Slashdot Mirror
Katie Jones Interviewed
scubacuda writes "Greplaw has interviewed Katie Jones (of the real Katie.com). In addition to the details of the dispute regarding Penguin's 'branding' of the book Katie.com (which many /.ers 'reviewed'), she shares the details of her conversation with cyberlawyer Parry Aftab, how she believes Penguin's title change suggests that it thought it could steamroll her without recourse, and the tremendous amount of support the geek community has shown her." Ms. Aftab has several blogs. Ms. Aftab, if you contact us with a response to these allegations, Slashdot will publish your response (we've also written to your email address). Another reader notes: "Yesterday /. ran an article about the book Katie.com. Out of curiosity I just visited the Amazon.com website to see how many more reviews were on the website. Yesterday when I first checked there were over 300 reviews, most of them negative and the book scored only 2 stars total. Today, the book has 81 reviews with an average rating of 3 1/2 stars."
What is Amazon doing now - monitoring the traffic it gets to certain books and then removing reviews that contribute to a less than average rating? How do we explain the reduction in reviews from 300+ to 81 and the boost in the rating?
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The problem is that she hadn't trademarked or copyrighted 'Katie.com'. That's the only reason that Penguin has any ground to stand on. If she had 'katie.com' copyrighted and/or trademarked, SHE could have sued THEM for using the title. Of course, how many of us think of trademarking our domain names on a regular basis? Especially a personal site?
Say I register Bill.com and someone writes a book about Bill Gates' secret life as a modern day Robin Hood, stealing from everyone and giving a portion back to the poor. Would I be allowed to tell them that they couldn't call it Bill.com? Fuck no I couldn't. Just because I own a domain name doesn't give me exclusive rights to tell other people what to do with the name.
At first she didn't tell them what to do with the name. Penguin had demanded she give up the address and all she wanted was to keep her existing domain. So to use your example: you register bill.com, Gate's book comes out, the publisher demands you give them bill.com
Still think this is fair?
From http://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-general.htm
So, by using the domain "katie.com", she HAS copyrighted it!
http://www.aftab.com/..... I mean come on, a lawyer is bad enough... there are too many of those. But a lawyer who apparently has no clue that its not squatting when the person owned the domain YEARS before the book was even made and whos sole buisness is to screw people on the web because there ARE so many loopholes in Internet Law..... that just deserves a slashdotting in my book.
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
I just checked; the negative reviews are still there.
Amazon has an odd sorting scheme, but if you click "view all reviews", you can then further sort by rating or by usefulness. Do the latter. Look for most useful... all are voted useful but one or two stars, mentioning the website bullying. Then click for least useful... those are the five-star ones focusing on the story BEFORE the bullying came out.
You just have to RTF screen.
You can't copyright a domain name. I'm amazed that you bothered to read the part of the FAQ that said when you can copyright but not the part that says what can't be copyrighted:
Titles, names, short phrases, and slogans; familiar symbols or designs; mere variations of typographic ornamentation, lettering, or coloring; mere listings of ingredients or contents
Making the URL a link makes it much easier to /. a site.
Thus:
http://www.aftab.com/
I will now proceed to fire up Opera and set it to reload the page every 30 seconds.
"Live Free or Die." Don't like it? Then keep out of the USA
As Ray Bradbury (author of Fahrenheit 451) recently found out, he could not prevent "Fahrenheit 9-11" from being titled as such because one cannot copyright a title.
"Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart, he dreams himself your master."
According to whois:
Administrative Contact:
Aftab, Parry (PA286)
parry.aftab@COUNSEL.COM
Aftab & Savitt, P.C.
E. 80 Rt. 4, The Atrium, Suite 410
Paramus, NJ 07652
US
(201) 845-0100 fax: 999 999 9999
IANAL, but I can read dammit.
Is registration of my mark required?
Copyright and Trademark are basically the same thing, at least in the US. UPTO does not need to grant you a trademark for you to have your asset trademarked. You can even use the little superscript TM if you wish. What they do say on their webpages is that _REGISTERED_ trademarks grant you additional rights, and should your trademark come in dispute I imagine it's an easier case. It's an added insurance for just such cases, but by no means necessary.
OTOH, she lives in UK, so the point is moot.
Toddlers are the stormtroopers of the Lord of Entropy.
It's a standard part of the contract to get a book published, in most cases, that the publisher decides the title. The author can suggest a title, but most of the time the publisher's marketing department has much more say in what the title will be.
If an author doesn't like that, he or she could self-publish. But self published works are rarely successful.
Or at least a law student. And, since this is anonymous, I'll give you my impression.
Katie J. can't trademark Katie.com without actually using it (or planning to use it) in a commercial sense. That's trademark law.
Katie J. can't register Katie.com for a website because it's in the form of [descriptive term].[top level domain]. That's from a CAFC case a few months ago (In re Oppedahl & Larson LLP, Nos. 03-1525, 78/061,755, 2004 WL 1416361 (Fed.Cir. June 25, 2004)). The case affirmed the Trademark Board denying registration for patents.com.
Penguin has a shot at registering Katie.com for the book except I anticipate that Katie J. would oppose the registration. Plus, she used it first so Penguin can't really claim priority.
As far as Katie J. suing Penguin, tough. I can't think of an appropriate cause of action that might work. Who knows, you could probably try to bend something into place but my guess is that it won't bear up.
This is a case of first impression. You can phrase it in 2-4 different ways but it all boils down to this: There's no law directly on point to prevent this activity. Should there be? I think so. But I'm not a law maker. I'm (supposed to be) a law follower. And litigator. Maybe.
People are actually allowed to use numbers other than 555-XXXX. They just don't out of habit/tradition and respect for people who have phones. There is no law (feel free to disprove me) that says you MUST use a 555-XXXX number if you are publishing something fictitious.
The main problem is that people aren't seeing domain names as a parallel to phone numbers, or anything else identifying.
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
Notably several people posted responses they got from here. They were all exactly that. I would suggest that it is a form response, probably prepared by her lawyer. To test that theory out, I sent an email that essentially said "I understand it's Penguin's fault, but you (presonally, and separate from Penguin) could always make an honest offer to buy the domain of Katie Jones". I have received no response to this - notable because most people that got responses got them promptly.
Jedidiah.
Craft Beer Programming T-shirts
Other people have the same problem with other .com want ot be. On exemple is "http://nissan.com/ the owner mister Nissan from the west coat if I remember have the site from the beginning of the internet, and use the site to promote his services. The big corporation Nissan make then close the site.
Ceci n'est pas une Signature !
Their customer service phone number in the US is:
(800) 631-8571.
Caution: Contents under pressure
Be careful with the donations. It's possible that the alleged friend is just someone trying to make some quick money on the case. Hold back the donations until you see an official link from Katie's homepage.
She already mentioned in the interview that she hasn't accepted any donations yet, but has been offered plenty.
Apart from the stunningly obvious fact that the titles "Fahrenheit 451" and "Fahrenheit 911" are not the same and a copyright on the former would be of absolutely no use to Bradbury, I find it humorous that Bradbury himself has a history of, shall we say, borrowing titles. For example, the title of the book "Something Wicked This Way Comes" comes from Act 4, Scene 1 of Shakespeare's MacBeth and "I Sing The Body Electric" was the title of a chapter in Walt Whitman's book, Leaves of Grass.
I'm reminded of Disney at this point. Here we have someone who plunders the public domain, adapts and creates something new from what they found there and then complains when others do the same to their own creations.
Being lawyers, our home page would not be complete without a legal disclaimer. Accepting the terms of the disclaimer is a condition to visiting our site. To our friends on the Net, we are sorry to condition our site on disclaimers. In a perfect world we wouldn't need this disclaimer, but in a perfect world, you wouldn't need lawyers either.
:-) We give all webbers the permission to copy our legal disclaimers, however, since limiting legal liability on the net is something we all want. Just don't blame us if it doesn't work. Also feel free to link to us.
Actually, in a perfect world we would have morally responsible lawyers. At least, they would know that a buried agreement without even a front page click is unlikely to be enforceable.
Our website and the materials contained in the site are copyrighted. That means terrible things can happen to you, including being drawn and quartered, if you copy or alter anything we publish at the site.
Where'd she get her law degree - an online college? Who uses emoticons in a disclaimer? Who threatens being drawn and quartered in this day and age?
We intend for this page to provide interesting information to our visitors and function as the equivalent of a seminar attended by lawyers and lay people. No information posted here or materials provided is intended to constitute legal advice. We cannot guarantee that all queries will get a response, and we cannot guarantee the accuracy of posted information, especially as to each individual situation. All responses to queries in our chat area or by e-mail are only educating the recipient as to the types of issues typically relevant to their inquiry, and are not legal advice and should not be relied upon by any recipient.
Fairly straightforward and surprisingly reasonable.
We are lawyers licensed to practice law in the states of New York and New Jersey only. The availability of this site to residents of any other state or country is not intended as a solicitation of clients in those states or other countries.
Now I'm confused. How does someone only licensed in New York and New Jersey have anything useful to offer in a web domain case?
Neither the receipt nor the distribution of materials, including the use of private electronic mail, constitutes the formation of an attorney-client relationship. An attorney-client relationship will be formed with Parry Aftab only upon the execution and delivery of a retainer agreement and the satisfaction of the conditions contained therein. Materials distributed shall not in any event be deemed confidential or privileged.
Translation: no privacy of what you send us is intended until you send us money.
No one shall be entitled to claim detrimental reliance on any views or forms or models provided or expressed, or to claim that there is a duty to update answers or materials provided or to use care to protect the interests of the recipient. You should not rely on our statements (or those of any other website) for legal advice, and should always confirm such information with your lawyers, who should be responsible for taking whatever steps are necessary to check all information and personally assuring that the advice they provide is based on accurate and complete information and research from any available sources. Links are provided for your enjoyment and no endorsement should be inferred therefrom. Now with this said, enjoy the site....
Translation: No matter how we set up this site to look like it offers useful information, we make no guarantee we were qualified to present any of it.
I've always wanted to write a book. I think "aftab.com" will be a great title.
R: That voice. Where have I heard that voice before? B: In about 365 other episodes. But I don't know who it is either.
The only sensible response to this little game that penguin is playing, is simply to write a book and title it 1-800-631-8571 (Penguin Group's customer service phone number).
Plume Re-titles Book by Katie Tarbox A Girl's Life Online (PDF)
... In 2000, Dutton published a hardcover book
(text reproduced below)
In an effort to avoid an association between the book originally titled Katie.com and
the website Katie.com, Plume and the author decide to make this title change.
New York, New York, August 6, 2004
called Katie.com by Katie Tarbox, an eye-opening account of one teenager's descent into
the seductive world of the Internet. After the book was released into the market, it was
brought to Dutton's attention that a website of the same name existed on the Internet.
The fact that the book, Katie.com, and the website shared the same name was purely
coincidental. In an effort to avoid any association between the book and the site, when
Plume issued the book in trade paperback in 2001, it printed on the copyright page that
the author of Katie.com and events described in the book have no connection whatsoever
with the website domain owner Katie Jones or her e-mail address.
Trena Keating, Editor-in-chief of Plume, said, "We have made every effort to clarify the
fact that Plume's book, Katie.com, and the website, Katie.com, are not in any way
associated with one another. In addition, it was erroneously reported recently that Plume
had asked its attorney to attempt to buy the web site Katie.com from domain owner Katie
Jones. This is absolutely not true. Ms. Jones confirms this point in a message currently
posted on her web site.
"We are not working in association with author Katie Tarbox or any other individual in
an attempt to assume ownership of the domain name address www.katie.com. Of course,
the personal views of the author are hers and do not represent Plume in any way.
"Going forward, Plume and the author have decided to re-title this book A Girl's Life
Online. This is an important book about predatory pedophiles on the Internet and how
we can protect our children. We changed the title to keep focus on this issue. The newly
titled book will be released next month. We have always taken this situation very
seriously. And we hope that by making this title change, it will demonstrate just how
dedicated Plume is to clarifying this matter."
"At the age of eighteen, Tarbox published her memoir and became the leading advocate for Internet safety regarding Internet predators"
She's not a what?
L-O-O-S-E is the antonym of TIGHT. EG: Your mamma is looser than a crack whore.
L-O-S-E is the antonym of WIN. EG: You are a total loser.
Why is it that the proponents of "one nation under God" are so eager to get rid of "liberty and justice for all"?
No you cannot copyright the word "windows". However you can TRADEMARK it.
Yes of course, changing 2 digits makes all the difference in the world. Moore has already commented to the effect that he appropriated the title. Perhaps you ignored the tagline: The temperature where freedom burns.
In short, it's stunningly obvious that you're wrong.
Yes, since Bradbury didn't want any confusion to lead to him being associated with an extreme political view, he must therefore hold personal hate in his heart for Michael Moore.
If you disagree then it must be overrated, redundant or trolling.
Trademark is not the same thing as copyright. I'm fairly sure Microsoft doesn't have a copyright on Microsoft, but does on the source code to Windows, and has a trademark on both Microsoft, and Microsoft Windows.