Slashdot Mirror
Dealing w/ Outside Interests in Your Projects?
Anthony Boyd asks: "Last weekend, I built a web site that is a poor-man's version of Classmates. Except that it is custom-built just for my high-school, with no ads or fees. I got a fine response from the people that knew about it, and was busy reconnecting with lost friends... until [last week], when my school's alumni association called and gave me an earful of comments such as, 'that's a rogue site' and 'it may not be legal!' Turns out, they hoped to build something similar, as a platform to entice donations. So, I'm stuck. Before I do anything, I'd like to ask Slashdot: have the projects you built for 'just for fun' been overrun by outside interests? If so, what did you do, and what would you have done differently?"
Well, if you're pleasant and charismatic, you can always try selling them their very own customized alumni website, which you just happen to have right in this briefcase....
--Mike--
tell them to go away.
Consensus is good, but informed dictatorship is better
Unless they can prevent alumni from gathering and discussing their common interests (hint, freedom of assembly), then just make sure your site doesn't use any trademarks, and tell them that they are welcom to run their site too.
Yes, it's legal. Assuming your school wasn't a private school, you can hook up as many people as you want for whatever price you want- as long as you make it clear that you're not an employee or affiliate of the school.. You're matchmaking based on a common interest, i.e. that school.
If they contact you about it again, tell them politely that you're exercising your rights as a public citizen and serving as a resource for alumni. If they would like to cooperate with you to avoid competiting services, that would be lovely; however, in the interests of alumni relations you would suggest that they cease their threats of legal action to avoid the inevitable bad press and probable decline in alumni support, as well as the embarrassing and ultimately expensive legal battle. If you keep getting problems, use your alumni network to find legal representation.
If it's a private school, though, you may well be screwed. I doubt it, but you may.
Well, I don't think anyone here is going to be able to help you much with this, since it really depends on the details. There's certainly nothing illegal about making a website for alums to coordinate. If they object based upon such a general reason, tell them to piss off as they're clearly just trying to get you to cave in.
However, if you used any copyrighted logos or artwork swiped directly from their site or any of their literature, they could probably get an injunction based on that. So, make sure the site is either text-only, or that any logos that you do use are original works that you create. Since it sounds like this is a non-commercial endeavor I don't know exactly how trademark laws work but so long as you acknowledge all marks as being property of their owners and you're not selling something that's related in any way, then there's no reason that you can't use a logo of a product or institution.
In other words, I don't think it's illegal for me to put a picture of a box of "Kellogs Corn Flakes" on a web site, so long as I took the picture (i.e. I own the copyright), and I'm not trying to sell cereal.
I know that colleges are often very protective of their Mascots and logos since they want a piece of the pie in terms of merchandising and they don't want thier image tarnished. If they continue to object to your site (moreso than a "please stop") then it will probably be on these grounds.
I personally have never been in that situation. That being said, I can't help but think I'd fight it. "Tell me why this is illegal. Tell me why you should be the only player in town. Tell me why we can't work something out."
If they can't answer that, then I'd keep it going until I recieved a cease and desist. Assuming that there isn't any legal issues with the students names being printed there, what's the BFD?
Like I said, I'd fight, though I wouldn't rule out compromise. Maybe you could support donations for them?
I believe HS year books are public record... or at least not 'illegal', so if you wanted to type in every person's name and have a website, they can suck it. Maybe you can't say it is the 'so-and-so alumni page' but you can say Society of Appreciation for Having Attended SASHS.. (IANAL)
/web classes make a school website?? How hard can a Forum really be or to let people update their personal info.. Schools would get current contact info to hit people up for money.. None of it makes sense. And my tingling tin-hat says Classmates (TM) is to blame.
Odds are they are getting kick backs from Classmates. I really wonder sometimes because I went to a fairly large HS and they *HAD* a start of a webpage and it all disappeared.. Nothing, not even notices of Reunions. How come every high school doesn't have their computer programming
Don't turn this into a battle. What was the original purpose of your site? Not fame. Not fortune. To be connected with classmates. Offer your website gratis to the association if they fund the hosting and give you due credit. Then everybody wins. You get free hosting. The alumni gets their donations. Classmates get a better quality service.
Instead of fighting them, or bunkering down at the first threat of litigation (which was probably an ignorant threat with no merit), talk with them and work out how you can both benefit.
Unless they're assholes. In that case, tell them to get stuffed.
PS: I've never been in the situation that you describe but that's what I'd do.
One future, two choices. Oppose them or let them destroy us.
You have a site frequented by many people from your high school. The alumni association survives by the goodwill of that same group of people.
:)
Post a bulletin on your site explaining the situation, and provide the alumni association's contact information so your classmates ---who presumably enjoy your site and want it to continue--- can ``express their concerns''.
Then sit back, wait a bit, and enjoy the newly friendly and polite alumni association.
Using some software that I wrote I am planning on setting something similar up for my high school class, in time for our 10 year reunion. Although since I was also class president I don't think the alumni association will be bugging me about it.
But enough about me! I would have to say that you are perfectly within your rights to setup whatever you want and charge whatever you want for it. Although I wonder if classmates.com might come down on you with some lame "process for talking to classmates" IP suit.
"More organs means more human." - Zim
Dear Alumni Association:
"expletia deleted."
Yours,
fish.
--
Don't like it? Respond with words, not karma.
This is a great suggestion.
You aren't doing anything illegal, but you don't want to get them all hot and bothered either (don't give them any excuse to go into that "at any cost" mode.. that's when things start to suck, no matter who's "right").
Here's the strategy I'd use:
* Ignore their most inflammatory claims/demands. Just pretend that they are being completely reasonable, and ignore anything that doesn't fit that.
* Save copies of all of their emails.
* Tell them you would be willing to help out however you can, but don't ever mention closing your site.
* Kindly offer to link to any site they set up, to suggest donations on your homepage, whatever (within your own reasonable limits). Present your choices as obvious ("selling my work is also possible, but the price might be higher than you'd want to pay, since anything less than $2K would be like paying me under minimum wage).
* If they don't snap out of it, kindly offer to post the discussion to the alumni to let them help decide, since they should have some say in the fate of your site (suggestion above).
As long as you keep everything nice, you can leave them plenty of escape routes. Yes, you do want that. The enemy is most dangerous when they feel they have no escape (or something like that... from the Art of War).
There are only 10 types of people: those who understand decimal, those who don't, and, uh, 8 other types I forget.
I'm confused. Unless I'm missing something really obvious, the alumni association is so far out of line it's not even funny.
If the website is hosted on school property, then the school itself would have a say in the matter. But the alumni association is not the school, no matter how much influence they might have with it. If you're not disregarding any school rules with the website, then I would say ignore the alumnis, politely present your side to the school, then wait for a school administrator to make a decision.
If it's not hosted on school property, then the alumni association can go take a long walk off a short pier. At least be thankful that you learning today what alumni associations are all about, instead of ten years down the road after you've already given them some of your hard earned money.
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
Limits on freedom. Click here for my audio clip of saying this.
How are you stuck? Just tell them to fuck off. It seems like we cant scratch our asses these days without someone telling us its "illegal". Im sick of this shit. We are being legislated into a new dark ages. Lawyers are in charge now, and unfortunatley what they do is destructive rather than constructive.
Businesses are simply not developing new stuff, for fear of getting sued by some patent-holder. They are only maintaining existing revenue streams.
Its a total mess. Aotearoa has recently set up another 5 year moratorium on genetic engineering, totally wasting millions of invested funds, along with a 5 year moratorium on building casinos.
Apparently people dont make their own minds about whether to gamble or not.
What we fucking need is a 5 year moratorium on Governments banning stuff. When was the last time the law was used to permit something rather than ban it? The last thing I can think of was the un-banning of sodomy in the 70s. Not exactly the most economically stimulating, job creating activity in the world.
We just got to stand up to bullshit laws. Infringe copyrights, use drugs if you want. Its wrong to let the lawyers and governments legislate us further and further backwards.
Sounds like the alumni association is populated by the bullies - and that they never grew up.
Tell them that they must issue a retraction, or you'll file a tortious interference suit against them.
If you don't like this kind of bullying, definitely don't give in. Post your correspondence on your web page, with as little editorializing as possible, and let others draw their own conclusions. If their behavior is outrageous enough, I'm sure you'll find that it results in a lot of bad publicity for them, and the last thing they want is for students to have a good excuse to hate the association when they call asking for money. Go ahead and stick a paypal link on the site that lets alums donate to the school at their discretion. Make sure you use trademarks carefully (you can check a primer about this many places online), and build your site with renewed purpose. ;)
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Spurious legal threats, be they from lawyers or just the old boys' club, are one of the worst problems in the legal climate today. Since there's so little cost to fire off a Cease and Desist letter that sounds scary but is essentially contentless, corporations do it as a last resort to harass small developers who they'd never be able to beat in court. The only way I know of to fix this situation is to make there be a *high cost* for waging war against the small guy, and this could easily come in the form of bad publicity if people don't just shut down their sites right away.
By the way, yes, this has happened to me several times. Most recently was my battle with the DMCA over flipping embedding bits
If it's true that they want to use such a site as a vehicle for alumni donations, why not try to help them? If you liked the school, you're probably not opposed to improving it, no? Just ask them what they would like, and see if you can accomodate their wishes. If they refuse to talk, just ignore them, and your site will be much more popular than theirs.
Oh, and yes, we've been Slashdotted once
That Anthony Boyd...that young man was always a trouble maker. Never had any respect for authority. If he was here right now, he'd be in detention. He has no affliation with this school anymore, and is stealing the thunder from my pet project. Something has to be done about these rogue Internet sites. The principal and the board need to get a handle on this whole Internet thing. I'm sure he's violating some laws or even worse school policies...kids these days...
No.
First that 'old-boy's club' you mock with your third choice may be the one that gets you places in the future. Don't burn that connection unless you absolutely have to....
I saw that and flipped- I thought you meant Carmel, Indiana. I can definately relate to the 'grossmans' that run the schools thru their generous 'wealth' and donations.....
:)
When they call you on the phone state at first that there is a 150$ per minute consultation fee for communications and (check your wiretap laws) you are going to send him a bill
Keep all your records and if you have to take up a civil action in court asking for relief.