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Plagiarizing a Takedown Notice

Posted by Soulskill on from the cheaper-than-paying-lawyers dept.

ChipMonk writes "Over at hobbyist site OS News, editor-in-chief Thom Holwerda published a highly skeptical opinion of the announcement of Commodore USA's own Amiga line. Within hours, Commodore USA sent a takedown notice to OS News, demanding a retraction of the piece and accusing the site of libel and defamation. What's funny is that the takedown notice was mostly copied, with minor edits, from Chilling Effects, a site dedicated to publicizing attempts at squelching free speech. The formatting, line breaks, obtuse references to 'OCGA,' and even the highlighted search terms were left largely intact."

2 of 113 comments (clear)

  1. So, why not? by pedantic+bore · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I would guess that most takedown notices look pretty much alike.

    Might as well save the money that a lawyer would charge to cut and paste this document... because you're probably going to pay that money to your lawyer for something else.

    --
    Am I part of the core demographic for Swedish Fish?
  2. Re:boilerplate by rolfwind · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I suppose it can. There are legal companies that sell boilerplate contracts online like for a landlord/tenant, so people can print them out and use them for a fee. I don't suppose if another company sprang up and used their templates, those companies would be too happy. If the original companies wrote the templates themselves, I can't imagine why they wouldn't have a case.

    IANAL though.