take it back: you might get sued if you do a Craigslist Experiment. And watch out, DMCA is just the beginning. The complaint against me follows up on the classic tactic originated by DMCA: chill free speech by claiming copyright infringement.
A Little Bit of History Before We Begin
You hit ball to my side of table! Now I hit back! That's the way DMCA goes, jive sucka.
However, additionally under DMCA procedure I have the opportunity to refute his DMCA claims by filing a counter notification. After that, the complainant has 14 days to file for an injunction to keep the allegedly offending material down. If he doesn't, I am free to resume my use of the material. Obviously, I never heard back from the complainant after 14 days, so I resumed my use of the photo.
Fast forward to 18 months later when I get an anonymous tip that I'm being sued for $75,000 in copyright infringement and unspecified damages for invasion of privacy. Interesting. Then I checked out the details of the case, and it got just plain bizarre.
Suing You King George Style
King George commands you to appear before the Royal Court, 5,000 miles away, by tomorrow morning. Good luck with that.
Maybe, maybe not. Civil procedure on jurisdiction is usually clear, but there are exceptions to the rules. In this case, Doe argues that since I attended Lulzcon, and alleges that I spoke specifically about him, that I have availed myself to the jurisdiction of the court there. We'll see about that.
Suing someone in a distant court is what's called doing a "King George," named for King George III of England who would charge his subjects with a crime and require them to make appearance before him in his court. Usually, these subjects would be in distant lands and had no opportunity to defend themselves against the King's frivolous and usually fraudulent charges. However, the King would summarily find his subjects guilty because they did not appear before him as required.
Looks like John Doe is running the same tactic here.
The Standard Copyright Whining
There's no surprise here, so I won't go into many details: Doe has a copyright on his personal photo. Yes, he does. It's federally registered. You can look it up. He's arguing that his copyright gives him unilateral power to control how that photo is used. Hmm, where have we heard this argument before?
Fair use is a slam dunk in this case.
EFF Up Your Chances of Getting Good Representation
The EFF: standing up for your rights. As long as we're all friends.
Seriously?
The EFF, guardians of civil liberties and individual rights in the Internet age, are working with a law firm that is trying to chill my free speech using tactics worthy of the RIAA? Are you fucking kidding me?
I like the EFF. No, actually, I fucking love them. Everywhere you go online, the EFF stands up against legal pitbulls trying to intimidate individuals from standing up for their rights. They fight for anonymity, whistleblowers, protection against censorship and a lot more. Why, why, why would they choose to work with a firm that uses the very tactics and philosophies they fight?
I think this is a mis-step for the EFF. I donate to them. I will continue to donate to them. But I'm shaking my head at this one.
Tort and Re-tort Sitting on a Fence: Are They Private?
Lastly, the privacy complaint is an interesting one, even though I don't think it holds up. Privacy laws have a lot of tort reference to them. That is, there aren't a lot of specific civil codes. You just have to sort of figure it out, or cite a helluva lot of precedent.
I'll be curious to see where this part of the complaint goes, if it goes anywhere.
Let Me Introduce You To My Amazing Lawyer
I'm not only the President, I'm also a client! (That's a joke, moron.)
You do have the various branches of the ACLU who are too busy handling life & death crusades to think about my first world problems. That's ok. I don't know if I want to turn to their Chicago office who said that handling e-mail was "too complicated, could you please send us a fax."
The groups who are versed in what to do, like the Stanford Fair Use Center, and the ACLU of Northern California are overwhelmed handling these kinds of cases. Now you're beginning to understand the scope of this issue. This isn't a couple of guys having a pissing match in court. This is a broad method of attack adopted by those who seek to permanently silence or stop anyone they perceive as even the slightest threat. And they get away with it because defense is costly and/or time-consuming. Most people simply give up and roll over. Except me. I absolutely will not allow another copyright abusing precedent to happen here.
So here I am, going Pro Se on this. This is going to be fun.
The Conclusion
Defend yourself or GTFO!
Anyway. I know a lot of other people will look at this issue and have a fair amount of anger at how civil law works. Lack of personal jurisdiction? Frivolous copyright complaints? A John Doe accuser? No lawyer to take the case? Shouldn't the judge toss this one out? Not until both sides have made their arguments. Cvil law differs from criminal law. In Criminal law, the system ensures fairness by giving maximum protections to those accused against the maximum power of government. Civil law, on the other hand, has a more caveat emptor flavor: if you can't fight off the sharks, don't go swimming in the water. And I think that's exactly the way it should be.
But, this is a clear cut example of the floodgate copyright law abuse has opened. Saying or displaying anything about someone? Watch out first for your DMCA threat, then your lawsuit. But, whatever you do, don't roll over and take it. These are your rights at stake. It's up to you to defend them.
That having been said, unless you're an actual lawyer, you most likely don't have a clue what you're talking about. So shut the hell up. I've had all the casual (and utterly wrong) advice/toldyaso's I can stand.
Related Links
[ craigslist, threats, dmca published on 2008-06-01 | Comments (17) | Permalink (4,048) ]
Tainted Savage Love
Dan Savage can't shut up about me. Download Dan's latest podcast. Fast forward to 18:30. Good stuff. About me.
Normally, Savage is a good thoughtful guy. But, on this instance, here's why he's a fucking idiot:
False Assumption: They were all BDSMers
Savage makes the assumption that the category of responders to the Experiment were all BDSM practitioners or looking for kinky sex.
Truth: No they're not. Did you read what these guys wrote? The guys who were most apt to provide personally identifiable information were not BDSM veterans in either the light or hardcore sense, nor were they even up to providing what was specified in the fake ad. They were just dumbfucks trolling for what they ignorantly perceived as an easy piece of ass. Some of them didn't even read the ad, they just replied with nonsense. They were smelt fishing.
This is what Craigslist is like for women, I've learned. Of all the responders, maybe two could be classified as appropriate BDSM practitioners. And both of those guys were very responsible with their replies.
False Assumption: Just hand out your personal information
Dan says while searching for BDSM on Craigslist, responders (tops/doms in this case) should always provide their real contact info.
Truth: NOT RIGHT AWAY, DAN! If it's insane to post your personal information in a CL ad, why would it be any more sane to just hand out your personal information to a complete stranger in response? If you're looking for a trustworthy encounter, you have to build the trust first, not just hand it out like candy.
In fact, if you Google around (you know, Google, that thing you told that other poor tranny-curious bastard to use) for other BDSM opinions on this Experiment, you would learn that most BDSMers, especially Dom Mistresses, frown on looking for encounters on Craigslist because it's so unreliable as a fetish matching system. No hxc BDSM woman would advertise herself like that on CL. Anyone trolling for BDSM ass on CL is begging for trouble.
False Assumption: Jason is a jackass asshole motherfucker
Truth: No, I'm a sociopath. There's a difference. Look it up on wikipedia.
Come on, Dan. You're a smart guy. I know that you can do better to discuss and talk about this old meme controversy instead of just blasting away like the empty headed flamers that show up on occasion. - J
Related Links
[ craigslist published on 2006-11-07 | Comments (0) | Permalink (1,286) ]
Don't Tread On Me (Or, how I learned to stop worrying and ignore DMCA threats.)
So, the closest thing I've received to legal action was a DMCA request two weeks ago from the lawyer of this guy, one of our favorite Craigslist Experiment responders:
zaarra@pobox.com "Ok, this is a reality check. If you are real, then we're good to go, because I am too. I'll give you exactly what you need. I'm an experienced smart creative Dominant and will take you down just the way you like it. Z"
Nice, yes? I thought so, too. Oh, by the way ED, if you're reading this, you can safely put his stuff back up on the list of responders. Good times.
So, what is DMCA, you ask? Simple, it's a legal system originally designed by big business to squash illegal file trading by going after those who casually post copyrighted material. It has seen been expanded to protect the rights of emo bitches who make shitty icons for LiveJournal, etc.
How Stuff Works: DMCA Edition
I'm posting your copyrighted work on my site? No problem! Have your lawyer draft a "takedown" letter to my webhost, claiming copyright infringement, referencing the DMCA (Digital Millenium Copyright Act).
Ignore the fact that you have no claim to copyright whatsoever. That's not important. What is important is that you take the cheapest route to intimidation possible. Either that, or you realize that you don't have shit for a case and pray to God that I don't know how to deal with a DMCA request. (Like 10 Zen Monkeys)
When your lawyer is done, the letter might look something like this:
Make sure to include pages and pages of pointless whining. Your attorney who has only had her license for about 6 months probably told you that was a good idea and it would help your case.
Then, in a couple of days I will receive an e-mail that looks something like this:
Hello,
We have received a formal DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) notice regarding allegedly infringing content hosted on your site. The specific content in question is as follows:
http://www.rfjason.com/temp/zaff1-300.jpg
The party making the complaint (Heidi I. Schmid, Attorney at Law, hschmid@muddlawoffices.com), claims under penalty of perjury to be or represent the copyright owner of this content. Pursuant to 17 U.S.C. § 512(c), we have removed access to the content in question.
http://www.loc.gov/copyright/title17/92chap5.html#512
If you believe that these works belong to you and that the copyright ownership claims of this party are false, you may file a DMCA counter-notification in the form described by the DMCA, asking that the content in question be reinstated. Unless we receive notice from the complaining party that a lawsuit has been filed to restrain you from posting the content, we will reinstate the content in question within 10-14 days after receiving your counter-notification (which will also be forwarded on to the party making the complaint). This response can be sent directly to me at ****@dreamhost.com.
In the meantime, we ask that you do not replace the content in question, or in any other way distribute it in conjunction with our services. Please also be advised that copyright violation is strictly against our Terms and Conditions, and such offenses risk resulting in immediate disablement of your account should you not cooperate (not to mention the legal risk to you if they are true).
http://www.dreamhost.com/tos.html
We also ask that if you are indeed infringing upon the copyright associated with these works that you delete them from your account immediately, and let us know once this has been done. We also ask that you delete any other infringing works not listed in this takedown notification, if they exist.
If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to let us know.
Thanks!
Now, you probably weren't counting on the fact that I'm no stranger to DMCA and I know how to respond to one. For those of you who have never had to reply to a DMCA takedown notification, you will want to research DMCA COUNTER NOTIFICATION PROCEDURE.
This is the really great part. The counter notification basically says "you're a liar liar pants on fire" and adds that if you don't respond within 14 days, I get to put my shit back up.
I send the counter notification to my webhost, who then notifies your attorney, and your attorney notifies you and follows up with something like "this will cost thousands of dollars to follow through." And then you swallow, and smack your forehead, and you don't repond within the alloted 14 day period specified in the counter notification and my shit goes back up.
And that's the way it goes! Thanks for playing. All contestants on the RFJason Show get "The Craigslist Experiment" home game and free turtlewax.
Related Links
[ craigslist, threats, dmca published on 2006-10-31 | Comments (0) | Permalink (4,056) ]
Today's post is brought to you by Fiona Apple's song "Criminal"
Via calladus.blogspot.com: there you have it. Craigslist pranking is not a criminal offense here in Washington State. Therefore, I would like to talk about how CL Experiments are properly done.
How to conduct your own Craigslist Experiment
Warnings
- I can only speak for Washington State. Laws in your state may differ. For example, an ideal location to try this is Alabama since most laws there excuse actions when they're between family members. I'm pretty sure it's legal to solicit sex from your half brother, as long as you're doing it to the half that isn't your brother.
- It is specifically against the Craigslist Terms of Use to screw around. Craigslist is serious business. Violate their TOU, and they'll *gasp* terminate your account! If this gives you pause, this experiment may not be for you. Try something a little less stressful. Like sleep.
- But, it is specifically stated in the Craigslist TOU, "you understand that ... by using the Service, you may be exposed to Content that is offensive, indecent, inaccurate, misleading, or otherwise objectionable." So, all your victims have been forewarned. Woe is he who believes in the Craigslist Illusion of Trust!
- If you're going to be a brave soul and make your identity publicly known, be prepared for things like lots and lots and lots of phone calls, some prank pizzas, a few death threats, pictures of you drunk up on national and international news, and so forth and so on. It's the peace corps of attention whoring: the toughest spotlight you'll ever love.
- Don't worry about lawsuits. They won't happen. Don't worry about getting stalked or beaten. Not gonna happen. You're waiting for idiots on Craigslist. If they had money and intelligence, they wouldn't be replying to shitty fake ads on Craigslist with their entire life story. For bonus points, post under the name "lonelygirl15" and see how many people still reply.
- If you have your own business, don't worry about that either. Your clients won't care about your personal life, except for those that thought your experiment was goddamned funny. In fact, you may just pick up one new client who found out about you through your stunt and admired your professional work. LOL!
Your Target
You need to decide what your target audience will be. Generic horny men? Polygays? Catholic School Girls? Generic Catholic polygay horny men dressed as school girls? Chances are, no matter what you pick, you'll just attract someone like this:
Which is pretty much what you want. Next, you'll want to select the appropriate city for your experiment. I selected Seattle because I just know the town. We're insane. We're also pussies. It's considered rude to honk at someone who cuts you off in this town. That's how lame we are. No matter what you select, you'll find a goldmine of sexual perversion. Humans are just freaky. And why shouldn't we be? Freaky sex is the best kind of sex. Seriously, you haven't lived until you've had sex with a midget. Tucker Max taught me that. Anyway. Just make sure you select a city with a decent CL population. If you haven't seen a personals ad posted in at least three days, you're looking at a ghost town. Move along, li'l doggie.
Your ad must be tailored around a particular fetish that all men have: a woman who openly wants sex. If you can capture this fetish in your ad post, then the world will be your oyster. It will be a sticky oyster that has no concept of foreplay or identity verification. But it will be yours, nonetheless. Keep it stored in a cool, dry place.
The easiest thing to do is just lift someone else's ad. If you lift the ad we used, and you can get more than 178 replies, I will formally call you a God and send you a certification of Deityhood that you can hang on your wall. However, most of you will want to go the extra mile and write something fresh and inspiring. Here are some ideas off the top of my head:
- baby girl is looking for a dildo king to stuff all her holes
- furry dom kitty wants to put a sub pup with a huge cock in his place
- cross dresser curious wants to explore his catholic school girl fantasy
- twink seeks bear couple for play time
- rape survivor seeks eunich
- recently divorced woman from the only man she ever had sex with seeks education with young studs
Decide whether you want to use a thrillingly hot photo of a woman as the shiny shiny lure on your internet fishing pole of doom, or if you want something a little more homely in an attempt to attract those who like to aim below the bar in order to esuage all fears of rejection. I'm pretty sure as long as it's female, it will work.
Note for those going after the gay community: I know the first thought coming to your head is to use a photo of me. But, that's just not fair. I'm wayyyyyy too pretty for the gay community. Believe me, they try and they try and they try. In fact, several of them purchased a lot of my LiveJournal paid time. And I said to myself, "so this is how blonde women feel in the workplace! That's so neat!"
Also make sure you exclude some subgroup. It can be black people, white people, Star Trek fans, whatever. This will be important when differentiating between horny men who know what they want versus idiots who just reply to every personal ad hoping to find something that bites. We call those people smelt fishers. Smelt fishers deserve to be laughed at for being total losers.
The Launch
Okay, so you have your ad, your pic, and your intended audience and city. Now it's time to go Enola Gay on their asses. Make sure you use a clean e-mail address that won't get mixed up with your own. There's nothing like accidentally hitting reply to a message talking about hot freaky bear sex and replying thinking it's your mom. I recommend using gmail, since the text ads that show up next to the responses are frequently more hysterical than the responses themselves.
Keep the ad up for at least 24 hours. That way you get the nighttime freaky deakies, and you get all the dumbasses replying from work addresses during the day. Yes, yes, yes, Craigslist forbids reposting ads that get taken down by the abuse community. But, seriously, what's the lawsuit going to look like? "OMG U POSTED 8 TIMEZ THAT IZ NOT NYYYYCE YOU GIVE US MUNNNEY!"
Once you have collected a decent number of replies, you'll need to build a wiki page so that your experiment and all the replies are well documented and easily browsed. If you want to buy hosting space to do this, then buy something in Russia or Sweden, or find a "safe harbor" ISP. If you don't mind having your broadband internet slowed to a crawl, you can build your own webserver and host it from home! It's economical, and you suddenly become your own web host, which means you make the rules! Yippie, hooray!
Also make sure you post CPM ads on your site. Yes, ppc ads are nice too, but when it comes to sudden, massive traffic, CPM is where its at. If you end up having longevity, look into affiliate marketing. In fact, you should check out this complete, up-to-date ebook on getting started in affiliate marketing!
Sit Back And Watch The Lulz Grow!
Okay, now comes the big event: seeing what happens when everyone finds out about what you've done. I have a few more helpful tips.
Seriously, if you're brave enough to identify yourself in all of this, make sure you throw out a few false bread crumbs to keep people guessing and arguing amongst themselves. Many many idiots will congratulate themselves for being WHOIS sleuths, and others will try to freak you out with archive.org. That's okay. Messing with them later by having multiple addresses and blocking your archive later will achieve maximum lulz.
Show up and disappear sporadically. People will try to track you! Your sightings will be reported and cross referenced. Be sure to throw out misinformation. This is also for finding information leaks in your friendship web. It will also help you identify who knows you best by who is able to say "he probably disappeared on purpose just to create more drama."
Be prepared for a LOT of online attention. Dozens of news sites, thousands of blogs, all powered by self-righteous morons. Seriously, if you didn't believe it before, you will come to understand that America is full of imbeciles who take everything way too seriously. And, it won't be like there's a lot of discussion, either. It will be one big loud chorus of angry, whiny bitches who can't think 5 minutes into the future to save their lives. It's enough to make you wonder if the whole world is Lutheran, or something.
You'll find out who your sane and insane friends are. But, generally, your friends will continue to be your friends. Be honest with them, and let them determine things for themselves. If some of your friends are hot, try to have sex with them. Especially if they approve of what you've done. You may now refer to these friends as "groupies." If the news comes calling, you may choose to give interviews. I would recommend it. My big mistake was not giving more interviews. The guy from waxy tried contacting me. I totally should have taken his IM. But, being the n00b I was to international notoriety, I didn't quite know which way to go. Trust me, folks, just do it. There's no such thing as bad press here. And, if you can get some obsessed blogger to write a complete history of your recent life as documented in your public LiveJournal that you meant to be public, then so much the better. Cult of personality and all that.
Okay, this next section is so important, I've decided to give it its own section:
Toying With Responders Who Decide To Contact You
Now, this is a little more intangible than what I've written above. So, I'll do my best to talk about this nebulous area. Some call it trolling, some call it griefing. I call it walking idiots through their irrational decision making processes and laughing at them when they realize what fools they are. Or when they fail to realize and flail about ceaselessly like a fish that can't understand that you got it to hop out of its tank and you won't put it back in. So vicious!
On second thought, trolling is much easier to say.
So, yes. The art of trolling. I've been doing it for so long, and I've changed so many minds through it I almost can't describe it in a short sentence here. (Except that I already did above.) There are many flavors and styles. I've tried them all. Some work better than others. Getting idiots to come to you is by far the best. You can use my trolling as an example to get you started. Or, just ask anyone on LiveJournal to clue you in about me. I'm sure there are dozens of people who are still bitter.
There are the three important rules for any good troll:
- Don't actually get mad. It's important to stay light hearted and Tom Greenishly playful to pull off a good troll.
- Don't engage in name calling unless you have a Hannibal Lecter level of skill in making people feel 3 inches tall.
- Don't defend yourself. If someone accuses you of something, you must always turn it around on them. Don't actually address their accusations because you'll just get off on a CNN Crossfire sized tangent about the details, and the lulz will then die.
That about takes care of that. I know a ton of trolls are now bemoaning me for handing out all our best tricks. For them, I quoth from Wargames: "Mister Potato Head! Mister Potato Head! ... They're not tricks."
Okay, your life isn't over. Not by a long shot.
- If you were stupid enough to cheat on your wife or reply from a work address, then I have no sympathy for you. Pls go die.
- If you just gave out a phone number or used an easily recognizable photo or name, then yeah, you're going to get some attention. Sorry. Try not to freak out. Take deep breaths. Recognize that your friends will laugh at you for a little bit, and you'll get some prank phone calls. Maybe a feminist will write you a nastygram. If this is making you cry then grow the fuck up. Be the real man you claimed you were on your response, faggot. You should be able to take a hit in the solar plexus without flinching.
- If you did not use any personally identifiable information and you used a safe, anonymous e-mail address, then good for you! Gold star.
If you're a wife or a boyfriend or a whatever of one of these Chachis, then oh well. Life's a bitch and you're involved with one. You can either deal with it or flame about aimlessly and be totally unproductive. It's your call, Joanie.
If you're a 10 year old and wondering why you're looking at a photo of Uncle Joey's cock, then all I can say is your mommy is evil and wrong for letting you use the internets unsupervised. You should draw a 666 on her forehead while she's sleeping and then go play in the street. That'll teach her.
If you're nothing but a concerned citizen, save your breath. Seriously. In all the blog posts and responses I've seen, there hasn't been a single comment that has moved me or made me reconsider. I know you think you're taking a moral high ground by denouncing this shit, but you just come off as yet another idiotic, baseless, unthinking American trashbag whose flexgrips are starting to look a little stretched. Time to send yourself to the dumpster and get rid of all that shit you're carrying around.
The Wrapup
So there you have it. Everything you need to pull off a successful Craigslist Experiment, including all the stuff that I failed to do. Now, realistically, you probably won't get the press that I did. I don't even know why I got the press I did. This was just a thing. My friend and I got curious about what kind of replies an ad would get, and when I saw all the people who willingly surrendered personal information, I decided to post it and talk about it and have a good chuckle with my LJ friends. Normally, when we do this sort of social hacking stuff, it lasts about three days, gets a little attention and we all move on. But this just kept getting bigger and bigger. Sure, I tested the waters with a couple interviews and some guidance from internet pros. But never did I have any idea it would get as big as it did until it was all over. This, along with me learning the Macarena, will be one of the big mysteries of my life. So, I guess if your experiment gets really big, we'll know about it soon enough.
Until then, take care of yourselves. And each other.
[ craigslist published on 2006-10-05 | Comments (0) | Permalink (550) ]
LNN Exclusive interview with Jason Fortuny, part 1
It's here! This is a Lulz News Network world exclusive interview with me, Jason Fortuny. This interview is presented in four segments for your viewing pleasure.
[ craigslist published on 2006-09-22 | Comments (0) | Permalink (865) ]
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