Penny Arcade vs. American Greetings

ferrocene writes "Penny Arcade's American Mcgee/Strawberry Shortcake spoof posted last Monday was pulled because someone at American Greetings got wind of it and set their lawyers on them. PA's forums are abuzz with activity. I'm pro-funny, myself."

Comments

How about it...

[bgog]

Does anyone have this comic mirrored anywhere? I'm sure we'd all love to see what the fuss is about.

My email to the company

[Glyndwr]

You know, you really should stop and take stock: how much harm was that parody *really* doing you? How much harm has this heavy-handed action *really* done you? Is this really how you want to be percevied by potential customers?

Short, to the point, and not abusive. Hopefully they will take note. Frankly, I think they need to lighten up.

Re:My email to the company

[Glyndwr]

Up until this morning, the only use of the words "strawberry shortcake" in the Penny Arcade cartoon or the associated news article were in the GIF and therefore un-indexable by Google. After this morning, it's all over the web like white on rice, and so are image mirrors. I can see what you're trying to say but you have to admit, from a practical viewpoint, this has not been a successful tactic.

Easy boycott

[Galvatron]

With Mother's Day just around the corner (May 11th), this is an easy boycott to participate in. Make sure not to buy cards from American or Carlton. By the time the next holiday rolls around, the situation will probably be resolved.

Between Penny-Arcade and Slashdot readers, there are probably enough people to make a difference in their Mother's Day card sales, and unlike boycotting the entire movie industry, this is a really easy one to do. Also, unlike with an MPAA member boycott, they won't simply be able to attribute declining sales to increasing piracy.

So buy Hallmark, tell your friends to do likewise, and let the American Greetings Company know you're doing it. Maybe we can start to teach companies that in the information age, sending out indiscriminate C&D letters in the hopes of intimidation will cause more harm than good to their brand names.

They need to talk to Brad Templeton

[Quila]

When Mastercard sent him a nastygram over a sick parody on Netfunny of their "...for everything else, there's Mastercard" ads, he sent them back a response -- in the form of a Mastercard ad parody:

Web site hosting for anybody: $10/month and up

Threatening letters to people who satirize you, hoping they won't know the law: $500

Reputation as giant corporation required to intimidate small publishers: $billions

Supreme court decisions protecting parody and satire from accusations of copyright and trademark infringement... Priceless

There are some rights money can't buy. For everything else, there's Mastercard's lawyers.

Of course, it didn't help Mastercard that the target of their attempted intimidation is the chairman of the EFF.

american greetings slashdotted

[juniorkindergarten]

It appears that the contact us section of american greetings has been slashdotted.

500 Internal Server Error The server encountered an internal error or misconfiguration and was unable to complete your request. Please contact the server administrator, help@corporate.americangreetings.com and inform them of the time the error occurred, and anything you might have done that may have caused the error. More information about this error may be available in the server error log.

Here's what I was attempting to send, feel free to use mine at your convenience.

Regarding the spoof of strawberry shortcake at penny-arcade.com
I think that your company is over zealous with its requirement to remove the parody comic from it's web site. You should be aware however your action been posted at several online news forums about your meager attempt at censorship. A pardoy is just that and it in by no means hurts the trade marks, nor does it cause confusion with the original work. I have also written a letter to the creator of the parody urging him to stand up your legal department and challenge your stupidity in court. If he chooses to do so I will gladly donate to his legal efforts.
Furthermore, I will urge my family, friends and co-workers never to buy any product from american greetings ever again, unless this sillyness by your company comes to an end.
Yours Truly
bla bla bla

Weird Al Yankovic Interview

[MyNameIsFred]

I really wish I understood the legal limits of parody and satire. It is often cited that copyright law allows it. At the same time, I once heard an interview with Weird Al Yankovic. He was talking about his parodies of pop songs. He mentioned that he always got permission from the copyright owners before he published one. He almost always got it, but he did ask. This would suggest that there are some potential legal hassles if you're not careful.

legal action against a web comic?

[cyb3rllama]

Come on, does American Greetings, Corp. really think attacking a legitimate parody really furthers its business goals as a company? Did the person(s) initiating this action have no knowledge of how an Internet based community would respond to such an assault on civil liberties? Did this action really protect and further your "Strawberry Shortcake" brand or simply generate much deserved hype around a web comic?

I would like to see you do the right thing as a company... retract your legal threats and allow Penny Arcade to repost that comic. Imagine the goodwill (and sales) you will generate from the Internet community.

Besides, I easily found the "forbidden" comic on an alternate web site (see attachment). Now this single panel will be seen by many, many more people simply because of your action. One second thought, thanks for all the free publicity for the web comic community! Keep up the great work!

By the way, I have a web comic (http://particlesphere.com/) whose main character is a redheaded female... sorta looks like Strawberry Whoever if you squint! Please threaten me with legal action... I really need the publicity!

Thank you,
Will Jayroe
http://particlesphere.com/