Countering a DMCA Takedown In the Magnet Wars

An anonymous reader writes "Zen Magnets, a maker of neodymium magnet toys, has been under assault by the much larger and better distributed Buckyballs, maker of a nearly identical toy. After Zen Magnets listed a couple of eBay auctions with a set of Buckyballs and a set of their own, asking customers to decide which was of higher quality, Buckyballs replied with a legal threat. Zen Magnets countered with an open video response, in which they presented the voicemail from Buckyballs and demonstrated their claims of quality through repeatable, factual tests, providing quantitative data to back up their assertions. Soon after, Buckyballs CEO Jake Bronstein got the video taken down from YouTube via a DMCA takedown, despite the fact that the only elements not made by Zen Magnets are the voicemail he left and some images of himself, which are low-resolution and publicly available online. Zen Magnets has decided to file a counter-takedown notice — not effective yet apparently, since the video is still marked as taken down." Slashdot's sister company ThinkGeek sells Buckyballs. No, we don't get kickbacks, but we totally should.
Update: 09/23 13:23 GMT by KD : Reader Coopjust (872796) points out one place where the disputed video has been mirrored.

Comments

bullcrap

[Pojut]

I think this is an abuse of the DMCA (some would argue that any use of it is abuse, but that's a different topic.) If they can back up their assertions with data and repeatable demonstrations, quit yer bitchin' and make a better product.

Re:bullcrap

[Pojut]

I have learned to include "I think" or "in my opinion" on Slashdot, regardless of what the topic is. I'd rather respond to posts like yours instead of "stop acting like your opinion is fact."

Re:bullcrap

[hedwards]

Clearly you're not American and haven't been to America in a really long time. This is the way that corporations work. They could make a better product, but it's usually cheaper to abuse the court system or buy out the competition.

Re:bullcrap

[commodore64_love]

In my opinion it's not "abuse" unless youtube refuses to restore the video.

You see under DMCA law, youtube has no choice. If they receive a request they MUST take down the material. Youtube is not supposed to make judgment calls on the validity of the request. Step 2 is to submit the anti-takedown request which youtube must also obey and restore the material (or else fce a lawsuit). Step 3 is for the offended company to either take it to court.

Re:bullcrap

[saider]

The problem with the Wal-Mart philosophy is that up-front cost becomes the only measure of "value". Things like longevity and quality are not considered.

Re:bullcrap

[kilfarsnar]

People want cheap cheap cheap, so the design choices you mentioned were made to reach a price point.

Indeed they do. I have had multi-millionaires rave to me about how cheap Wallmart is. I don't fully get it. I understand wanting to pay less for something. But at some point that low price comes at the cost of quality or features. That seems like a bad trade to me, but many people don't seem to consider it. Maybe they think that if their widget breaks, it's ok because it's cheap to replace. That still seems short-sighted to me.

Re:bullcrap

[dcavanaugh]

We have few options to buy long-lasting products because nobody wants to pay a premium for higher quality. There is a good reason for this. Factory production is a process that can be automated from end to end with most of the labor coming from low-cost offshore workers.

Repair is a different matter. It takes more labor to fix an appliance than it does to make one. The repair tech has a higher skill level than most of the factory workers, and this labor cannot be sent offshore. The cost of parts is much higher as well. Somebody has to operate a warehouse full of replacement parts for machines made over many years. Some of those parts will sit on the shelf for years, some will never be sold. Therefore, the markup on parts has to subsidize the slow-selling and non-selling parts.

If someone could make a durable appliance that NEVER had to be fixed, it would be worth the premium. But as soon as service is required, we all know that a service call is dangerously close to the cost of a cheapie replacement appliance. Consumers generally demand features (like computerized controls) that increase the chance of failure at some point -- regardless of how well-made the rest of the machine is.

Kirby vacuum cleaners are awesome machines. But if you buy a plastic Hoover every 3 years, it will probably cost less (even if you buy 7 of them over 21 years). Your carpet will still be clean, and your risk at any given point is limited to the cost of a Walmart plastic vacuum cleaner. The Kirby will cost more to fix than the Hoover will cost to buy.

Some people buy exotic cars with the full understanding that the annual cost of repairs will be dangerously close to the payments on a brand new Toyota. But if you love the car, you accept the tradeoff. This happens far less often with appliances because it's hard to love a refrigerator all that much.

Re:bullcrap

[blackraven14250]

"The vice president's office was furnished with a folding lawn chair and a chaise lounge." i.e. Cutting costs. Saving money.

Yet the owners with the highest number of shares, the Waltons (all 4 of them), each walk away with billions per year, while the people working there live just below the poverty line.

Re:bullcrap

[saider]

I have a VCR that still works (it was bought in 1993 when I was in college). I also still have my original Sony CD player bought in 1988 (not the size of a small TV) and it is still plays CDs from time to time. My Panasonic receiver and amp I bought in 1995 are still driving my 30 year old speakers. My appliances (washer, dryer, fridge, dishwasher) are all older than my 10 year old son, with only minor repairs here and there.

Granted, I don't use the CD player much because I have my computer hooked up to the stereo now. But why should I have to repurchase something just because some marketing droid figured that everyone will want to toss ProductX in 3 years. Most components of playing music (amp, speakers, etc) haven't changed much. Mowing the lawn and doing laundry have not changed much in 30+ years. Why should I buy a cheap machine, when I can pay twice as much and get a machine that lasts much, much longer? Appliances never break on Saturday morning right before you were heading off to Home Depot. They go out on Sunday night on the week that you need to work overtime in order to get the Super-Important project done on time.

I vote with my wallet for quality all the time. That is why I do not shop at Wal-mart. I have found that even the quality brands will have cheap-ass Walmart-only models that are far inferior to the other models that they sell. The problem is that people do not do their research and buy these inferior models and send the message to the retailers that "I like crap". This causes other retailers to do the same in order to compete. This makes the quality models much harder to find, and more importantly, the retailers never get the message because they are plenty busy selling crap to people who don't care.

Re:bullcrap

[SpeZek]

their appliances tend to be bloody heavy

I've found that judging a lot of different things by weight gives you a good indication of the quality of that product.

Heavier furniture? They didn't use cheap wood. Heavy fridge? It's metal, not plastic. Heavy powersupply? It has quality caps and sinks. Heavy metal...

Re:bullcrap

[mcgrew]

Often you're not paying for anything but a name; I could have spent $150 on a pair of Nike shoes, but I bought a pair at WalMart for $5 several years ago; they're only now to the point of needing replacement. I'd be willing to bet that if I'd bought Nike they'd be shot, too.

I pick up Nike tshirts at garage sales for seventy five cents. It's stupid to pay extra for "quality" in an item you don't plan on keeping long, and IMO it's doubly stupid to pay extra for a name.

Aleive costs three times what the same strength generic naproxin sodium costs, but the product is identical. The extra cost buys you nothing.

news.

[postermmxvicom]

This is news. However, Buckyballs is certainly giving Zen Magnets lots of free advertising by making it newsworthy. I can only assume after watching the video that the people making their PR decisions are just that dense.

ThinkGeek

[Jaysyn]

Slashdot's sister company ThinkGeek sells Buckyballs. No, we don't get kickbacks, but we totally should.

Perhaps your sister company should stop selling the products of a known DMCA abuser?

After watching the response...

[definate]

LOL, After watching the response Zen Magnets vs Buckyballs Comparison Video, Zen Magnets seems far superior to BuckyBalls.

Not because of product quality, though that seems significantly superior, but because they seem to be way more in tune with the nerd culture. Buckyballs should be ashamed of themselves for issuing a DMCA takedown notice. No geek/nerd would stoop so low.

In comparison, Zen Magnets seems to be kicking it nerdcore, which is how I roll.

ThinkGeek, you need to drop Buckyballs and pick up Zen Magnets. You gotta protect your nerd points, and getting behind a DMCA abuser, and a company which doesn't seem to understand the geek culture, is not cool. Drop Buckyballs, pick up Zen Magnets!