Slashdot Mirror
Tempers Flare Over Ill-Tempered Sword Remarks
msaulters writes "The Austin American Statesman is reporting on Daniel Watson, a Hays County swordsmith who is suing a group of San Francisco-based techies, charging that they extorted him by posting negative comments regarding his sword-making business on the discussion forums they host and then offering to clamp down on such comments if he bought advertising with them. On the one hand, this sounds very chilling, as the defendants, Sword Forum International, are very well-known and respected in the world of sword-making, and abuse of that position would be very un-cool. On the other hand, they make some valid points in the article, and historically, the ability to express your opinions freely online is one aspect of the internet that arguably should never be curtailed."
If the site's staff are expressing an opinion, it is protected speech. It they are attempting to pass off BS as fact and damaging the reputation of the swordmaker, it's libel. He can sue them and he should win. You have the freedom to say anything you want in America, but that doesn't mean there aren't consequences if you're a liar.
"I think you suck" is an opinion.
"You suck and here's a bunch of untrue claims about you" is libel.
There are existing laws that can be enforced if any have been broken. There is no need for news laws, or any reason for this to have a chilling effect on web sites.
then offering to clamp down on such comments if he bought advertising with them.
On the other hand, they make some valid points in the article, and historically, the ability to express your opinions freely online is one aspect of the internet that arguably should never be curtailed."
Is Blackmail or Libel protected speech?
"Can of worms? The can is open... the worms are everywhere."
His [Watson's] lawsuit alleges that Ko attempted extortion by offering to have the moderators of his online discussions clamp down on negative comments about Angel Sword if Watson bought advertising.
The whole suit, both sides, is hooey except for this allegation. If this is true, it is extortion. "We will trash you in a public forum unless you pay us money." If not, the judge should open up his can of whup ass and let the complainant have it.
IANAL, IMHO, YMMV, RTFM, ETC
someone was going to say it
For every annoying gentoo user, are three even more annoying anti-gentoo crybabies. Take Yosh from #Gimp for example.
Daniel Watson's web site can be found at http://www.angelsword.com/ . After looking through the site carefully, I found no mention of "magic." Although the man may have some unusual beliefs about his work, it is clear from looking at his photo gallery that he is an amazing swordsmith.
I do not doubt the fact that the spreading of lies to damage another's reputation is libel, and blackmailing a fine craftsman like Mr. Watson is downright slimy. Take a look at his stuff, and if you're as impressed as I am, tell the guy in the cube next to ya. You don't have to wait for some court to award damages to get this problem solved....in a time when government seems unstoppable remember that all of the machinery of justice and corruption merely utilize a tiny fragment of the collective will of the apathy of our civilization.
But there is another kind of evil that we must fear most... and that is the indifference of good men.
A look at their website should excite this thread (knowing geeks anyway).
It's hard to take this lawsuit seriously looking at this. And with terms like "Avatar of Techno-Wootz(TM) Damascus steel".
I wonder if we'd get sued for slashdotting their server.
best web host ever
In my experience, it's usually a bad idea to piss off somebody with a sword.
Much nastier than an ill tempered sea bass.
If tits were wings it'd be flying around.
is a piece of junk? But it chops carrots in half
so easily.
Seriously though. Swords are really neat and all,
but what practical use do they have? NONE. There is
so much more I could spend 10 grand on that would
see actual use.
Old 240sx, sr20det engine, some mods, POW!
11 second car to scare the ricekids with for barely
8 grand
So yeah, a car isn't quite the same thing as a
sword, but I'd see more use out of the car. What
am I going to do with the sword? I can't carry it
conceiled. If I pull out my sword when 4 guys
jump me in an aly, I'm dead when they start
shooting me with their jennings 22 autoes and
tec-9's. A kid with a bb gun is going to fuck me
up pretty badly until I can get within sword
striking range. So a sword is kinda pointless in
light of current technology. It's "for pretty".
Or it's to satisfy that "I just gotta have one"
thing that happens after you rent Highlander.
But you can placate that need with a 99 dollar
flee market sword. So the moral of the story is,
don't spend 10 grand on a sword. Instead, make
yourself a Silvia clone with an old 240sx and a
sr20det crate motor instead. With the couple of
grand left over, get a membership at a decent
gym, buy a good handgun (like an HK USP Compact),
and take some martial arts and marksmanship
classes. Not only will you have a great car that
will annoy the hondahahaha crowd, you'll have a
great gun and know how to beat people up and
be all muscled and stuff. Sure beats the hell out
of laying in a pool of blood dying while someone
walks off with your 10,000 dollar sword.
For every annoying gentoo user, are three even more annoying anti-gentoo crybabies. Take Yosh from #Gimp for example.
Lightning Bolt! Lightning Bolt! Lightning Bolt!
David Cole
www.davidcole.net
Whew! I'm glad /. never does this. Anyway, I guess its back to reading /. articles filed under the topic, borg^H^H^H^H Micro$^Hsoft.
-Sean
Daniel is a cool guy, and as far as I'm concerned, anyone who would say bad things about his work is just a complete asshole. If you want to meet Daniel, just go to any major Texas renaissance festival.
And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
I think I have a new name for my laptop.
"Eve of Destruction", it's not just for old hippies anymore...
You can get an actual decent sword for a little bit more than that...
Tim
Omnia vestra castrorum habetur nobis.
Just another example of Saber Tattling by weapon manufacturers
__________
Love conquers all... except CANCER
I find that a sword is a very good way to piss someone off...
The real Webmaven is user ID 27463. I don't rate an imposter, because my ID is such a lame-ass high number.
For the curious, here is a link to the "Living Steel" section of the angelsword.com site which no longer appears to be there, courtesy of archive.org.
Living Steel
Portable versions of Firefox, GIMP, LibreOffice, etc
If Watson has evidence that Sword Forum International tried to extort money from him, let him bring it forward now or forever hold his peace.
"In a lawsuit pending in federal court in Austin, Watson accuses Sword Forum International of driving away customers by ridiculing his work. "I was presented as a charlatan," said Watson, 51. "
At the heart of the lawsuit are posted messages such as one by a Sword Forum moderator titled "Muffinhead Alert." Watson said the message refers to Angel Swords and tells readers to "steer clear of them." Another posting by a Sword Forum staff member said some of Angel Sword's advertising is "just insulting to anyone with even the most basic science background."
If all Watson has are postings on a review site whose reviewers decided his "Techno-Wootz" was not up to snuff, then this lawsuit is frivilous. If he has actual evidence of an extortion scheme, then Sword Forum International is liable for civil or criminal penalties. But either way the outcome is very clear, and not at all specific to the internet. It does not "speak to questions of freedom of speech on the internet" (reporter shorthand for "it's about talking on that newfangled internet thingie"), it is a very clear case of either abuse of media outlets by people looking for advertising money or a frivilous lawsuit from a craftsman upset over a review, both old-media problems.
I'd personally like to stay on and find out who is right and who is full of bullshit, but I have a gripping George Bush vs. Saddam Hussein debate to return to on Fox.
The ______ Agenda
I wonder if tinfoil hats help you channel the
natural energy your body has as well as their
swords do. That page had me singing the highlander
theme song and saying "there can be only one!" in
a chrisopher lambertesque voice.
For every annoying gentoo user, are three even more annoying anti-gentoo crybabies. Take Yosh from #Gimp for example.
7) What the hell does Jingoism have to do with any of this? I don't think I've ever seen anyone on /. use any variant of the word until now. I'm not sure 99% of /.'ers out there even know it's meaning.
[ironic smirk]Jingoism is obviously extreme nationalism, as any red-blooded American knows. The UN would supress America's knowledge of Jingoism and that is why they ought to be given the boot along with all the other foreign nationals![/ironic smirk]
"There are two things that I can't stand. People who are intolerant of other people's cultures. And the Dutch." -Nigel Powers
Why didn't you demand that they give you your money back because their service was bullshit, otherwise you'd publish a story about how they rip off consumers, using your case as an example?
If it's true, it's not extortion, even if you ask them for a refund.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
These two need to settle this like men. They should duke it out in a sword fight to the death at the next Texas Renaissance Fair.
It's good to use your head, but not as a battering ram.
Yeah, right.
Back in my SCA days, one local sword maker described how he did it. He started with blanks intended for use as auto leaf springs. After suitable grinding, he had them heat treated. This was Cleveland when it had steel mills. He went to a heat treating shop, handed over the sword blade, said "ASTM Process 50, 4 hours". They said "It'll be ready Thursday". The result was far better than anything in period; you could cut through logs with those blades without damaging them.
"You suck and here's a bunch of true claims about you, and if you don't like my posting them, that's just tough, because they're staying" is free speech.
"You suck and here's a bunch of true claims about you, but I'll stop posting them if you pay me enough money is blackmail.
That's what's at issue here.
I used to like Baron the best, but Swordsmith wins hands-down.
A Multiplayer Strategy Game for Mac OS X, Windows, and Linux
Yes, but if you look at some of the actual items:
The girl with the sword is marketing. The product actually looks quite decent, and the Techno-Wootz(TM) is impressive as well (see other users' comments for description on this name)
I owned one of these for three months last year--my mistake was being lazy and buying someone else's problem, instead of just doing the damn swap myself.
It was a 1989 white coupe with a '93 Silvia K's redtop sr20det. I miss the sound of the blow-off valve, but the damn chassis was falling apart before my very eyes--rear diff was starting to grind, and the engine would overheat when stopped in traffic for more than thirty seconds because the car still had the old ka24de radiator. tEh st00pid = m3.
My god, imagine how much money Slashdot could extort out of Microsoft if they demanded that MS buy ads from them if they ever wanted Taco to shut up about MS's failings...
Oh wait. They buy ads anyways. Curse you, Microsoft, for foiling my nefarious plan!
No, if it's true, it still can be extortion. It can't be libel.
Let's say I know Embarrasing Fact A about someone. I threaten to reveal it to his girlfriend unless he buys me a steak dinner. I am extorting him, and what the basis of my extortion is factual.
If I try and use Embarrasing Rumour B, which I know is not true, then it's either slander or libel, depending on the method of tranmission of the rumour (spoken word, or printed text).
Kierthos
Mr. Hu is not a ninja.
Trying to get your money back on a rip-off job is not extortion if you threaten to expose that to the world. The company is the one at fault here.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
If you want to shave index cards, then an x-acto knife is much easier to handle; and a fair bit cheaper than $1500.
I understand the allure of a large blade, but why use meaningless measures of performance.
Don't moderate flamebait as Troll. Know the difference or you will be Meta-moderated.
The question is: Are some guys in SF running a sword forum trying to extort a sword maker? Or is a guy in Texas who sells $11,000 swords sueing some hobbyists from SF in a Texas court to get them to shut up because he doesn't think they can afford the defense.
Since I doubt the sword forum is a real money maker for the guys that run it, I think they do it because they like swords, and my gut tells me that they probably aren't trying to squeeze the guy for advertising money.
I hate the fact that the courts can be used as a bludgeon. It is more expensive for the defendants than the prosecution in this case, and the prosecution has more to gain. So the defendants have to choose between settling and paying a large amount of money to defend themselves while risking more money on the off chance that they would lose. If it actually gets to trial, and the suer doesn't have a case, he can just drop it then, after the defendents have shelled out the bucks. What the SF guys need is an attack-lawer who can go after the sword maker with a counter-suit so that he as something to lose and a reason to drop it. But the lawer has to be cheaper than settling with the suer, or you've got a pyrrhic victory.
Don't moderate flamebait as Troll. Know the difference or you will be Meta-moderated.
Did you connect your Spiritometer to the blade and measure the quantity of spirit in the steel? Honestly, the biggest fallacy of modern science is the notion that if there's no Geek Toy to measure a phenomena, that phenomena doesn't exist/is impossible. What hubris. This is a result of the conditioning to our brains that math & science education does. Analytical thought processes break things up into individual parts, and science/geeks lose the ability to perceive the connections between these things. Just because you can't perceive it (scan it with your tricorder blah blah blah) doesn't mean it's not there. To assume so is simply another kind of superstition. This over-reliance on analysis instead of synthesis has been very useful in making our modern technological world, but has created terrible environmental and political consequences. It's time to do a little integration.
O~ Him that studies revenge keeps his own wounds green. -- Francis Bacon
The jingoistic marine let out a ringing "Woot!" as he burst into the room. The Iraqi technician cowering in the corner cried out, "Please! The boxen in this room form a Beowulf cluster conducting valuable research on virii!"
The marine turned his weapon on the machines stacked in their racks and fired a long stream of bullets into them, while laughing in a chilling manner. The technician screamed, "But what about my fair use rights?!"
The marine yelled back, "Shock and Awe, baby! This is what you get for pirating MS Server 2003! Hail to the King!!"
If you carry that thing around unsheathed its bound to bring tears to your jeans, its bloody sharp!
True. My point was, however, that the threat of revealing something that is true _can_ be extortion.
Duhaime's Online Law Dictionary has the following definition:
Extortion: Forcing a person to give up property in a thing through the use of violence, fear or under pretense of authority.
IMAO (and IANAL), trying to get paid back for being ripped-off is not extortion. Threatening to expose a "rip-off" to the world, when it can be proven that you were not, in fact, ripped off, _is_ extortion. (No, I am not directly paralleling this particular case. I am using an example. I do not have any sort of insider knowledge as to the particulars in this case.)
Kierthos
Mr. Hu is not a ninja.
Um, no. It's being truthful. You say to a company, I am going to write a review of your service. Either I will say that you treated me fairly and did not rip me off, or I will say that you ripped me off and did not refund me, depending upon how you act. This is simply doing what it takes to get what is rightfully yours. Btw, "property". Since their obtainment of your money was fraudulent and void, it is not their "property".
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
The truth can still be extortion, but only under narrow circumstances.
Extortion usually requires the threat of a criminal act. As long as the speech is not libellous, then it is legal. Even if it was libellous, it would have to be subject to criminal libel laws, not just civil ones. Of course this varies from state to state, talk to a lawyer if you want legal advice.
http://www.lectlaw.com/def/e073.htm
EXTORTION - The use, or the express or implicit threat of the use, of violence or other criminal means to cause harm to person, reputation, or property as a means to obtain property from someone else with his consent. USC 18
Blackmail and extortion laws are generally written very carefully, they do not apply to most of your run-of-the-mill situations.
I've had enough abrasive sigs. Kittens are cute and fuzzy.
Good post. This confirms what I figured intuitively. Threatening to publish a review of a company saying that they defrauded and ripped you off -- unless they refund your money -- is not extortion, nor is it lebellous (if it's true that they ripped you off). This is the case with the very original parent poster.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
this will probably be buried in the basement never to be read....you know.....comment 1243
out of 1600. Yeah yeah there are nowhere near
that many in the letter to which I am answering.
Trouble is, you have to put a subject on each
of these replies and there is no way to be sure
that the reply will go under the heading or in
the thread of the letter under which you pushed
the 'reply button'.
that said, my comment: the internet is no longer
a society of equals that it was in the 1980's. With the enshrinement in the laws of many nations
of ethereal and immoral 'intellectual property'
legislation, what you say and even hear on the
net is no longer free and it sure as hell is not
equal. We have injected economics and its attendant inequalities of class and station into
this formerly free medium and the result has forever changed our net. Look at recent 'rulings
concerning reverse engineering' equating looking
at code as 'trespassing'. Are hex editors to be
made illegal now? Are decompilers presently
illegal unless owned by the dominant class on the
net....RIAA lords and their MPAA mistresses?
Look at how trespassing laws have historically
and are now presently enforced. We own property
and can whistle if our land is trespassed upon.
However there is a large factory downtown that
is surrounded by vacant lots. Schoolchildren
are routinely arrested at their homes for having
earlier 'trespassed' on these lots by 'cutting
corners', etc. Evidently here and other places
there is one law for large combinations of great
wealth and another stricter one for we workers.