Nintendo Apologizes to SuicideGirls

As a follow up to the unfortunate incident on Wednesday, thanks to emfra (and others) who pointed out that BoingBoing has Nintendo's Apology Letter to the SuicideGirls site up. They even went so far as to offer up a free game system and game to the site owner. So alls well that end's well...but not before Penny Arcade had a chance to comment.

Comments

Can someone repost?

[Isca]

Some of us are behind firewalls at work :)

Re:Can someone repost?

[Walkiry]

I tried, but it's already /.ed.

Man that was fast...

Re:Can someone repost?

[marktaw.com]

Hello,

We would like to apologize to you and to those who frequent the suicidegirls.com website for inadvertently contacting you about a fan posting on the website.

We know that many of our fans are old enough to make their own choice about what they want to view on the Internet. We value the support of our fans and we respect their decisions. The letter was sent as part of an ongoing Nintendo program to aggressively protect our younger consumers from the hundreds of sexually-explicit sites each year that use Nintendo properties to attract children. We are proud of our efforts in this area. Unfortunately, the site posting identified in our letter was targeted by mistake.

As a gesture of goodwill, we would like to offer you (and RuneLateralus) a free Nintendo video game system and game of your choice. (...)

In addition, we would appreciate it if you could provide us with contact information for RuneLateralus, or have him contact us directly, so that we may apologize to him. We would be glad to send him a game and system of his choice through you as well, since we do not have his contact information.

Sincerely,
Christie Hamilton
Nintendo of America Inc.
Consumer Service Department

Re:Can someone repost?

[Perdurabo26]

You can pick it up at MirrorDot.

Re:Can someone repost?

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone really needs to write a HOWTO on getting around employer's firewalls and Internet monitoring, if they haven't already. Spoiler: run sshd and an HTTP proxy (apache or squid) on a spare box at home. Have sshd listen on port 443. SSH from work to home; forward a port from your desktop PC at work to your HTTP proxy at home. Configure your browser to use the proxy over the forwarded port. Benefits: your employer can't easily snoop your Internet traffic or control where you go. Hazards: suspicious traffic on port 443 may alert employer's network snoops. Obstacles: your ISP blocking incoming port 443, your employer's firewall blocking HTTPS access to your ISP. Difficulty: four out of five. Success rate: ? Unknown, but it works for me, and my employer is very paranoid.

Re:Can someone repost?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm calling bullshit. There are no sexually-explicit sites that target children. The credit card chargebacks on something like that would be overwhelming.

Yeah, duh. It's called "damage control", where bullshit excuses usually occur. Nice touch with the free game/system though.

Re:Can someone repost?

[Bfaber]

And if they block ssh as many do, you can use anonymizer.com, which you get if you don't enough money to the EFF.

Re:Can someone repost?

[Errtu76]

Configure your browser to use the proxy over the forwarded port

That would only work if your sysadmin hasn't denied access to Internet Options (which most (smart) admins have).

Re:Can someone repost?

[julesh]

And when the IT department works out that you're intentionally circumventing their monitoring and blocking of sites that frequently carry spyware and trojans, they're going to be _really_ pissed off with you.

Re:Can someone repost?

[nuxx]

What works really well for me is running a copy of CGIProxy on a https vhost on my personal server. That way the URLs are obfuscated and all content is wrapped up in SSL. Works rather nicely, and it works for most types of sites.

Re:Can someone repost?

[Le Marteau]

Which begs the question:

No it doesn't

It is true that many people use the phrase the way you did, but it makes one look uneducated.

Re:Can someone repost?

[hexmem]

I'm calling bullshit. There are no sexually-explicit sites that target children.

And I'm calling bullshit on you. I've seen sites that look like legitimate Barbie, Mattel, etc. sites only to be forwarded to hardcore porn. If I can find any examples I'll post them.

I applaud Nintendo for trying to protect kids, and for stepping up and admitting they were wrong this time.

Re:Can someone repost?

[AvantLegion]

P.S. - You may pick up your free game systems at Nintendo of America headquarters in Redmond, WA.

Please bring the girls.

Re:Can someone repost?

[archen]

If they block by port, just change the port on the home box. Personally I never run sshd on a standard port anyway. It helps keep the script kiddies away at least.

Re:Can someone repost?

[fugu]

It's a trap! They're just doing this so they can get his contact information... Then in the morning he'll find lawyers at his door instead of a new Gamecube! ;)

Re:Can someone repost?

[Loco3KGT]

OMG THANK YOU FOR POSTING THIS

No kidding my employer blocks everything and I can only get out on a few certain ports. Try being a volunteer sysadmin for Big Bro Big Sis and needing to be able to SSH to it except you can only get out on port 80 and 443.

Oh, and you already have a web and email server running on those ports.. then you have to resort to firewall exceptions for yourself. it's retarded.

BUT IT'S OK BECAUSE BLOCKING OUTGOING PORT 22 MEANS BLOCKing H4X0RS

Re:Can someone repost?

[aliens]

If you can do all that, I think you're either A) Working in IT or B) Friends with IT

If you're not, why aren't you? Are you a closet geek?

Re:Can someone repost?

[NeoSkandranon]

Also known as: HOWTO get fired for circumventing your organization's IT policy

Re:Can someone repost?

[Flying Purple Wombat]

There are no sexually-explicit sites that target children

Yes, there are. Two examples:

My wife opened a URL that once belonged to Toys-R-Us. She bookmarked it a few years ago, but now it's a porn site. I TRU didn't renew it's domain registration for that particular domain, and the porn guys grabbed it.

Also, see my /. post about how my son was tricked into firing up a porn-dialer http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=112780&cid =9562923

Re:Can someone repost?

[seafortn]

In brief, yes, and Opera too - we have a lot of terminals around my school which allow file access only to a local "my documents" or a net-shared drive - so last year, sick of all the IE toobars and other stuff that idiots kept installing under their accounts, thereby affecting all accounts, I installed opera to my file share, and it ran fine - same thing with a work box this summer - Firefox installed fine - it just isn't the default for opening .html files... So you could run it out of my documents, a thumb drive, you take your pick...

Re:Can someone repost?

[gphinch]

How about a VirtualBoy?

Re:Can someone repost?

[Bootsy Collins]

I'm calling bullshit. There are no sexually-explicit sites that target children. The credit card chargebacks on something like that would be overwhelming.

There certainly have sorta been sites that fall into that domain, even if it wasn't the site master's intent. Viz. this story from the winter.

Re:Can someone repost?

[Kiryat Malachi]

In my case they block by blocking all traffic except for specific types, which are all run through proxies. There are no non-proxied connections allowed between the intranet and the Internet.

Which, I have to admit, is probably a good idea for security, even if it annoys the hell out of me when I want to SSH home to check my email.

Re:Can someone repost?

[drawocsuomynonagmail]

Good. Once again we prove that if you have physical access to the machine, you own it. So you put a browser on that thumb drive and SSH too. This probably doesn't matter much at your school, but at your employer, you don't want to put evidence of your exploits in a folder on their machine - or worse, on their file server. Once it's there, it's in their backups... which they might send offsite into storage for years, so even burning down the fscking building won't eradicate that evidence. Use the thumb drive, please. Better still, encrypt its contents if you can. (Of course, if you're really worried about the safety of your job, you probably shouldn't be doing any of this stuff in the first place.)

Re:Can someone repost?

[drawocsuomynonagmail]

Nevertheless - if they're allowing SSL connections (https://foo.com), then they're allowing connections into which they cannot snoop, and it should be possible to use such a connection for SSH. Hmm... does your browser give you certificate warnings for EVERY https: site you visit? If so, they're doing man-in-the-middle jiggery pokery, and you can forget trying to sneak an SSH connection across it.

Re:Can someone repost?

[drawocsuomynonagmail]

Closet? No, I came out years ago. You don't have to be in IT to understand how it works. It's almost all documented out there in RFCs and other accessible information. There's also loads of free software out there. If you have a PC, you have everything it takes to play around with almost ALL the technology used by today's browsers, and other wonderful things like proxies.

Re:Can someone repost?

[drawocsuomynonagmail]

Damn straight. As I've said in other posts here, better keep a low profile and have a cover story ready. If you can't make up one the screws will believe, then don't even think about messing with this stuff. (If you need or like your job, that is.)

Re:Can someone repost?

[MissTuxie]

a free Nintendo video game system and game of your choice

They're only gonna ask you to help them move 50.000.000,00 USD (fifty millions american dollars) outside Nigeria before they give you a free video game. Because they know you're someone trusworthy.

Re:Can someone repost?

[TiggertheMad]

And when the IT department works out that you're intentionally circumventing their monitoring and blocking of sites that frequently carry spyware and trojans, they're going to be _really_ pissed off with you.

If I were working in an IT department, and I found out someone set up a SSH proxie forwarding service, I would make a wild leap of logic and assume that the person was smart enough to keep their own machine spyware and trojan free. Most people don't even know what a port is, let alone how they work...

Re:Can someone repost?

[TheLoneDanger]

"She should ask them if she can have that Super Famicom CD ROM prototype I drooled about in Nintendo Power when I was 9."

Wouldn't that be the CD add-on that Sony developed, which Nintendo spurned (in a surprise public announcement because they felt Sony wanted too much control). IIRC, this led to Sony getting really pissed off and going solo with the project, eventually culminating in the Sony Playstation....

Re:Can someone repost?

[zrobotics]

ahem..
*cough*whitehouse.com*cough*

Re:Can someone repost?

[zoeblade]

I believe the parent post is right, although I'm not entirely sure. I heard Nintendo commissioned Sony to help them build a CD-ROM add-on for the SNES after the "success" of the Mega-CD (or Sega-CD as it's known in America), then changed their mind. Sony weren't too pleased about this so went ahead with the system anyway, improved it quite a bit, and released it as the PlayStation.

Re:Can someone repost?

[michrech]

While not targeted at children directly, try dlsreports.com.

I mis-typed this once in front of my boss and ended up with a picture of a vagina on my screen.

Luckily there were no customers in our shop at the time.

Going to the site now returns a 'search' page instead of the porn site it used to be. Maybee dslreports.com had it taken down?

Re:Can someone repost?

[xCepheus]

My advice is to use SSH + VNC.

What I did is set up sshd + VNC server on my box at home then had my router forward the SSH port and customized the firewall on my box at home to open the SSH port. Then put SSH (putty) and VNC clients (both standalone executables so no install rights necessary) on my workstation. I have VNC tunnel through SSH so everything is all nice and encrypted and bingo... just browse the net using your the browser on your home box instead using your workstation to browse. The only visible traffic on the network is encrypted SSH traffic (is that not allowed where you work?) and since all the browsing is done on your box at home getting a worm/virus/trojan/malware/spyware/etc. won't get you in trouble at work.

For more info on how to configure VNC to work through an SSH tunnel just google for SSH and VNC and you can find some online tutorials. A little tricky... but considering your reading this on /. it should be pretty easy.

Re:Can someone repost?

[Anonymous Coward]

If I were working in an IT department, and I found out someone set up a SSH proxie forwarding service, I would make a wild leap of logic and assume that the person was smart enough to keep their own machine spyware and trojan free

And if I were your boss and knew about this, I would fire you in an instant.

Re:Can someone repost?

[Babbster]

I can see making that assumption. Of course, I can also see the next assumption being that they're using that connection to transfer proprietary information from the company's network to their own computer.

Re:Can someone repost?

[Aqua OS X]

Might be cool... if you have an overwhelming desire to become cross-eyed and enjoy being shot in the face with red lasers. :)

Re:Can someone repost?

[Holi]

Language changes and as this usage is now the most commonly
heard use of the phrase (to invite the obvious question). It would seem that you are quickly becoming wrong. I believe this usage has made it into the The Oxford Guide to English Usage but as I am at work I will have to look it up when I get home.

Re:Can someone repost?

[trewornan]

not as a challenge to your "hacking" skills

We're hackers *because* we see this as a challenge

but shouldn't you be at work doing WORK

Puh-leaze . . . only lamers go to work to WORK; anybody with any sense goes to work to get PAID, having to do work is a sort of unpleasant (but mostly avoidable) side effect.

Re:Can someone repost?

[brain159]

The rest of the world uses the term "beg the question" in the way which sounds sensible to normal people. The most appropriate name for the logical fallacy you linked to would be "begging the answer".

My best friend is a Philosopher and even he agrees with me on this point. (And do be careful to not commit a No True Scotsman if replying to this point)

Re:Can someone repost?

[pyrrhonist]

Benefits: your employer can't easily snoop your Internet traffic or control where you go.

They can if they read their DNS logs.

Re:Can someone repost?

[TheGatekeeper]

Try a CGI Proxy w/ SSL. Very few companies block SSL, as it is required for banking and online shopping.

Re:Can someone repost?

[Omestes]

Woohoo, we're capitalized now! and one-man experts on what the common parliance of rhetorical gimmics should be as well. In rhetoric it is "begging the question", which may not be the most appropriate name, but the one it goes by, no matter what you and the Philosopher think. We can say, though, that there is a difference between the PHRASE and the FALLACY, and that there is no relation between them.

The rest of the world has not studied rhetoric, appearently, and most of the rest of the world does not speak english. And I doubt that the rest of the world confused a rhetorical device for a common turn of speech.

Re:Can someone repost?

[Newtonian_p]

I'm calling bullshit. There are no sexually-explicit sites that target children.

I remember that zelda64.com use to foward you to a porn site a few years ago.

Re:Can someone repost?

[codemachine]

Probably, but maybe they're just sending it home so they can keep working on their projects after work. Geeks are sometimes like that.

Re:Can someone repost?

[Babbster]

To me, though, it seems that computer geeks should be the MOST interested in following security policies since they know better than most the horrors possible with an unsecured computer. Were I running such a business, I'd be far harsher dealing with security violators who know their way around PCs and networks than I would someone who doesn't know what they're doing. I would similarly mistrust someone who claims to be sneaking work out to do at home - that seems like the kind of thing for which one could ask permission, instead of evading security to get it done.

Re:Can someone repost?

[madprof]

Works great until someone seens your screen. :)

Re:Can someone repost?

[Holi]

After some more research into this (it's Friday I don't want to start a new project), I found this:

The original sense is of a logical fallacy, of taking for granted or assuming the thing that you are setting out to prove. To take an example, you might say that lying is wrong because we ought always to tell the truth. That's a circular argument and makes no sense. Another instance is to argue that democracy must be the best form of government because the majority is always right. The fallacy was described by Aristotle in his book on logic in about 350BC. His Greek name for it was turned into Latin as petitio principii and then into English in 1581 as beg the question. Most of our problems arise because the person who translated it made a hash of it. The Latin might better be translated as "laying claim to the principle".
from here http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-beg1.htm.

It seems our problems with this phrase (other then the fact that the word beg is misused in this statement at least according to its accepted english definition. and should have been more accurately translated from its original greek "to en archei aiteisthai" meaning "at the beginning to assume" to its latin form "petitio principii" to "to assume the question". Unfortunately, some idiot in 1581 decided to use a direct translation (from aiteisthai which literally means "to beg" though in this case a more accurate translation is "to assume").

Ok my rambling will end soon enough.

If you take the phrase "begs the question" and use the accepted definitions of the words then it does mean "to earnestly ask the question" (at least when using the formal definition of beg), though the idea passed down to us from Aristotle is the fallacy of circular logic.

There now I have wasted some of my time and some of yours.

Thank you and good night.

Re:Can someone repost?

[toiletmonster]

use the google cache. we have lots of sites blocked. u don't get any pictures from the google cache but i'm usually just looking for the text of an article anyway.

Re:Can someone repost?

[irc.goatse.cx troll]

"Going to the site now returns a 'search' page instead of the porn site it used to be."

Its situations like these that spawned the WayBack Machine

Re:Can someone repost?

[Queer Boy]

I can also see the next assumption being that they're using that connection to transfer proprietary information from the company's network to their own computer.

Downfall of improper screening of employees and a McJob society in America. Boo freaking hoo.

A. It's a workplace that fosters animosity of workers against the company
B. It's a disgruntled employee and there's no interest in assuring job satisfaction
C. You have a crap HR department and crap managers that pay so little attention to employees as to miss the fact they have industrial espionage on their hands

If you have such little regard to who your employees are and what they are doing, you deserve all the consequences.

Re:Can someone repost?

[Psymunn]

or worse yet... SPAM!!! *camera cuts to nintendo's secret headquarters* yes, now that we have painted ourselves in a positive light in the eyes of the slashdotters, we can proceed to punish these pedlers of smut in the worst way we know how: send mass quantities of flyers to their doors. BWAHAHA

Re:Can someone repost?

[Babbster]

Yep. Because setting up firewalls and proxies to secure one's network, and maybe keep employees on task instead of surfing the web for porn, is absolutely justification for stealing from a company.

Re:Can someone repost?

[Queer Boy]

I said a company deserves the consequences from their poor policies. I never said there was justification in wrongdoing. Interesting and very American to jump from accepting consequences to justifying theft.

Thank you for reinforcing what I said though. You agree that companies have such poor policies in place for hiring and managing employees that they are hiring the types that do not keep on task and that surf for porn instead of working.

Clearly you are one of the people that feel it's a waste of time to try and hire for quality and work to keep employees satisfied when you can just block their net access and hope for the best. Zieg heil corporate Amerika!

Re:Can someone repost?

[Babbster]

You're full of shit. People don't steal from companies because they feel put upon. They steal from companies because they're greedy and they're thieves. And, guess what? If someone hasn't been caught stealing before (thus creating a criminal record), there's no way for an HR department to screen out potential thieves - even WITH a criminal record, if it's not local it might not be easily discovered.

Now, that's the last feeding you'll get from me, troll. I wouldn't have offered this morsel if it hadn't been for the fact that blaming victims and evading personal responsibility is a pet peeve.

Re:Can someone repost?

[pchan-]

Of course, I can also see the next assumption being that they're using that connection to transfer proprietary information from the company's network to their own computer.

you should already assume that any technically competent person (the kind who can set up a web proxy over an ssh tunnel) can already do this. whether it be over ssh, uploading over http, burning on cd, loading on their ipod, transferring it to their laptop, or setting up a super-secret backdoor way of passing it (tunnel over http, ping payload, whatever). you should also assume that if it were happening, you probably wouldn't know about it.

Re:Can someone repost?

[The Briguy]

and after Nintendo spured Sony they changed thier minds again, built the thing with the help of Phillips, and then changed thier minds AGAIN. Phillips ended up releasing it as the stand-alone CD-i.

Re:Can someone repost?

[TClevenger]

In a previous company where I worked IT, a manager approached me and asked if there was a way to block web access to the outside world for one of their employees without alerting HR or Corporate IT that they were surfing porn.

I immediately wanted to answer, "Uhh, why don't you try being a manager and tell them to lay off the porn if they want to keep their job?"

Re:Can someone repost?

[NaDrew]

My wife's employer has their machines locked down pretty fierce, so talking her through installing Trillian and the Gmail Notifier was interesting. I had her change the install path to My Documents (a subdirectory for each, of course), thinking that she would at least have rights there, and that actually worked. These are both pretty well-behaved applications, though, which properly write to HKEY_CURRENT_USER instead of HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, and run properly under a non-Administrator account.
I guess the question would be, do Moz/FireFox run acceptably under those conditions?

Re:Can someone repost?

[EvanED]

No, Sony does. (Maybe slightly NSFW depending on what picture thumbnails are randomly chosen.)

Re:Can someone repost?

[damiam]

If they're blocking porn, they're probably also blocking well-known anonymous proxies, including anonymizer.com.

Re:Can someone repost?

[damiam]

That's a valid assumption if their machine has no CD burner, floppy, Zip, USB or Firewire ports, and they have no access on the internal network to a machine that does. Otherwise, there are much easier ways to covertly transfer information than over an ssh proxy.

Re:Can someone repost?

[f0rt0r]

You've got that right. There was a manager fired 2 weeks ago using ssh to bypass the companies network filtering systems. Dude was probably in his 40's and probably had a hard time explaining to his family ( assuming he was married ) how he lost his job.

Just understand the risks before you try to violate company policies. Just because you managed to circumvent the technology used to implement the policy, doesn't mean you can't still lose your job for violating it. Employers for whom their data is their business are usually much harsher about policy violations than those who either don't care or don't have enough resources to prevent information leaks.

Back to understanding the risks, if you violate the company policy, they have every right to terminate your employment. One would hope to get a slap on the wrist the first time if the incident had no signs of being an intentional refusal to follow the rules, but one would not have a leg to stand on even if they skipped the warning and went straight to the more severe punishment. Bottom line, how much is bypassing the network filters worth to you?

Re:Can someone repost?

[tylernt]

And since banking and shopping are generally non-work-related activities, that's exactly why employers would block SSL/port 443.

Re:Can someone repost?

[LegendLength]

Ha Ha /Nelson

Re:Can someone repost?

[capitan]

They meant the porn not the article. :)

Re:Can someone repost?

[gwynevans]

Pretty easily - See "Portable Firefox 0.9.3 & 1.0PR (USB Drive-Friendly)" at http://johnhaller.com/jh/mozilla/portable_firefox/ , for example.

Nintendo

[MyLongNickName]

Sounds like Nintendo did the right thing after messing up. Time to forgive and forget.

Oh wait.. this is Slashdot :)

Re:Nintendo

[MyLongNickName]

*SIGH* This really wasn't meant to be funny. Or at least it was only meant as a funny way to make a serious point. I am a skeptical personal. But sometimes, you just have to take something at face value. Accepting apologies allows reconciliation. Not accepting apologies means we will always be at war with each other... see 99% of the world. Nintendo did something stupid. They apologized and made an attempt at correction and reconciliation. I have a lot of respect for that. Yet, it seems like it is human nature to be vindictive. And it also seems to be in the nature of Slashdot to be vindictive even when folks here were not personally involved in the original wrong.

Re:Nintendo

[Anonymous Coward]

You should stick to the jokes you get depressing when you get serious....

Re:Nintendo

[mr_z_beeblebrox]

There is not much content to my post here. I was looking to say exactly what you said and rather than post redundant I will just say. Right on, 100%. Nintendo realized they were in err and Nintendo apologized (even issuing product as a goodwill gesture). By accepting the apology runelatus can show that he is a good upstanding moral person who believes in proper conduct in society. Thus he can cause a dent in the perception of SGs' audience.

Re:Nintendo

[gamgee5273]

I think what's important to note is that it was Nintendo's lawyers who contacted SG, not Nintendo. My guess is that someone from Nintendo of America has chewed out someone at the lawfirm royally by now...

Re:Nintendo

[Ubergrendle]

Paraphrashing Ganhdi, "if we rely upon eye-for-an-eye justice, the whole world will end up blind."

Corporations are big, confusing entities. They're byzantine. Sometimes one individual, or team, or department, or DIVSION, exercise a strategy inconsistent or in competition with the corporation's main objective. How many times have you gone to work, looked at a project, and wondered "what the HELL are they doing?!?!?".

In this case, cooler heads prevailed and the situation was rectified. I don't think that Nintendo should be penalised for correcting a mistake. They were even gracious about it.

Re:Nintendo

[lifeblender]

Well, it's a lot better than companies who stand by their mistakes, rather than recanting and apologizing. To me, this is just more proof that Nintendo is sensitive to the perceptions of its customers, whereas many large entities are not. I for one will try to emulate Nintendo.

Well, maybe my spiders should be less hair-trigger, but whatever.

Re:Nintendo

[Anonymous Coward]

Or more direct, quoting Jesus: "You have heard that it was said, 'Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.' But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also."

Re:Nintendo

[gl4ss]

the question is what nintendo will do to prevent such harassing from happening the next time?

are they giving their contracted goons the bitchslap and denial of money they deserve?

Re:Nintendo

[daemon_mf]

Oh, c'mon... why isn't this modded funny? It's boring drivel as insightful, but modded funny, it's hilarious!

Re:Nintendo

[spectral]

I've been trying to emulate nintendo for a while. Where can I get a decent GC emulator? I can't afford the money for a new console, I just bought an iPod Photo. (this is a joke btw, there's already a GC at my house, and I haven't orded the iPod Photo.. yet.)

Re:Nintendo

[geoffspear]

Don't you know that it's better to be resolute in your wrongness than to flip-flop? Admitting your mistakes is a sign of weakness; a Real American knows that it's better to be strong than right.

Re:Nintendo

[Dyolf Knip]

Indeed. And it looks like this apology wasn't a boilerplated item, either. Normally, when a big company backs down from a major IP snafu, their statementes are more of the "Well, you're still an naughty criminal, but out of sheer altruism we'll let you live for now" variety; basically insulting you under the guise of "We're sorry". So to see a real mea culpa and a request for additional contact info so they can do some _more_ apologizing is rare in the extreme. Kudos to Nintendo on this.

Re:Nintendo

[SpecBear]

The problem is, nowhere in the Nintendo letter did i say that they'd taken steps to ensure that innocent people weren't harassed by legal threats in the future. They corrected one mistake, not the system that made the mistake. If Nintendo had said "Oh crap, we screwed up! We'll make sure it never happens again," then I'd be in full forgive and forget mode.

Nintendo is a big corporation, so frivolous legal threats don't bother them much. But to the average webmaster who doesn't have a legal team on staff, such threats have to be taken seriously and have the potential to cause serious financial harm even if they're retracted.

Re:Nintendo

[sik0fewl]

Exactly. It's obviously the law firm that is hunting down people that are using Nintendo's trademarks to gain higher Google rankings. It is also the law firm's job to make sure the site *is* actually using trademarks to gain high Google rankings and isn't some profile or forum comment.

The law firm didn't do their job and because of that Nintendo looked like the bad guys. At least Nintendo had the guts to 'fess up and tell us what happened. They were even nice enough to not place all the blame on the law firm.

Re:Nintendo

[Anonymous Coed]

Paraphrashing Ganhdi, "if we rely upon eye-for-an-eye justice, the whole world will end up blind."

The reason I hate that quote so much is that it makes no sense. An eye for an eye means that everyone who goes around poking eyes out will be blind. Not the whole world. Just the eye-pokers.

Re:Nintendo

[atari2600]

Umm the name is *Gandhi*.

Re:Nintendo

[Doctor Faustus]

*SIGH* This really wasn't meant to be funny.

Think of it this way: You got not one, but two +5 posts out of it.

Re:Nintendo

[Anonymous Coed]

Sure, I know, we all jab a stick into someone's eye at some point or another. It happens to the best of us. But hey, don't hold that against me. Hey, what are you doing with that stick??? Get away from me!

Re:Nintendo

[fossa]

Let's assume that you need at least one eye to successfully poke the eye of another. After poking a single eye, the eye-poker is now one-eyed, having given an eye for justice, but can still poke. The eye-poker's eye won't be removed until he is caught. This is the key point, and it allows the one-eyed (or two-eyed) eye-poker to poke as many eyes as she can until someone stops her. So it is possible for a clever eye poker to poke many more eyes than her two eye quota that she would at first appear to be limited to. (Let's ignore for a moment the question of punishing a multi-poker who has but two eyes to lose). Thus, it is certainly possible for everyone to go blind in an eye for an eye world if we allow for an eye-poking rampage.

Or maybe you just shouldn't take everything so literally.

Re:Nintendo

[buxton2k]

I think you're interpreting a bit too literally. The point of the quotation is that we all hurt each other at times, whether intentionally or unintentionally. Sometimes it's physical harm, and sometimes emotional, economic, etc. If those who are hurt demand the right to vengeance, then the cycle of hurting goes on; conversely, if we understand that both we and our neighbors are imperfect, we can take the first step towards apology and reconciliation.

Re:Nintendo

[Burpmaster]

Wait a minute...

Let's assume that you need at least one eye to successfully poke the eye of another.
[...]
Thus, it is certainly possible for everyone to go blind in an eye for an eye world if we allow for an eye-poking rampage.

Who pokes out the eye of the last person? By the time there's a last person, everyone else is blind!

Re:Nintendo

[lew3004]

Now THAT is probably in the top three for me on one of the funniest comments on Slashdot! I'll be laughing all day; thanks!

Re:Nintendo

[fossa]

touché

Re:Nintendo

[atari2600]

Fucking dickhead moderators and fucking 20second limit - fucking fuck fuck fuck

I said it before...

[marktaw.com]

This was a stealth marketing ploy on the part of Nintendo.

"Hey, hot goth chicks like Nintendo games, how can we publicize this fact? I know, let's send them a nasty letter from our lawyers and 200,000 geeks will start to associate hot goth chicks with Nintendo."

And you all fell for it.

Re:I said it before...

[D-Cypell]

Nintendo Marketing Guy #1: "Why dont we create an elaborate ploy to associate hot goth chicks with Nintendo?"

Nintendo Marketing Guy #2: "GREAT IDEA!! Thats much better than Magic Mushroom munching italian plumbers.... get the lawyers on it"

Seems fairly sensible to me!

Re:I said it before...

[Anonymous Coward]

Soooo, somebody makes a mistake and (when informed of it) both apologizes *and* offers to make it up to the offended. Now, I'm not one to shill for corporations, but how does this equate to "sleazebag company"?

Re:I said it before...

[fatwreckfan]

Except that the user that posted the names of those games was a guy. That doesn't meet my definition of a "hot goth chick."

Re:I said it before...

[SilkBD]

Profit is not a good reason to run a company, enhancing the overall good of society is.

Damn, I never laughed so hard in my life. I don't know what bizarro universe you live in... but companies exist to make profit, there's no way around that unless you're a non-profit company.

You see, they explicitly make a type of company called "non-profit" to destinguish them from all the other companies who exist for profit.

You, my friend, need to rethink your idealistic subjective reality.

Re:I said it before...

[marktaw.com]

Now everybody knows hot goth chicks like Nintendo AND we're going to give them a free DS so they can blog about it all day long just in time for the holiday season.

Sounds like a win-win to me.

PS: nobody cares that it was a guy who wrote about it, all they hear is "suicidegirls.com" and "nintendo."

Re:I said it before...

[PhoenixFlare]

Actually, this geek now associates "Nintendo" with "sleazebag company that I won't ever buy from again." There is no fury like that of a geek scorned.

How you know that, i'd love to know. The mentality around here of "If I don't like something, everyone else must hate it too" gets really annoying sometimes.

Re:I said it before...

[ArbitraryConstant]

I think it's a conspiracy. One assumes at least some of the 200k geeks will pay to see the hot goth chicks naked. They both benefit.

Re:I said it before...

[bluephone]

Yeah, it's not like SuicideGirls.com itself is a goth chick porn site or anything.

Re:I said it before...

[VEGx]

Company types are defined by law. In most cases that means there are tax differences. "Non-profit" doesn't mean anything "better" by definition. Most non-profits try to max their profits just like anyohter company

Re:I said it before...

[Anonymous Coward]

Although you're mostly right (companies do need to make a profit), you are missing a detail. We, as a society, allow corporations to exist as a fictional entity. This entity removes liability from those creating the company, and allows for some really risky ventures to be started that possibly wouldn't otherwise. Because of this legal immunity, corporations do owe society something, since we are allowing them to exist at all. If a corporation is not acting towards the good of society, then it should be our right to remove its charter, since it's abusing the privelige that we have given it. Companies should exist to enhance the good of society, and those that do not should not be given special priveleges.

Re:I said it before...

[TeamSPAM]

You're new to this internet thing aren't you? Guys pretend to be a "hot goth chick" all the time. ;)

Re:I said it before...

[joggle]

I don't know what bizarro universe you live in...

That universe has a name. That name is Japan.

Re:I said it before...

[Firethorn]

Most non-profits try to max their profits just like anyohter company

Um, no. A non-profit company can't make any money other than "growth". They can have cash reserves, but by law they have to disperse their "profits" by very specific means. Now if you just meant max their income that would be a different matter. If they measure their "profit" as doing whatever charitable thing they incorporated for, then yes again. But they don't make profit in the sense that stockholders get dividends.

Not-for-profit works a little differently, they're allowed to do more, but again, they're not allowed to pay dividends or simply stockpile cash.

Re:I said it before...

[CommanderData]

Nintendo Marketing Guy #3: "???"

Nintendo Marketing Guy #4: "Profit!"


The joke's been done before but I couldn't resist :)

Re:I said it before...

[fatwreckfan]

Touche ;)

Re:I said it before...

[Lord_Dweomer]

" Except that the user that posted the names of those games was a guy."

Well, hate to burst your bubble, but on the internet pretty much all of the "hot goth chicks" you will meet will present the same problem.

Re:I said it before...

[irc.goatse.cx troll]

And the ironic thing is theres a nice set of one of the girls posing with NES stuff. complete with lightgun, blocky controller (dangleing between her legs), and duckhunt. ..or so I've heard..

Re:I said it before...

[Lost Race]

There are two ways to run a business:

1. You do what you enjoy, and get other people to pay for it. The goal is not to make money; making money just lets you keep doing what you enjoy without going broke.

2. You try to make as much money as possible, doing whatever it takes whether you enjoy it or not.

Grandparent poster thinks #2 is a bad way to run a business. That is one opinion, which has some merit from certain points of view.

Parent poster seems to think #2 is the only way to run a business. That is incorrect.

Re:I said it before...

[TheDredd]

Except that the user that posted the names of those games was a guy. That doesn't meet my definition of a "hot goth chick."

That depends on how drunk you get!

Re:I said it before...

[SilkBD]

When I formed my company, I never read anything about owing society for giving me limited liability. It just said I had limited liability. Unless there are written strings attached, there are no strings attached.

well after RTFA

[JeanBaptiste]

and checking out the suicide girls website...

I'd like to know why Nintendo's Lawyers are looking at goth-porn. That would seem far more damaging than a goth-porn site mentioning they like Nintendo games.

but what do I know.

Re:well after RTFA

[frankthechicken]

Maybe they were doing some research for a future Mario adventure, Princess Peach always seemed to me to like the darker side of life, what with her constant "kidnapping" by Bowser, and her penchant for chains, whilst being locked up in Bowser's "dungeon".

Re:well after RTFA

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe the webmaster of SG should offer Nintendo a free corporate subscription to the site as a sign of good will? :)

Re:well after RTFA

[RyoShin]

More likely than not (as other people have mentioned,) this letter was probably brought on by a spider. If you read the original C&D letter, it mentions a link pointing to Nintendo, which was not on the page in any way.

Of course, after a hard day of coding Super Mario Sunshine, I probably wouldn't mind kicking back with some lesbian goth pictures. So if it was a person, it was most likely NOT the lawyers.

Re:well after RTFA

[MrNemesis]

"I'd like to know why Nintendo's Lawyers are looking at goth-porn."

Surely you just answered your own question...? ;)

Re:well after RTFA

[Hoi Polloi]

Well we know that Nintendo's legal assistants had at least one hand on their keyboards so they could type the threat letter.

If I had a job that required me scanning porn sites for trademark violations I'd probably take much shorter lunches.

Re:well after RTFA

[dash2]

Cease and desist at once!!!! Yours, Nintendo.

Re:well after RTFA

[carpe_noctem]

I believe that SG staff doesn't do that unless you submit a set to be considered for application as a model on the site. Somehow, I don't think that Satoru Iwata is gonna make the cut...

Re:well after RTFA

[iMaple]

On second thoughts Slashdot and you will receive a free girl ^H^H^H^H Nitendo of your choice.

Re:well after RTFA

[t35t0r]

Suicidegirls is not "goth porn", I saw no pictures of penetration, blowjobbing, cunninglingus, and cum gargling, but maybe i didn't look in the right places.

It seems to me the Suicidegirls is erotic/nude art with a gothic twist and should not be confused for porn, although it may have the same effect on your penis.

Re:well after RTFA

[MilenCent]

You outta take a look at the final boss of the new Paper Mario game....

Re:well after RTFA

[MilenCent]

It can be porn even if it doesn't have those listed things. You just have to have no clothes.

Heh, doesn't that mean the natural state is porn?

Dear Nintendo,

[Anonymous Coward]

I like to dress up as a woman in public and tip custard over my head. Then I come home and play Mario 64 for 3 hours, I really need some professional psychiatric help.

Yours faithfully,

A.Nutter

Dear Nutter,

Yes you do need help. Mario 64 is crap.

Yours faithfully,

Your shrink

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[Fade_to_Blah]

*GASP*

I can't believe you said Mario 64 is crap!

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[KEVINWASH1]

Nintendo is your shrink? Wow, they're expanding more than i thought...not just movies now, but going into therapy as well! So what kind of rates do they charge?

Re:Dear Nintendo,

[jacoplane]

You forgot to post your adress so they can send you a free gamecube!

I have mod points, and wanted to mod this...

[John Murdoch]

But "Obviously wearing tinfoil hat" isn't one of the mod options.

Re:I have mod points, and wanted to mod this...

[julesh]

But "Obviously wearing tinfoil hat" isn't one of the mod options.

Actually, it should be. It should also not affect the score of the post, only the tag that it gets. Then you can set a bonus/penalty for tinfoil hat posts in your user preferences depending on whether you think you need one or not.

Re:I have mod points, and wanted to mod this...

[John Murdoch]

Hi!

I was just being a smart aleck--but you're right. That'd be a useful mod option.

Thanks!

Makes perfect sense to me

[Phixxr]

I'm glad that Nintentdo is attempting to protect their trademarked property from mis-use by porn sites. Obviously they don't want you googling zelda and getting farmsex.com.

I think they've handled this in a most professional, and logical manner. Something that cannot be said for most large entertainment companies these days.

-phixxr

Re:Makes perfect sense to me

[Rude Turnip]

Nintendo stepped way over the line and was utterly wrong. If someone mentions that X and Y are her favorite video games, that is not mis-use. I think in the end, it was a case of lawyers getting caught with their pants down in their zealotry.

Re:Makes perfect sense to me

[jdreed1024]

I think they've handled this in a most professional, and logical manner. Something that cannot be said for most large entertainment companies these days.

Seriously. They didn't even blame it on an intern, or outsourcing, or anything. They didn't try to pull the "Well, we know we were right, but we're going to do you a favor and back down anyway" thing. And in offering one of their products, they're letting the person choose what they want. As opposed to the RIAA, which dumps poorly selling albums in inner-city schools and calls it good.

Re:Makes perfect sense to me

[Lisandro]

Just what i thought. They did something perfectly understandable, fucked up in the process, realized it *and* apologized promptly. And make up for the hassle with a game system, which you might think (or not) that it's cheap, but again, no one forced them.

Kudos to Nintendo.

Re:Makes perfect sense to me

[ArbitraryConstant]

While I agree that Nintendo took appropriate action, I think that they realized that they needed to dispose of the situation very quickly once it started hitting the major news sites. And Penny Arcade. :)

Re:Makes perfect sense to me

[webrunner]

Actually funny you should mention that. There was a time when Zelda.com was a porn site (and it was an actual porn site, I think it was an amature site by a woman named Zelda) - the time was about when Ocarina of Time was new. Since then, Nintendo bought the domain (if someone has any more detail here, I'd be glad to hear it.. whether it was a legal battle or just money being handed over) and now Zelda.com is the Legend of Zelda offical site.

Re:Makes perfect sense to me

[Lisandro]

And Penny Arcade.
Yeah, I am *really* sure they were *scared* of that one.

Why, of course they are. A site visited regularly by a lot of gamers - most between 15 and 30 years old? Sounds like potential Nintendo customers to me...

It was a PR move, of course, but they made it right. They deserve some credit.

Re:Makes perfect sense to me

[baywulf]

At one time in the late 90s if you typed zelda.com you would get a porn site. I ended up typing this at work one time back then and boy was I in for a shock. Luckily employee snooping tools were not common back then and nobody was looking.

Re:Makes perfect sense to me

[sindarin2001]

While I don't advocate shooting anybody, Bush was elected in a '00 year. We have this thing called the '0-curse with our presidents in the US. So far nearly every president elected in a year ending in 0 has died while still in office. I say nearly because it is thought that Reagan has broken the curse (there was an assassination attempt on him, but it was not successful).

Re:Makes perfect sense to me

[rsmith-mac]

Zelda.com definitely has an interesting history. It was at one point an amateur site(mid-90's), but then went big and commercialized soon after that(changed owners, I think), touting a huge 10Mb Internet link. It then changed formats some more, last belonging to "Erotic Box Office" before Nintendo got control of it(I'm not sure how). The biggest problem with the site is that unlike modern standards where potentially offensive material is not on the front page for any serious adult web site, everything up to 1999 had not-work-safe material on the front page(NWS link, duh). I seriously don't know how Nintendo put up with it for so long; it's a company's worst nightmare, and a very good example for pro-regulation arguments for the Internet.

Re:Makes perfect sense to me

[ArbitraryConstant]

"Yeah, I am *really* sure they were *scared* of that one."

You're kidding, right? Penny Arcade is one of the most widely read and most influential gaming sites out there. They're also a good indicator of the mood of the industry.

I'm not a gamer, but even I know that much.

Re:Makes perfect sense to me

[Anonymous Coward]

The Pretzel failed.

Re:Makes perfect sense to me

[jcr]

Nintendo stepped way over the line and was utterly wrong.

Was it Nintendo, or outside counsel looking for a few more billing hours?

It will be interesting to see if Nintendo continues to use that law firm after this.

-jcr

Re:Makes perfect sense to me

[lew3004]

I agree that Nintendo handled this "mis-step" with professionalism and courtesy, however shouldn't a big corp like Nintendo also check out the accusation before sending a cease order to a website? I mean really, didn't they even check it out? Oh wait, maybe they did.

Penny Arcade Comment

[Anonymous Coward]

Hoochie Coochie Man

Fri, October 29 2004 - 4:30 AM
by: Tycho

I'd say it's better than even odds you've seen the story, either at VE or Slashdot. The long and short of it is that someone said they liked a couple Nintendo games in their SuicideGirls profile - and, in a parody of the reasonable universe, lawyers bared their teeth. I have a hunch we're talking about some kind of perverted spider application, an automated process with a bottomless appetite for filth, but it's funny to think tracking down meaningless infractions like this is some guy's fucking job.

I guess I should say a few things in advance of this discussion. SuicideGirls is a site where, among other things, girls take off their clothes. I'm not saying you should go there or not go there. They've asked to advertise here before, and while I don't have any great qualm with titillating media I didn't know if it was the best match for the site. It may be that my scheme for rating pornography has been damaged by the Internet, but the site is actually pretty tasteful compared to other sites I have subscribed to, many of which are filmed in barns.

Now, with the caveat out of the way, I am not without reason: I can understand why Nintendo as a corporate entity might not want their juggernaut brands associated with teen coochie. And indeed, if we were talking about photosets with explicit connections to their brands I would be less likely to ridicule them for it. I can even envision a scenario where a girl might have a Mario tattoo or something, and they might have something legitimate to say in that case, but honestly now I'm just indulging some kind of fantasy.

At this point, I don't care if it was a spider or some asshole at a terminal somewhere. When we did our Strawberry Shortcake comic, I was able to come to terms with the fact that there was an interpretation of my country's laws that prohibited what we had done. I didn't like it, but I could connect the dots and we relented. This, on the other hand, is merely stupid and evil. For better or worse, their company is built on these ancient, perennial brands that sprout up again on each new system. The reason it works is only partially because they tend to make excellent games - they deal gently with those classics, modernizing what they need, and somehow manage to retain a sense of wonder. But Nintendo's success hinges on the fact that their characters have become cultural icons - and being cultural icons means that we as gamers take an ownership in those franchises. They're a part of our language and, if you're the sort of person who reads Penny arcade, your culture.

It's not legal ownership, no - but we're heavily invested in those characters. Which I guess is a crime.

Update: Or, maybe it's not. Someone at Nintendo figured out this was stupid - BoingBoing has the letter they sent out.

(CW)TB out.

Re:Penny Arcade Comment

[PPGMD]

I was wondering why PA wasn't working that well. Found out when it came time to browse /.

Just goes to show you, you don't need to browse /. to feel the effected of a site being DDOS'ed out of existence.

Re:Penny Arcade Comment

[ticklemeozmo]

When we did our Strawberry Shortcake comic

You'll notice the Strawberry Shortcake comic is removed. However, the wonderful and great archive.org has saved it for you. Consider donating to them for helping preserve history. http://web.archive.org/web/20030601105900/http://w ww.penny-arcade.com/images/2003/20030414l.jpg

It's funny 'cause it's true.

[Spamlent Green]

That's great -- my sister-in-law actually is a trademark attorney, and once spent her days doing nothing but writing C&D letters... I immediately sent the link to the PA strip to her.

can it be true?

[DeusExMalex]

penny-arcade + porn = ?

Re:can it be true?

[Hagakure]

penny-arcase + porn = $.24 cheaper than the truck stop.. er.. quarter "arcade" i usually go to!

The letter?

[slimak]

Does anyone else need to moderate the reposted letter? I can post it here again in case any of the many above posts have the moderation maxed out at +5. Normally I don't repost articles, but there seems to be large demand (or at least supply) for this one. Please advise.

I see . . . . .

[theparanoidcynic]

I was wondering why Penny Arcade was running like crap. I figured I'd check the overnight Slashdot stories and come back later. Seeing the top story answered that question.

Oh well, time to go help /. suicidegirls . . . . .

E-mail address?

[Dracolytch]

What, slashdotting wasn't enough, so now we're including their e-mail address so we can mailbomb them too? I mean, I know we're a secret socity trying to destroy the Internet one website at a time... But come ON! That's just EVIL.

~D

Re:E-mail address?

[lukewarmfusion]

Secret? I dunno.

Re:THANK GOD FOR PENNY-ARCADE!

[sjwt]

yerh but now they have been /.'ed .. which in its self seems odd, i would of pined there being enough /.'ers reading penny arcade to reduce the overall hit rate.

I hope not too late...

[koi88]

I hope Nintendo's apologies don't come too late.
You know, these emotionally labile personalities (suicide girls) take these things to heart...

Don't do it! Life is so beautiful!

Re:I hope not too late...

[HideEverFree]

Do you mean "emotionally labial"? :)

Smart move Nintendo

[HangingChad]

Whoa, a flash of corporate intelligence. That's so unusual anymore.

It was a loser but at least give them credit for recognizing it and trying to make amends. Short term it's ugly either way, but this will limit the long term damage. There's no story now.

Good job, Nintendo. Bite the bullet, apologize, move on.

Enough is enough....

[Alci12]

SCO or Microsoft is one thing but /.ing hot goth chick sites..man thats just low.

WARNING NOT SAFE FOR WORK!!!

[minus_273]

The nintendo apology link goes to a site that carries pornographic ads. WTF is wrong with the editors and the MORON who submitted the story! Put a warning there at least.

Re:WARNING NOT SAFE FOR WORK!!!

[Mac_D83]

The nintendo apology link goes to a site that carries pornographic ads. WTF is wrong with the editors and the MORON who submitted the story!

That is because this whole story from beginning to end is fake. The whole of slashdot goes "WTF is wrong with Nintendo" and surf to suicidegirls or another pornographic site. This results in suicidegirls getting loads of free advertising... The whole thing is a ploy and they have done it before, just look at these:
http://ask.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/11/26/17 58210&tid=95&tid=4
and http://ask.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/11/27/10 6259&tid=155&tid=4

Re:WARNING NOT SAFE FOR WORK!!!

[JeanBaptiste]

guess that depends on your workplace. Im at work and I opened the suicidegirls site without fear. If any of my coworkers saw it, at worst they would be slightly interested.

I guess I like my job better than I thought I did...

Re:WARNING NOT SAFE FOR WORK!!!

[julesh]

Huh? The ads I have on the page are for "Basecamp painless project management", "O'Reilly Revolution In The Valley", and a third one which isn't loading at the moment (i.e., we've slashdotted boingboing's ad server), but which I doubt is pornographic, given the tone of the rest of the site which is largely IT related.

Re:WARNING NOT SAFE FOR WORK!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

actually that third ad is for suicide girls...

Be careful when you assume, you just make an ass out of you.

Re:WARNING NOT SAFE FOR WORK!!!

[Grayraven]

Eh? Exactly how are the SSG ads pornographic?

Re:WARNING NOT SAFE FOR WORK!!!

[toby]

Uh, yeah, one of the sites advertised is SuicideGirls itself, which you were already reading about, so wtf?

Current Iraqi civilian death toll from American actions in Iraq: >100,000

Re:WARNING NOT SAFE FOR WORK!!!

[shreak]

Mod Parent up!

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Blame in the right place?

[SeanDuggan]

Bleh. It was probably some minor functionary overstepping their bounds who caused all this trouble. You'd might as well decide Walmart was evil because of a bad experience with a cashier. (Well, you'd be right about Walmart being evil, but for the wrong purposes)

Re:"All's well that ends well"

[Rude Turnip]

Luckily, all those years of playing Duck Hunt paid off and we were able to shoot that balloon down. Ha!...hoisted by your own petard Nintendo!

btw, anyone ever notice how much Nintendo stuff (clothing, stickers) is on the shelves at Hot Topic? They don't seem to mind alt.culture when there's a buck in it.

So... will Nintendo pay SuicideGirls for...

[dnaumov]

... all the traffic this little incident has caused? SuicideGirls has now been slashdotted TWICE within a week :)

Re:So... will Nintendo pay SuicideGirls for...

[Cyph]

So Nintendo shold pay for all the free advertising SuicideGirls received on Slashdot this week? Did Nintendo post the Slashdot blurbs, or did Slashdot do that?

Re:So... will Nintendo pay SuicideGirls for...

[garett_spencley]

It's not just advertising .. it is literally handing them cash.

For-profit sites, particularly paysites, operate by converting traffic into money. Traffic is a liquid asset on the Internet. It is bought, sold and traded in bulk. The quality, or value, of the traffic is based on how productive the traffic is (ie: how much the surfers click around once they arrive on the site .. a surfer who doesn't click isn't interested in buying anything).

Each site has it's own conversion ratio with it's general traffic. For example, 1 out of every 700 surfers that hit the site might buy a membership. When a surfer buys a membership it's calleda 'conversion'. The traffic has just been converted into money.

So if suicidegirls gets slashdotted by over a million surfers and their conversion ratio is 1:700 (just pulling both those numbers out of my ass obviously) then they just got 1 million / 700 sign-ups. They are probably sending Slashdot and Nintendo gift baskets and thank-you letters as we post. Their profits most undoubtedly went through the roof this month.

The things I would do to have one of my sites slashdotted. The profits would far outweigh the bandwidth overages.

Re:So... will Nintendo pay SuicideGirls for...

[Mr. Flibble]

... all the traffic this little incident has caused? SuicideGirls has now been slashdotted TWICE within a week :)

Well, given that slashdot is read by geeks hidden in dark caves gathering monitor tans... I suspect that their bandwith will be paid back by geeks subscribing to goth porn.

Re:So... will Nintendo pay SuicideGirls for...

[garett_spencley]

It's ultimately up to you how you chose to see how fairly the models are compensated. However, you need to understand that the system doesn't work any differently whether you're doing porn sites or shooting for magazines.

The models don't have anything to do with the site's day to day operations. They performed a one-time service for the site and thus were paid for their services. They are not employees. They are not under contract. Many models do shoots through agencies and are featured on many different sites.

I get bothered when a model is treated poorly. If she's descriminated against etc. But as long as both parties signed a model release contract and delivered what was agreed upon, I don't see why the model would be entitled to any of the site's ongoing profits.

The only case where a model generally gets paid on an ongoing basis is on single girls sites where the site features one model only. Many times the model will be under a contract to perform exclusively for that site. She will either get a fixed rate for each month that she delivers the required content and services (chats, e-mails etc.) or occasionally she'll get a percentage of the site's net.

This just in...

[Anita Coney]

Today the State Bar Association moved to disbar Attorney Christie Hamilton for conduct unbecoming of an attorney.

A spokesman for the Bar Association was quoted as saying, "Apologize?! If lawyers start giving apologies for simply doing their jobs, our entire legal system will collapse as everyone will simply get along rather than continue pointless and expensive litigation."

Re:website

[spellraiser]

In addition, we would appreciate it if you could provide us with contact information for RuneLateralus ...

Aha! It's all actually a part of the evil ploy! They want to know his address so they can dispatch black-clad agents to abduct him for nefarious purposes! Don't fall for it guys! Run away! Run
+++ATH
NO CARRIER

Its all a trick. . .

[barryman_5000]

Nintendo hasn't given up in persuing them. They are asking for contact information so that they can raid their houses and still all their Nintendo merchandise! BEWARE. NINTENDO WILL HUNT YOU DOWN AND TEAR OUT YOUR SOUL.

Re:Its all a trick. . .

[mark-t]

Was the biblical parallel there deliberate, or are you just being a conspiracy theorist?

Re:Its all a trick. . .

[barryman_5000]

you want to know . . . you want to know so bad . . . but THEY JUST . . . WON'T . . . LET . . YOU!!

What's that sound...?

[MrNemesis]

It's the sound of a million /.'ers uploading their porn collections to their websites and namechecking every Nintendo franchise ever.

I can't think of a better way to get free consoles. Terabytes of pr0n is *way* better than any pyramid scheme :)

Response

[LittleGuy]

Dear Nintendo:

This law offices represent SuicideGirls. Ever since your letter of apology, they have experience a dangerous swing of confidence and self-respect. As a result, they can no longer see themselves as 'SuicideGirls' and prefer the term 'MildlyDespondentWomen'.

We are asking for a settlement of one billion dollars for emotional non-stress, lack of pain and suffering, and character assassination.

And a pony. a Shetland Pony. /s/
Dewey, Cheetham & Howe

Re:website

[bitslinger_42]

Granted, I am rather overtly paranoid, but did anyone else look at the last paragraph ("we would appreciate it if you could provide us with contact information for RuneLateralus") as a smooth attempt to get directly at the user without having to bother with a subpeona? I mean, come on. I'm Nintendo and I'm getting critized for attacking the website when it was an individual who posted (ignoring the context for a second here). So, I want to go after the user, but I don't know how to send the SaD letter. This looks to be a pretty cool way of getting the info without having to pay^H^H^Hcontact a judge.

/me adjusts tinfoil hat and shuffles off muttering to self

They've always seems sensible

[miyako]

Nintendo has always seemed sensible legally to me. I'm not saying they are alturistic or anything, but you just don't hear of them being evil, like one hears of Sony or Microsoft being evil.
From the letter, I can understand why they did what they did, after all, didn't zelda.com used to be (still is?) a porn site? For most kids, Nintendo is their first introduction to games, and it wouldn't be good for a kid to google for "pikachu" only to find out that some porn site had managed to come up high on the results list.
Somewhat off topic, but it seems to me that a lot of their newer games are targetting older gamers.
The recent entries to the zelda and metroid series seem to have been targetted at older players, mostly by virtue of their difficulty.

Re:They've always seems sensible

[jakethejuggalo]

i think nintendo realizes that the base of gamers that made mario and zelda and metroid household names are growing up, so they're starting to cater to them again instead of hooking new younger fans with more childish games.

classy

[minus_273]

Reading the letter, i have to say that i like nintendo more as a company. Rarely do we see anyone thesedays admint a mistake apologize and then offer a jesture of goodwill to make amends. I think it was a really classy move on the part of Nintendo. I have alwasy liked their systems and games. It is nice to see that there are some reasonable people working there. I think nintnedo handeled this really well and in the end, people will either simply forget about it or bring it up when defneding nintendo instead of the other way around.
Kudos.

Re:classy

[vhold]

1. Send nasty letters to people
2. Apologize
3. Profit

Good move by Nintendo...

[Goronmon]

Of course, the best thing would be to avoid situations like this in general, you would think people would pay more attention to what was going on when sending out C&D letters.

But, they did the right thing and fessed up to their mistake, something companies rarely do anymore. Way to go Nintendo.

Re:Good move by Nintendo...

[FearUncertaintyDoubt]

At first, I shared your point of view, but after some further reflection, I don't really think this is such a terrific thing after all.

First, the only reason Nintendo backed down was because it got posted to slashdot and/or made significant negative publicity. They did not back down because they were wrong. If there was no publicity, there would have been no action. Therefore, the motivation behind their action has nothing to do with the justice of the situation. They would prosecute an innocent person or let off a guilty one solely on the basis of self-preservation. Way to go indeed.

Second, publicity of the form required for this sort of resolution is scarce. That is, every injustice cannot be highlighted; every act of corporations and lawyers bullying average people cannot make big news. Therefore, when we let them off the hook for the mistakes that become publicized, we are making it very easy for them to continue what they are doing.

This is not about a single web site or a single C&D. This is about a pattern and practice of just blindly sending out legal threats to ordinary people knowing most won't stand up for their rights. So for the price of a couple of consoles, they look like good guys while continuing to send out lord knows how many more letters improperly. If they aren't made to pay long-term consequences for their pattern of behavior, there is no incentive to change.

Imagine if a company went out of business because of a coordinated boycott after a single infraction of this kind. No chance for resolution. You intimidate people, your corporation dies. How would that change the way companies do business?

*blink* *blink*

[SeanDuggan]

That was extremely incoherent and yet extremely amusing. And sadly, that sounds like a lot of the user reviews you see these days. {shakes head} Very bizarre and yet it draws you like a train wreck.

Yes, this replay is only on-topic to the off-topic post above it. I've already stated my point of view on this, that Nintendo seems to have realized their mistake, have apologized, and are making amends. I personally think the original claim they made was a bit ridiculous (just mentioning the names of two games you like?) but I could see them not wanting their brand names associated with a porn site in search engine results. I suspect it was an automated system that picked them up and a relatively minor functionary who decided to send out the official letter. Nonetheless, Nintendo did the right thing in promptly apologizing and making amends.

Nintendo game system of their choice?

[Moloch666]

Just to really throw them off, I would ask for an original Nintendo system.

Re:Nintendo game system of their choice?

[SendBot]

I would ask for an original Nintendo system.

Complete with the little robot guy to handle the gyroscopes! That thing was awesome!

Re:Nintendo game system of their choice?

[NeoSkandranon]

"Top loading" model NES and a copy of Final Fantasy 1 sealed in box =D

Only way they could have a harder time coming up with something is if you just asked for a shitty game that never had many copies made

Re:Nintendo game system of their choice?

[archivis]

I've got an original copy of Final Fantasy 1 sealed in a box.

Yes, I know admitting this makes me seem lame.

Re:Nintendo game system of their choice?

[TheLink]

How about this instead?

Re:Nintendo game system of their choice?

[NeoSkandranon]

It's making me jealous, who's lamer ;p

Re:Nintendo game system of their choice?

[cnj]

I was thinking the same thing, only one of the re-made top loading ones since the slot loading NESes I have are both problematic, and they are impossible to find (at least cheap).

As it is, I play most of my 8-bit games on a famicom clone now, although I have a lot more games for the NES since I spent most of my life in the US.

Re:Nintendo game system of their choice?

[Moloch666]

Lol, nothing like blowing on your games. I don't think that ever made a difference.

The reality is I would much rather use an emulator... which I do.

Their reaction would be worth even the newest console. Then seeing if they could come up with it. I'm sure they got some orginal stuff in a museum somewhere though.

Re:No, businesses exist to serve the public good

[MoneyT]

Define recent, because last I checked, a bunch of kings through history weren't exactly concerned with "enriching" society.

Re:"All's well that ends well"

[Mikail]

I don't think Nintendo had the problem with the alt.culture so much as the nudity. Of course, if Nintendo had a buck in nudity...

Re:website

[Hatta]

As a gesture of goodwill, we would like to offer you (and RuneLateralus) a free Nintendo video game system and game of your choice. (...)

Which system? I'd take a shiny new NES over a Game Cube any day. And a copy of Nintendo World Championships. =)

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Free publicity

[Hoi Polloi]

How long will it be before "www.slut-teens.com" puts up some lawyer bait on their site to get some of that sweet sweet free publicity?

Infringement spidering

[NiceGuyUK]

To me, this just smacks of yet another "infringement spider" that trawls the web looking for mentions of a companiy's trademarks with little or no human intervention. There was a /. story akin to this relating to Linux Australia not long ago where an MPAA bot mis-identified a tarball that happened to have the same name as an obscure movie.

Automated Attorneys(tm) - Infringement Idiocy in a Digital Age

Let's give Nintendo a break, folks.

[Randolpho]

Now that we have the whole story, I think we can cut Nintendo a little bit of slack. Note the following from the original C&D letter:

It has come to our client's attention recently that you are using the Nintendo trademark(s)/works in the hidden text/visible text/meta tags and/or title and/or links of the above-referenced sexually explicit Web site.

Note the bolded portions. Then note this quote from the apology letter:

The letter was sent as part of an ongoing Nintendo program to aggressively protect our younger consumers from the hundreds of sexually-explicit sites each year that use Nintendo properties to attract children. We are proud of our efforts in this area. Unfortunately, the site posting identified in our letter was targeted by mistake.

What Nintendo did was try to protect children from porn-site google-spoofing. I know every one of you has done an innocent search for, say, "dog food brands", and come up with hundreds of porn links, usually on the first page, often the first link! I think what Nintendo was trying to do is a good thing, not a bad thing; unfortunately, they targeted a legitimate porn site rather than a google-spoofer.

It was a mistake, and they recognized it and fessed up. That in and of itself takes balls, and I salute Nintendo for it. I think the rest of us should calm down about it. I understand the desire to knee-jerk and think the man is out to get us, but I think the truth, in this case, is a little more mundane.

Re:Let's give Nintendo a break, folks.

[mlippert]

Good comment, those were my thoughts after I read the apology letter.

Too often the big companies sending out these types of letters refuse to admit there was a mistake. When they do it is usually something that barely admits any error on their part.

Which makes the action of Nintendo really stand out, and this action by Nintendo of both making it clear that they were in error AND actually making some restitution has definitely raised my opinion of the company.

Re:Let's give Nintendo a break, folks.

[Buran]

So now you can get nastygrammed if someone links to you with terms someone else doesn't like.

Re:Let's give Nintendo a break, folks.

[KaiserZoze_860]

SuicideGirls is porn??? And all this time I just went there for the articles... sigh.

Re:Let's give Nintendo a break, folks.

[ElleyKitten]

I agree. It takes alot to apologize, alot more than just, say, sueing someone. So, props to Nintendo. Yay.

Why stop there?

[Hoi Polloi]

Why stop there? I'm setting up a website with some pornstars and references to the following:

Subaru
REI
Nintendo
Sony
Dell
Bank of America Loan Dept. ..etc

Of course it could backfire and I'd end up instead getting an apology letter from a pornstar with an offer for free...you know.

Re:Why stop there?

[huge colin]

"Subaru"? Pfah. Put NASA and General Dynamics on that list. I've always wanted my own reusable space vehicle and Ohio-class submarine.

--Colin

Re:Why stop there?

[KEVINWASH1]

Of course it could backfire and I'd end up instead getting an apology letter from a pornstar with an offer for free...you know.

Only on /. would people consider this to be the plan "backfiring."

Re:Why stop there?

[Dark Lord Seth]

Of course it could backfire and I'd end up instead getting an apology letter from a pornstar with an offer for free...you know.

Well, I've contacted a few friends of mine and guess what... Your dream will come true! Tonight you will have free sex with a true genuine pornstar! Isn't that great? Don't worry, everything has been taken care of; he will bring a jar of vaseline, so you needn't worry about that...

Re:Why stop there?

[mink]

Living in Ohio, I am puzzled and frightened by a class of Sub. named after the state. Have you seen how people drive there?

Re:Why stop there?

[a8o]

Porsche?

The best part of that apology...

[Alzheimers]

is imaginging poor Christie Hamilton, a member of the Consumer Service Department, specificly offering a free console to the online identity "RuneLateralus". She didn't even try to pretend it was a real name by putting a space between the two words!

"Is that Rune or Ms. Lateralus? Ohh....ooook...."

You almost get the feeling that if Christie had asked what level her half-elven ranger was, she wouldn't have to stop and think before answering...

Re:The best part of that apology...

[ImprovOmega]

My half-elven ranger is level 67. -- Everquest junkie

Slashdot/SG connection?

[Anonymous Coward]

It seems stupid that Nintendo would send the site webmaster a video console in exchange for making a legal mistake, so this all seems fishy to me. Furthermore, slashdot has posted numerous stories with direct links to SG in the past. Naturally, they allow enough time in between stories to make the scheme less obvious.

This would make a good Slashdot poll.
"Does SG pay Slashdot for this advertisement?"
o Yes
o Probably
o CowboyNeal gets free nookie

Touching Is Good

[marktaw.com]

Nintendo Says 'Touching Is Good' in Sexed-Up DS Ads

Teaser spots start on Monday, playing up the dual-screen device's touch controls. A woman's sultry voice invites the viewer to come a little closer and get a feel.

When you're a kid you're always told you can't touch anything, said Perrin Kaplan, vice president of marketing at Nintendo of America. Touching is good. You're grown-up now, so read it how you want.

Print ads appear in young men's magazines Maxim and Blender, with a buxom woman holding a DS model and advising, How to Score! ... Start listening to her needs, playa!

Industry analysts said Nintendo's ads should draw young adults who are keen on gadgets and the image they project.

The Game Boy Advance has always been a kids platform, said Wedbush Morgan Securities analyst Michael Pachter. The DS is going to move up the age scale ... and they are going to put some more mature content on there,

Tell me again that the hot goth chicks connection isn't intentional.

Re:"All's well that ends well"

[julesh]

Moderation -2
50% Troll
20% Insightful
10% Interesting

So... what are the other 20%?

A free system + game?

[El_Muerte_TDS]

Cool...

I like the following Sony Playstation games:
Grand Theft Auto, Ratchet and Clank, Tony Hawk's Underground 2

I like the following Microsoft XBox games:
Halo, Star Wars: Battlefront, Mortal Kombat: Deception

I like the following Nintendo games:
Mario Kart Double Dash, Metriod, Pikmin

Ok, now it's just a matter of time before I get my free games and game system.

In related news...

[MrNemesis]

...namechecks of the Suicide Girls appeared all over Nintendo's global website. Nintendo are hoping SG will sue, and then retract and offer free samples of their products by way of condolence.

Congrats!

[Duncan3]

So will all of Slashdot's advertisers be getting this 2 FP story treatment? Maybe some of revenue sharing?

punish Sony

[Anonymous Coward]

I say the Suicide Girls should punish Sony and / or their lawyers.

I suggest a spanking.

[queue scene of Monty Python's Castle Anthrax, but with less 'innocent' looking girls]

Re:"All's well that ends well"

[H8X55]

That and the alt culture at Hot Topic is about as tame as it can get. That store screams PG-13 - which is ok by NoA.

If the Suicide Girls were selling nintendos on their site NoA would likely have a problem with it. That site is just a bit more sexual than the alt culture you experience at Hot Topic.

For the record

[2names]

I just want to say this about Suicide Girls:

[Homer voice]

uuuuuuhhhhh.....Suuuiiiiccciiiidddeee Giirrrllllssssss...*drool*

[/Homer voice]

Re:"All's well that ends well"

[pclminion]

They don't seem to mind alt.culture when there's a buck in it.

While I see your point, I'd hardly call Hot Topic "alternate culture."

Just to summarize

[phorm]

Nintendo sends C&D nastygram to SG for use of various names of their games, where an SG member mentioned being a fan of said games

Coverage on Slashdot, Penny-Arcade, etc on this debacle

Nintendo goes "oh sh*t" at the negetive PR, fully owns up, and offers free (Nintendo brand) gaming system of choice to some of those involved at SG.

SO basically, SG comes up with a whole crapload of attention, extra site traffic, and some free gaming systems. Now, since the site didn't get nuked I'm assuming that a full slashdotting didn't happen. If at least some of the visitors end up signing up - offsetting the bandwidth cost - they benefit not only from the free systems but also from the free publicity/extra signups.

Heck, I sent me GF a link to this, she was looking up some girls' on SG and found their profiles rather cool, wanted to sign up herself. I'd say that I score this one:

SG:+2 (traffic/signups/game systems)

Nintendo+1: or 0 (no harm no fowl, but perhaps bonus points for owning up where few would)
Idiot IP lawers:-1 (for doing the right job in the wrong place).

Re:Just to summarize

[ChairmanMeow]

Nintendo+1: or 0 (no harm no fowl,

No ducks were harmed in this incident.

Re:Just to summarize

[Kris_J]

Heck, I sent me GF a link to this, she was looking up some girls' on SG and found their profiles rather cool, wanted to sign up herself.

Dear Penthouse, I don't normally write letters like this, but...

Whoa dude

[pclminion]

Granted, I don't think we'll ever see the way of life he envisions, but wishing for something that's more than what seems possible is a facet of human nature. It's something cynics like you appear to have lost (and I seem to be losing quickly).

It hardly implies that he lives in some "subjective reality."

Re: SSH and everything else through 80...

[Llama_STi]

At my work I can send out traffic over 80 but my firewall blocks the incoming traffic. I tried this "solution" before and no go. It is a smart idea, just sucks that it doesn't work here... :(

Not perfect

[siskbc]

Yes, that people with money and power are frequently just indifferent to how their use of it affects people as long as they get what they want. Are you sure that's a step up from malice?

Take the tinfoil hat off. First, it was a fuckup. That's clear, they admitted it, end of story. Second, "what they want" in this case is for pedophiles to stop using Nintendo to screw up kids. I think I'm on board there. Third, there's no case for indifference because they did everything they could to fix the fuckup.

I know it screws up the schemas of the slashdot crowd, but there's really not this global conspiracy to screw you personally.

Re:Not perfect

[d34thm0nk3y]

I know it screws up the schemas of the slashdot crowd, but there's really not this global conspiracy to screw you personally.

Well, really, there is, it is just that Nintendo is playing a smaller part than originally thought. hehe

Re:Not perfect

[Maestro4k]

• Second, "what they want" in this case is for pedophiles to stop using Nintendo to screw up kids.

The AC replying to you said this as well but I wanted to point this out so it wouldn't get missed by others.

The jerks using Nintendo character names and stuff on porn sites to pull in links probably aren't pedophiles, and they probably don't give a shit that children get drawn in as well. They're just crooks hoping to cheat the system so they can pull in more money from their porn empire. Labeling this type of stuff as pedophilia hurts cracking down on the real problems by diluting what people think of as pedophilia and/or child porn. Frankly you're part of the problem, not the solution when you say things like this. We're all against child porn but most of us want to be helpful in stopping it, not mislabeling things to confuse the issue.

Re:Not perfect

[colmore]

If Nintendo ISN'T my ally in the underground war of conspiracies, then I'm putting up a white flag right now.

Jeeze, that would be like finding out my Mom was an Illuminati agent...

Re:Not perfect

[snkline]

Wish I had mod points. This is correct these people do these things to get more visitors to their pages and generate more ad revenue. I have never in 10 years come across a peice of pedophilia on the internet, which leads me to think its something you would really have to actually look for, not something that pops up by accident. Now normal porn on the other hand.....

Re:Not perfect

[dubl-u]

Take the tinfoil hat off.

Oh, please. If you'll read what I said, I'm saying it's not malice. And there's no need for a conspiracy. But I've seen both sides of this. I helped run a small site that got bogus lawyer threats, and I've worked for a company that used the threat of legal action to get people to to what they wanted, knowing that they couldn't win. Honest, it really happens.

First, it was a fuckup. That's clear, they admitted it, end of story. [...] I know it screws up the schemas of the slashdot crowd, but there's really not this global conspiracy to screw you personally.

I'm not saying they're mean, that the Trilateral Comission is behind this, or that they're working at the behest of the CIA. I'm saying they mainly are concerned with getting what they want. And because they're unusually insulated from the consequences of their actions, they are likely to be indifferent to their effects on ordinary people.

Second, "what they want" in this case is for pedophiles to stop using Nintendo to screw up kids.

What they want is to protect their trademarks and their reputation. There's no particular reason to think they're carefully focusing on pedophiles. The point of their cease-and-desist-bot was probably to stop search engine bait from using Nintendo trademarks; if they were serious about stopping a pedophile the last thing they'd do is send a "please don't use our trademarks" letter to the sicko.

And the reason they made a big public apology is that they got a fucking huge amount of bad press. This is just another side of protecting their public image. But you can bet that when their lawyer-bot bothers other innocent people, ones who get less press, free video game systems are not the general result.

Third, there's no case for indifference because they did everything they could to fix the fuckup.

They did? I missed the press release where they said they'd review their process to make sure that only people actually violating their trademarks for commercial gain would get legal threats. Could you point me to that?

Maybe you don't mind getting threats like that, but reasonable people feel that some people and corporations are using their resources to threaten people with ruinously expensive lawsuits just to get their way. Personally, I think it's an abuse of power, and I'd like to see it stop.

Re:Not perfect

[tylernt]

"I know it screws up the schemas"

Dude, you've been doing too much work with LDAP. I think the word you wanted was "schemes".

Unbelievable

[Rogerborg]

Anywhere but Slashdot, I mean.

Well, if they didn't have a Cease and Desist from Nintendo before, I'm damn sure they'll get one now. How about we don't report on that?

Honestly, the adage about replacing people with very small shell scripts has never been more apt. Would it be possible to write an 'editor' script for Slashdot that performed worse than the 'editors' who currently draw a salary for 'doing' that 'job'?

Membership drive....

[un1xl0ser]

If the token of a Nintendo doesn't seem like much, just wait to see how many h0rny g33ky slashdotters sign up for memberships now. Horray for slashdotting pr0n.

/butt

[slackerny]

I guess we need to have a new section for /butt!!!

Re:Fairly obvious what happened

[julesh]

So, where can I get a nakedness-sensitive spider of my own? :)

Damn!

[Anonymous Coward]

I know it screws up the schemas of the slashdot crowd, but there's really not this global conspiracy to screw you personally.

Damn.. and I thought I was going to get laid!

Sheesh.

[2names]

Just bribe your friendly neighborhood IT dork.

You could probably get unrestricted web access for the price of a green laser pointer.

Here's the HOWTO

[Digital_Quartz]

http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Firewall-Piercing/

There's even a tool for automating the process.

Re: SSH and everything else through 80...

[drawocsuomynonagmail]

Interesting. How does the firewall block the incoming traffic without blocking content from "real" sites? It must be snooping within the HTTP packets.

That's another good reason to use port 443 and not port 80 - because firewalls can't see within the SSL connections anyway. But beware the man-in-the-middle attack!

Re:website

[SMQ]

Sheesh, only on Slashdot does Paranoid == Insightful.

They state they want to contact him to appologise. They offer to do so through SG if he'd rather not be contacted directly. Where's the malice there? I can be rather suspicious at times myself, but I just can't read anything more into this than a companies attempt to make up for a high-profile cockup.

You really mean it?

[Other Than That...]

In addition, we would appreciate it if you could provide us with contact information for RuneLateralus, or have him contact us directly, so that we may apologize to him. We would be glad to send him a game and system of his choice through you as well, since we do not have his contact information.

For me, it's right here where Nintendo demonstrates its sincerity and general non-evilness in this regard. Kudos to them.

It's a trick!

[spiritraveller]

Don't trust them Suicide Girls!

It's just a ruse so that they can get RuneLateralus's home address and sue him directly...

DON'T DO IT!

(I'm joking, but if it were the RIAA or SCO instead of Nintendo, I wouldn't be.)

Re:Penny Arcade

[affliction]

It's just you.

Re:It's funny 'cause it's true.

[supmylO]

That is right-wing? I must be very far out of the loop.

Re:Penny Arcade

[j4ck50n]

I dunno, I have read a lot of em, I cant remember even smiling once.

Furthermore, why is SuicideGirls considered a "pr0n" site? Hardly what I would call pr0n, doesnt that usually entail penetration?

Nice to see, but be more careful in the future...

[Arcturax]

Nice of Nintendo to do this, but they should be careful when throwing out letters like this. This is serious buisiness, not, must I say it... a game.

My guess as to what happened is that they were looking for sites which advertise wares/porn/spam etc via meta tags so that searches for that game will bring them up in the top 10 on google and other engines. They probably came up with a list of porn and other sites, searched google for them and lists of their games and that is how these letters were generated, based on which of these sites used that. It was apparently Nintendo's attempt to deal with link spammers, which I'm sure most of us also despise. Hopefully this will case them to re-think their approach. I would like as much as anyone to see these link spammers cut down, but this approach here is too likely to finger innocents like these girls.

Ever hear of a thing called...

[karlandtanya]

Fiduciary responsibility?

That's the thing where it is the legal responsibility of the company to make money for its stockholders.

Subversion of that responsibility in favor of your personal prejudices is not only unethical, but often actionable.

If a man is not a liberal by the time he is twenty years old, he has no heart. If a man is not a conservative by the time he is forty years old, he has no brain.

Re:Ever hear of a thing called...

[fr2asbury]

In response to the sig. I also was a conservative at 20 but now in my early 30s am quite liberal.
I can laugh and say I used to have not heart and now I have no brain, but I prefer to look at it like Elwood P. Dowd (portrayed by Jimmy Stewart) in the movie Harvey: "You can only be so smart or so pleasant. For years I was smart. . .I prefer pleasant."

Parent has merit

[Adam9]

What kind of business letter starts with "Hello,"?

No contact information provided for the SG owner to contact customer service with the system of his choice

Most people scan in their letters as JPGs or PDFs, not retype them

Attorneys usually send e-mails to supplement a cease and decist letter sent via mail. SG says they only got an e-mail.

I could go on, but I think it's apparent now that SG did stage this.

Re:Parent has merit

[Lord_Dweomer]

Too bad we can't get our friend Samir Gupta to weigh in here and give us the "official" Nintendo word on this.

Re:Parent has merit

[Bagels]

It was probably somewhat edited... not *everyone* needs that contact info, they could get flooded with people claiming to be RuneLateralus. And who the hell scans their *typed documents* in after printing them? Probably they just hung on to the original file and used that.

Re:Parent has merit

[Anonymous Coward]

What kind of business letter starts with "Hello,"?

The kind sent by Nintendo's customer service dept. I've gotten email from them before (in reply to a complaint). They're rather on the informal, ingratiating side.

No contact information provided for the SG owner to contact customer service with the system of his choice

How about clicking reply? It was an email.

Most people scan in their letters as JPGs or PDFs, not retype them

Most people copy and paste the text of email messages.

Attorneys usually send e-mails to supplement a cease and decist letter sent via mail. SG says they only got an e-mail.

I don't know what lawyers usually do, but you haven't established that you do, either.

Re:Parent has merit

[Jack9]

What do you think was cut out (...)
This should answer your question.

I doubt this was faked. If you're a consultant, you learn to ask forgiveness rather than permission from your corporate handlers while with the public you ask permission rather than forgiveness. Historically, corporate ends up with more bad press then good, even with an apology letter.

Of course this is the intarweb and the rules of ye olde days may have changed.

Robocide

[Doc Ruby]

So Nintendo's robolawyer was denied by a website of tough chicks who don't take any shit (except in their consensual photosets ;). What does Nintendo care that their robopology SW cranked out another email, while the rest of their automated assault on fair use is crawling across the Net, finding more compliance among the not-so-ornery?

Re:website

[falcon5768]

and even if they did want to ask him to remove the nintendo games

remove two nintendo game names = free Gameboy DS......

I say thats a fair trade.

"I'm Spart....er I mean I'm RuneLateralus"

[cttforsale]

"I'm Spart....er I mean I'm RuneLateralus"

free Gamecube?

[mandrake*rpgdx]

I am so going to put pr0n on my site and claim that I love Zelda so I can get a free Gamecube.

Re:Shenanigans!

[Le Marteau]

No intellectual snobbery from you anymore plz kthx.

I was performing a valuable public service. Fact of the matter is, using the phrase as the grandparent did DOES make one appear uneducated, whether or not some grammarian gives that usage the thumbs up or not. The guy may be going on a job interview or the like, and things like that make a difference.

Holy crap!

[Anonymous Coward]

Nintendo is actually run by reasonably nice people!

A megacorporation being nice is like the seventh sign. I'm packing my bags and getting the fuck out of Dodge.

Re: SSH and everything else through 80...

[Llama_STi]

Well we're running Checkpoint firewall here. I don't have admin on my network so I can't really snoop around without getting "spoken to" if you know what I mean. Other than port 80, most all other ports are closed tight. :(

google cache

[toiletmonster]

try the google cache.

Re:website

[mekanizer]

Good idea as long as you don't ask for their Virtual Boy system, they would send you 1 000 000 virtual boys at your home that they never sold :) I would go for a brand new NES too and an unique prototype game.

Yeah, right...

[EvanED]

Just like cigarette ads aren't intended to target kids either...

hooray for nintendo

[dummymael]

that is why i really like this gaming company even though their targets are mostly kids... way to go nintendo!

ObBabylon 5

[geminidomino]

Garibaldi: I'm more of a "an eye for an eye" kind of guy.

Delenn: So you support a system that will leave everyone blind?

Garibaldi: Not everyone, just the bad guys.

Re:no fury like a geek scorned

[Sinner]

Are you saying I can scorn you all I like and you won't yet mad?

Yay!

Re:no fury like a geek scorned

[PhoenixFlare]

I think you missed my point. Scorn away, though.

Re:no fury like a geek scorned

[Sinner]

Sorry, got diarrhoea today. Too much exertion could stain my undies. I'll try to get some scorning in tomorrow, assuming my lower intestines are done wringing themselves out.

Holy "missing the point" Batman

[2names]

1) It's humor. You should learn to recognize it.

2) I am grown up, and as such, can recognize humor.

3) If a little comment on /. gets you that worked up, you need a vacation. Take your family to the islands and chill for a while before you give yourself a heart attack.