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Canon Tries To Shut Down "Fake" Canon Blog

Posted by kdawson on from the what-part-of-fake-do-you-not-understand dept.

Thomas Hawk writes "An interesting twist over at the Fake Chuck Westfall Blog. Fake Chuck (like Fake Steve before him) has a blog out parodying Canon's real Technical Information Advisor Chuck Westfall. It seems that Canon and their lawyers over at Loeb & Loeb are none too fond of all the fun that Fake Chuck and DSLR geeks everywhere have been having at their expense and have sent Fake Chuck's blog hosting company, WordPress, a notice to take the blog down. Canon's lawyers cite that Fake Chuck's blog is 'calculated to mislead recipients,' even though the blog has 'fake' in the title, 'fake' in the URL and 'fake' just about everywhere else in the blog. What in the heck is wrong with Canon? Do they really think that trying to shut down a parody blog is going to make their new 5D Mark II ship any faster?" After Fake Chuck removed the Canon logo from his site, WordPress is standing behind him and has rebuffed Canon's demand.

25 of 125 comments (clear)

  1. Fake First Post by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    This post has fake all over it, so you can't mod it down.

    1. Re:Fake First Post by Dachannien · · Score: 5, Funny

      I only have fake mod points today, so I fake modded you down.

  2. MS fakery by Goffee71 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Is there no fake Microsoft blog? If so, I'm guessing no one believes what they write anyway.

    --
    If he's the Walrus then can I be a penguin please?
    1. Re:MS fakery by Cally · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Sure there is. http://fakesteveballmer.blogspot.com/

      --
      "None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free." -- Goethe
  3. Guess business is kinda slow by iminplaya · · Score: 5, Insightful

    More free press for Canon. The real intention all along. Good job.

    --
    What?
    1. Re:Guess business is kinda slow by Anthony_Cargile · · Score: 4, Insightful

      With the lack of interest I would have for starting a blog centered around a key individual of Canon as opposed to Nikon/Motorola/etc., I wouldn't doubt it if the whole thing was staged just for publicity like this, after somebody at Canon saw the "fake steve jobs" fiasco. It probably isn't likely, but hey you never know these days.

  4. You'd think by now... by DeadPixels · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Companies would realize that not liking someone's views doesn't give them the right to censor the person.

    1. Re:You'd think by now... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      In this case, though, the views expressed are decidedly noncanonical.

    2. Re:You'd think by now... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      ...that the above poster would have noticed the 'fake' in the author's pseudonym.

    3. Re:You'd think by now... by Stuart+Gibson · · Score: 4, Informative

      He's not pretending to be a real person other than himself, he's pretending to be a fake person other than himself

      --
      It's all fun and games until a 200' robot dinosaur shows up and trashes Neo-Tokyo... Again
    4. Re:You'd think by now... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Absolutely! Canon are hurting as they've had nothing but immense quality problems with almost every major model released in the last 2 years. Canon just cannot stand being called out as making 'fake' cameras and watch their user base walk over to real Nikon.
      FACT: On a Luminous Landscapes trip to Antarctica, ZERO Nikon D700 failures, 6(six) Canon 5Dii failures of which 3 recovered and 3 were bricked.
      Can you smell the PANIC back at Canon HQ?

    5. Re:You'd think by now... by Chabil+Ha' · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Risking being off-topic, but seeing these all the time since the new "Web 2.0" upgrades to the slashcode has now drawn out the 'troll'.

      Please! Put the 'moderate' *button* back. Simply putting taking action on an index change on the drop down list makes it so that people can accidentally mod the wrong way. It's only by good fortune that there are some people who decided to post something in response to remove the moderation. By putting the button back to confirm the selection, you avoid the mess of people posting to remove moderation and posts like these to beg for that simple piece of functionality be put back.

      The Karma Whores will love you for it.

      --
      We're all hypocrites. We all have hidden parts, it's the contrast between them that make us more a hypocrite than others
    6. Re:You'd think by now... by roguetrick · · Score: 5, Funny

      I tried to mod you offtopic but I ended up modding you insightful.

      --
      -The world would be a better place if everyone had a hoverboard
    7. Re:You'd think by now... by Miseph · · Score: 4, Informative

      "Also, but I'm not sure if it's because of my browser's ineptitude, posting something to undo moderation doesn't give you the modpoints back."

      That is intentional, check the moderation FAQ. The stated reason is that it allows an abusive mod to mod up/down a post in a new article, then post once it comes off the front page (making it a lot less important) and get the points back to use again.

      --
      Try not to take me more seriously than I take myself.
  5. Thanks to Canon and Slashdot by UnknowingFool · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The Streisand effect has now hit the Fake Chuck blog. I wasn't aware of the blog but thanks to Canon's own doing more people will be aware of it.

    --
    Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
  6. Fake MWoody says... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...I'm a complete moron!

    --Fake MWoody

  7. Bad Summary by the+eric+conspiracy · · Score: 5, Informative

    The take down letter asked for 4 things:

    1. Stop using the Canon logo.
    2. Remove references to violence.
    3. Remove references to Chuck's family.
    4. Changes to the look and feel of the blog so it would not be
    confused with actual Canon corporate sites.

    It wasn't a totally unreasonable blanket take-down demand, and as such Fake Chuck will easily be able to comply and continue as a source of satire and humor.

    1. Re:Bad Summary by rcw-home · · Score: 4, Informative

      I looked at the PDF of the takedown. Yes, it mentioned those four things as "particularly egregious" but it was a blanket take-down demand. Let's examine the basis they list for their complaint and their demand:

      http://fakechuckwestfall.wordpress.com/ (the "Blog") - is using our client's trademark and Mr. Westfall's name and likeness without authorization

      Accordingly, we hereby demand that you immediately remove the above-mentioned objectionable and harmful content from your website, as well as terminate the Blog author's account.

      (emphasis mine)

      If Wordpress hadn't exhibited some common sense, Fake Chuck would have had to find a new home.

  8. Re:WTF by Teun · · Score: 3, Informative

    Because this is one of their flagship products and it has according to early reports performed a bit sub-par?
    Canon

    --
    "The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
  9. Bad lawyers by Kupfernigk · · Score: 3, Insightful
    The take down letter made other, unreasonable demands. As I've posted before, it's often the case that from the plaintiff point of view, the weaker the case the stronger the language, and contrariwise for the defendant. This was a weak case so L&L tried to boost it with strong language demanding that Wordpress cease to allow the fake CW to publish any blogs. Wordpress detected it was a weak case and offered the minimum actually needed to comply. And now, people who had no idea that some people think Canon DSLRs are not very good, and have inadequate QA, are suddenly informed on the subject.

    I had to issue a takedown notice last year when I discovered that a fake business had stolen the identity of our legitimate business. As a result, we could have been raided by the police and had our equipment taken by them, which could have driven us out of business. The initial response of the website host was to go away. Before I could respond to this, which would have involved a High Court injunction, they obviously took legal advice and I suddenly got a grovel. So I am sympathetic to legitimate takedowns. As you say, part of this one was legitimate. But L&L should have done better than have it drafted by a paralegal, and simply insisted that the genuinely infringing material be removed or fixed, and requested as a matter of courtesy that the blog confine itself to technical matters. Despite their claims to the contrary, lawyers are frequently not the shiniest apples in the barrel.

    --
    From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
  10. I would not even have removed the logo by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 5, Informative

    since using it in obvious parody is protected fair use.

  11. Re:5D Mk II by WillKemp · · Score: 4, Insightful

    [......] already over 50 customer reviews posted.

    Looks like Canon's marketing dept have been busy then!

  12. Re:What? by hyades1 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The story's not about photography. It's about a major multinational corporation using its lawyers and money to bully into silence bloggers who point out its failures.

    You didn't get that?

    --
    I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
  13. 3 words... by pig-power · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Thank You Wordpress

  14. Re:the biggest threat to Canon profits by kimvette · · Score: 3, Insightful

    When Canon started chipping their cartridges I finally took the plunge and bought a Xerox color laser printer. I haven't looked back since.

    FUCK the whole cheap printer/expensive ink business model.

    --
    The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50