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Exxon's Brute Squad Hacks the Yes Men
tom_evil notes a story up on Infoshop.org about a parody site and the lack of a sense of humor in a large multinational. "One day after the Yes Men made a joke announcement of ExxonMobil's plans to turn billions of climate-change victims into a brand-new fuel called Vivoleum, the Yes Men's upstream internet service provider shut down Vivoleum.com and cut off the Yes Men's email service, in reaction to a complaint whose source they will not identify. 'Since parody is protected under US law, Exxon must think that people seeing the site will think Vivoleum's a real Exxon product, not just a parody,' said Yes Man Mike Bonanno. Exxon's policies do already contribute to 150,000 climate-change related deaths each year,' added Yes Man Andy Bichlbaum. 'So maybe it really is credible. What a resource!'"
This is another example of how corporations and not people are the important ones in USA.
Not to mention that their ISP couldn't cut their pipe fast enough after Exxon complained. No due process here, just cut it off.... Only in America....
If you mod me down, I *will* introduce you to my sister!
Not that anyone gives a damn, but is there any proof that Exxon actually was responsible?
Remember folks, its not censorship when big business does it!
(Sarcasm-impaired mods: This post is a parody, much like the Yes Men's Vivoleum)
~Rebecca
Nice trollish headline. It's hardly a hack, rather a cease-and-desist from an 800 lb gorilla. In other words, not news for nerds.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
Apparently you they are starting a program where you can bring grandma into a recycling plant and exchange her for fuel. It's called Blue Hair to Green Fuel. They are hoping to show their carbon neutral environmental side.
Oh, fuck all the politics. These guys are funny! I mean, from giving a presentation to a food service industry convenstion about McDonald's making their new hamburgers from the shit of their customers' to this... Come on! It's FUNNY!!!
how about, that even IF climate change is man made (that's a big IF) there is NO CREDIBLE way to link someone dieing in a storm to exxon. The storm could have happened without climate change, the person could have not walked into that torrent of water, there's no way to trace emissions to a specific company as the cause for a storm or any kind of weather.
It just shows the absurd claims global warming cult members will make in order to feel self righteous.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
Remember corporations have human rights too. ExxonMobile has an inherent free speech right to distort debate http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/your-opinion-c ould-be-paid-for-by.html and threaten others with law suits to intimidate them.
s -selling-solar.html
It is their right to have no sense of humor, especially if the joke is at their expense. Please be more sympathetic.
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Det solar power are save money too: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
See, here is the problem: yes it is censorship, no it is not a violation of U.S. law nor the First Ammendment (as far as I can tell from the article). People often cannot separate the two, including the Yes Men.
"Since parody is protected under US law"
You see, they are in a business relationship with the hosting company. The hosting company can break that relationship for pretty much whatever reason they see fit, including parody -- might not be smart but those are the facts. If the Yes Men put this out using their own resources, etc. and were sued for it, that's where US law would protect them. However, since they are in a business relationship with someone else, you really can't claim protection. Does that mean it's a smart idea / good idea for the hosting company to do this? No. But it's not a violation of someone's rights. That's the truth.
First, we don't actually know that Exxon complained to the ISP, because the ISP did the takedown "in reaction to a complaint whose source they will not identify." You can argue that it's likely to be Exxon, but the fact is nobody knows.
Second, filing a complaint with an ISP is not the sort of action one implied by "Brute Squad".
Third, there was no hacking involved.
You know, the only way to improve this headline would have been to name a group other than the Yes Men as the ones who were cut off.
i dont like the yes men either. i tend to agree with their positions, but i feel like they ultimately hurt their cause because they wind up looking like idiots and don't change any minds but just serve as entertainment for the most die hard of leftists.
nevertheless, their internet connection was turned off because exxon didnt like what they were saying. it's kind of disconcerting. had this been any group conservative, liberal or otherwise it is troubling that they can be wiped off the face of the internet.
that's why it's news for nerds and why you're flamebait.
just because I don't care doesn't mean I don't understand!
If you need to shout it's funny, it probably isn't so much.
I'd certainly call it funny if they produced the parody and uploaded it, but they didn't. They tricked someone into fronting the expenses for their stage and audience and did "performance art".
Not funny when it costs someone else's money. More like parasitism.
Also if you are worried about the 150.000 deaths, don't use oil, except it's used in everything, even lubricant for windmills...
And how many lives have been saved by oil, might I suggest many of millions each year that rely on the fuel to transport food and drugs...
On the other side of the argument there are persons who believe corporations should have no rights at all. These people believe that they can say the Microsoft sponsors the mass killing of anyone who disagrees with them. This is ok a the accusation is so extreme that no one would believe, so it is clearly satire. The problem, of course, is where to draw the line. Is it ok to say that MS regularly sanctions threats of any medium ranking figure who threatens their monopoly? Where does satire end and stock manipulation begin?
Ultimately, I think we get into the nature of satire, and the death of the art form. Traditional satire abstracts some tyranical figure that is simply to dangerous to attack directly, and cleverly illustrates the tyranny and negative impact of the figure. Or satire highlights some social policy, and then proposes a ridiculous solution to it. Satire is useless when launched at figures that can be attacked directly or when is simply attributes characteristics that the figure probably does not possess.
It saddens me that meaningless verbal attack is put forth as satire. In this case the article could have proposed that ExxonMobile convert the people into a product. Such a modest proposal would not be original, but at least would be an attempt at satire, rather than just the ranting of thugs. Or they could have attributed the action to Butthole Petrol Incompentated(BPI), or EXpat Oil Nation MOBlized , or whatever. Just make it interesting satire, not school house insults.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
In fact, having witnessed the breathless chops licking surounding the Petroleum Council report http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/02/trimming.html, I can say for sure that this was parody. No one would have taken this for the real thing if they were not completely stupified by anticipation. That report is going to say that we are going to boost our oil use by 30% by 2030. Amazing hornswagle, but there are many many people wishing to be duped by it.s -selling-solar.html
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Break free of fossil fuels: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user
Hum... You Honor, how can you charge me with killing all those people? They were going to die anyway. Everyone does you know.
But seriously, read the article and see if malnutrition is not mentioned.
Are you thinking of the Gaia hypothesis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaia_hypothesis as your control mechanism?
See, that's the funny part.
You are welcome on my lawn.
That's purely conjecture at this point.
"Broadview did restore both IPs on Wednesday, after the Vivoleum.com
website was completely disabled and all mention of Exxon was removed
from TheYesMen.org."
1. Wait about three weeks.
2. The terrorists used low tech non-functioning methods, and were noticeably inept. More of "your government at work" sort of stuff.
Help find a cure for cancer. Join the [H]orde
Firstly, if the ISP received a DMCA section 512 take down notice for the content, they should give the customer the full details of that notice.
Secondly, if they didn't receive a section 512 take down notice, they should have asked for one (thats assuming that the ISP was told to take the content down for copyright reasons, if it was for other reasons, there are other procedures to be followed)
That's exactly how civil rights were won in the 50's and 60's. A few, rare people had these "Whites Only" signs on their doors, and then once the media made others aware of that, no one patronized those stores. After that, those establishments took down those signs because they realized that no one would eat at a restaurant that served "whites only". If it worked then, surely it would still work today!
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
oligarchy counts, but I like to be a bit more specific.
These are my favourite type of terrorists: incompetent ones.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
At the end of July, Thing.net will terminate its contract with Broadview and move its operations to Germany, where internet
expression currently benefits from a friendlier legal climate than in the US,
I think these people are in for a rude awakening. AFAIK, Germany doesn't even have a parody exemption, and mere mention of a corporate trademark on your web site can make you subject to large fines.
If you want to get this kind of message out, don't introduce a single point of failure (web hosting). Instead, make it funny, put it in the form of a press release, make it easy to cut-and-paste, and people will be mailing it around widely. Bonus points if you can get various news wires to pick it up. If you need pictures, make them free of any trademarks, potential copyright issues, or other obstacles and you can host them on Flickr.
The speed of the takedown has more to do with the power of lawyers than the power of corporations. If the ISP wants to take advantage of the "CYA" safe harbor afforded them by the DMCA and other similar laws, they have to comply with takedown notices without delay.
If the notice came from a credible lawyer for an individual, it would still have to be honored.