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Penny Arcade vs. American Greetings Revisited

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the your-right-to-parody-is-void dept.

Jojo writes "After American Greetings got some lawyers to bring down a Penny Arcade strip (M i r r o r) last week, PA is now striking back.. IANAL, but I fear their latest strip might get them into real trouble this time." As always, PA cracks me up, but these are scary events. The banned strip is clearly a work of parody, which I believe is still legal in this country, unless that too changed recently.

4 of 571 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Clearly Parody, But.... by John_Booty · · Score: 5, Interesting
    This is an example of where you bite the bullet, pay for the lawyer, and proceed to file a counter suit for personal damages, ie, the cost fo hiring a lawyer to defend yourself from a baseless lawsuit. You get your money back, and then some. But most people will just back down, Am Greets is counting on it. Hope the PA guys get some backbone.

    Just a few problems here...
    1. Even if they successfully defend themselves against AmGreet, I don't see how they'd get much compensation for damages... legal costs aside, how much money have they lost here?
    2. You... do have a passing familiarity with the American legal system, right? You know how lawyers cost a LOT of money, and trials take a LONG TIME and get appealed a lot? And you know how you don't get paid until the end, even if you win? I don't know that the PA guys have tens of thousands of dollars sitting around that they don't need for the next couple of years, when the court stuff would be finished and they'd possibly get paid.
    3. If PA somehow lost, they might be totally bankrupt. So they have to weigh the very small potential gain agsint the very large potential losses they'd face.
    Truthfully, when it comes to having "backbone", probably the most effective way to get back at AmGreet is to make them look stupid and maybe encourage a boycott and letter-writing campaign. PA has thousands of readers; I don't know that a PA-reader boycott of AG would really make a dent in their bottom line (in face I'm sure it wouldn't) but if they see it's costing them money and letters start pouring in, perhaps AmGreet will back down.
    --

    OtakuBooty.com: Smart, funny, sexy nerds.
  2. Re:Clearly Parody, But.... by neo · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Uh, I've got some money ($2.50). And I hate corporations. PA is just one paypal button away from a legal defense fund of massive proportions.

  3. Call Larry Flynt by coyote-san · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Like many people, I have a strong love-hate relationship with Larry Flynt and Hustler magazine. I love his willingness to fight to protect our rights from attacks by the easily offended, even while finding much of the content of his magazines personally repugnant.

    Anyway, one quick phone call or email should end this matter real quick. How many people have seen this online strip, vs. how many people would see similar strips in that magazine? How much money is AG willing to spend to harrass a couple small-time artists, vs. how much money is it prepared to spend defending itself from a company that's successfully argued Freedom of Speech cases before the Supreme Court?

    Call me crazy, but I don't see a lot of crossover in the consumers of <i>Hustler</i> and sappy greeting cards so the magazine can fight hard and fight dirty if AG wanted to fight them. Hell, I wouldn't put it past them to launch their own lines of parody greeting cards (real greeting cards, not just jokes in the magazine). I mean, where else are you going to find the perfect Valentine card for the girl who dumped you for your best friend, or for your former boss?

    --
    For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. -- H L Mencken
  4. Re:Admirable pluck... by villoks · · Score: 4, Interesting

    And it's also spreading, I think that that this is even better cartoon about the topic:
    Ghastly's Comic

    V.