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PetsWarehouse vs. Mailing List
klaun writes "Salon is running a story about a federal suit against members of an Internet mailing list. Seems a company got a bad review on the list and the owner sued the person that said it and everyone who agreed. But the case grew bigger from there, including a suit against the legal defense fund set up to support members of the list being sued and anyone who linked to the defense fund. The ultimate rub of it all is that it basically worked. Most of the defendants have settled." This is a truly bizarre story.
Free Mac Mini
New York has an anti-SLAPP statute. I wonder why this was not used to kick out the case.
Some of these fights have to be taken and some of these SLAPPERs have to be hit with large enough damages to make others think long and hard before bringing another SLAPP action.
Fight Spammers!
The moral of the story here is that giving up on what you believe in gets you nowhere. If you cave in to corporate pressure, you will lose your money, your good name, and your credit rating when you settle out of court. If you stand up for your rights when you know you're correct, justice will prevail and you will know you've made a difference for netizens everywhere. What would you rather be - a victorious hero or an unprincipled loser? Don't answer here - save your response for the judge.
I've seen this argument from Pets Warehouse on various mailing lists when I kept salt water fish.
His own actions have caused him more problems than one customer complaint.
From the lead in it said that it was a lawsuit filed in federal court, thus New York's anti-SLAPP statutes would not be applicable (to the best of my knowledge).
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
This isn't the first time this has happened. Seems that anytime someone posts in the negative regarding a company, the crap almost immediately hits the fan. In fact, not too awfully long ago, we saw this story in which 2600 was threatened for trying to register the domain name verizonreallysucks.com.
I also seem to remember AOL instituting a policy some time ago restricting AOL-hosted websites and chat rooms from having any anti-AOL sentiments published... And what about those who have been unfortunate enough to raise the ire of the Scientologists?
Sad that having negative feelings about a group or corporation means having to spend one's life savings defending oneself in court.
In case it get's S'dotted.
...
... it was one of the selling points for me. Then the
Thinking of buying plants from Pet Warehouse? Don't.
Actually the plants I received were average to maybe a bit below
average, but they'll pull through in my tank. What is crappy is their
service! And they're maybe even a bit dishonest.
Way back in the beginning of April (April 10th to be exact) I was
seduced by the huge list of plants for sale on their web site. I
ordered 4 types of plants, all quite common. Though it states on their
web site that they directly import their plants, I didn't realize that
they'd import the plants you ordered *after* you placed your order! Or
at least that's the way it seemed
I received my order today, May 15th. It only took them 4.5 weeks. And
this is after 6 phone calls. Twice they promised they'd be shipped on
a certain date, then nada. And dealing with them on the phone is,
well, let's just say they stick to their pat answers and work very
hard at getting you off the phone as quickly as possible. My 6th call
was last week, and when they realized I was calling about a plant
order they proclaimed "They will be shipped on Monday". Click. And I
didn't even give them my name or order number! Maybe *all* orders
finally went out on Monday?
There was never a "sorry for the delay" or any sign whatsoever that I
was the valued customer and they were the business providing a product
that I was paying for.
Though I found all of this very annoying, it wasn't what annoyed me
the most. On my order confirmation I was quoted a shipping price of
$7.50. Nice
order arrived complete with an invoice stating that shipping was
$18.50! When I called them today to straighten this out, they
informed me that the original quote was wrong and that I was stuck
with the $18.50. Again, no "sorry for the mixup" or any indication
that they would fix the problem (with the web site and order
confirmation system).
Another hassle - their shipments *require* a signature. I quote their
email notice telling me the plants had been shipped: "You must be home
to sign for it. We guarantee live arrival if the order is accepted on
the first delivery attempt." Yikes. This was the first I knew of this
policy. So I actually had to take a half day off work in order to be
there to receive the order! These plants are getting *very* expensive.
The whole organization has the feel of someone who started yesterday
out of your neighbors garage. It even sounds that way when you talk to
them on the phone.
Maybe I expect too much?
Though I have a few gripes about Arizona Aquatics as well, they're
light years ahead of this outfit as far as service.
As always, your mileage may vary.
dan
--
From the Long Island Business News ...
...
http://www.libn.com/Column_details.cfm?ID=1249
"Novak, meanwhile, said he has further legal targets. One is the Better Business Bureau of Metropolitan New York. The BBB gives Pets Warehouse an "unsatisfactory rating," the organization's lowest. Novak said some of the complaints were from another business that licensed the Pets Warehouse name and that he didn't get adequate opportunity to respond. "
Shoot for the stars
http://www.aquaria.net/lawsuit.html
And the archive of the infamous mailing list is at:
http://fins.actwin.com/aquatic-plants/index.php
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
Go here:l timateb b.cgi
http://www.petswarehouse.com/cgi-bin/ubb/U
and let their forum posters know about their practices, or at least tell them about the Salon article so that they can read it themselves. Post in a forum for whatever pet you have.
-Chuck
A few weeks back I sent Pets Warehouse a letter condemning their decision to file a $15 mil. suit on a group of vocal dissatisfied customers. In the letter, I brought up Pets Warehouse's unsatisfactory rating by the Better Business Bureau.
In their response to me, the email began with the line:
"We're suing the BBB too!"
The problem is that, although frivolous suits will likely lose in court, in many cases the defendants are unable to pay to defend themselves. The plaintiff has the time and money, and the defendants don't, so they are forced to settle, even if their chances of winning in court are high. THIS kind of thing needs to be stopped. Some proposed recommendations involve all sorts of fines against the party that brought the case if it is determined to be frivolous (plus paying the defense legal fees), but the problem is that the defense still needs to money to get to that point. Deterrents like this stop lawsuits where the plaintiff KNOWS it is frivolous, not lawsuits where the plaintiff really believes.
People have a right to freedom of speech. I have voiced my complaints many times against crappy vendors, crappy banks, crappy stores and crappy products.
But what would happen if this dude continues to win, setting precendences for companies like Microsoft to sue slashdot for example on how slashdot user continue to bash windows/microsoft products.
I use DSLreports constantly to express my opinions of products from routers to broadband service and i KNOW it can get nasty on there. What would happen of COmcast sued dslreports and everyone on there? What if lucent got sick of hearling complaints about companies products or services and did the same?
Heck EPINIONS.COM does a fantastic job keeping the consumer aware of products and scams, we should go rate this company on epinions.com as a horrible company to do business with.
My list of companies to stay away from is.
1. Cross country bank
2. Verizon
3. Southwestern Bell
4. Apex collections.
5. Blockbuster (music/video/whatever.. they all steal)
Consumers have a right to now, and freedom of speech even includes the ability to bitch about something.
Aren't we still human anymore?
Some business partners and I had a contractual disagreement with a company several years ago (they mistakenly thought that they did not have to pay for some work that we did for them). After several collections attempts, we decided to take the matter to small claims.
We did not make use of a lawyer, even though we were facing a moderately large company. Amazingly, they failed to appear (perhaps they did not take us seriously) and the judge awarded the full amount to us.
It works.
Basically, The Plaintiff's goal is to cost the defendants as much money as possible while spending the least possible. He represents himself (something he may not be able to do), and lives five miles from the court house; the defendants (mostly) live in other states and have to hire an attorney who's able to represent them in that specific court.
OMG, does he have ANY idea what the BBB does to business that fuck with them?! He's going to get blasted to hell and back. If he thinks 'Unsatisfactory' is the worst they can do he's in for a nasty surprise. This sleezy antique dealership near lexington complained about the BBB after they got a poor rating because half of their merchandise was bootleg. The BBB had them shut down within 2 weeks. It was killer.
Kintanon
Check out JoshJitsu.info for Brazilian Ji
Unfortunately, The Plaintiff only has to file his suit to drain your pockets.
I have a better idea. Write your local news agency and tell them about this. I have already reported the story to my local news channel (who just happens to cover Long Island) and told them about this story.
3 5&mode=nested&tid=153&threshold=1
t ic_plants/index1.html
Its important that the largest audience is exposed to this story and sees just one of the many ways that others try to impinge our right to free speech.
If you do submit the story to your local news include the following links:
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/04/04/14592
http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2002/04/04/aqua
http://www.libn.com/Column_details.cfm?ID=1249
http://www.petsforum.com/psw/
If enough of us raise this issue maybe we can get more new coverage raising public awareness.
-- Button up, your ignorance is showing
actually a better place to post would be the board i found here it seems that some of the people involved in the case post there, and so does Mr Novak himself (under the name Jack).
You will still be communicating with the people involved in the case, just not on a censored board ran by Mr Novak.
Actually according to this article at the Long Island Business News, Mr. Novak has stated that he intends to target the BBB with legal action as well.
From what I understand, a number of homeowner's insurance policies provide coverage for slander and libel lawsuits.
i sin/
quoting http://www.iii.org/individuals/homei/hbasics/what
"You can purchase an umbrella or excess liability policy which provides broader coverage, including claims against you for libel and slander, as well as higher liability limits. Generally, umbrella policies cost between $200 to $350 for $1 million of additional liability protection. "
Often times this coverage may already be included in the insurance policy. For those of you in a position to purchase these policies, I don't see a reason not to negotiate the libel protection. It sure would have helped these guys.
Famous Last Words:
Web talk lands some in hot water
My favorite is the Long Island Business news article about how filing lawsuits is this guy's "hobby".
Mike, some of us aren't going to rest until the "settled" folkes get back what they lost.. :)... JoAnn should NOT have lost her plantedtank.com domain ONLY because she has 3 kids to put through college and couldn't afford to defend her rights (and she was never even SERVED as a defendant!).
Gregory
www.thedefensefund.org