FunnyJunk Sues the Oatmeal Over TM and "Incitement To Cyber-Vandalism"

eldavojohn writes "You may recall from last week the news item concerning FunnyJunk's extortion ... er ... threat of defamation lawsuit against The Oatmeal highlighting a fairly pervasive problem of rehosting content — in this case web comics. Instead of expediting a payment of $20,000 to FunnyJunk, Matthew Inman of The Oatmeal decided to crowd source the money (with 8 days left he has only garnered 900% of his goal) and donate it to charity after sending a picture of it to FunnyJunk. Charles Carreon (the man who has FunnyJunk) has made statements of Inman saying 'I really did not expect that he would marshal an army of people who would besiege my website and send me a string of obscene emails.' In an interview Carreon says 'So someone takes one of my letters and takes it apart. That doesn't mean you can just declare netwar, that doesn't mean you can encourage people to hack my website, to brute force my WordPress installation so I have to change my password. You can't encourage people to violate my trademark and violate my twitter name and associate me with incompetence with stupidity, and douchebaggery. And if that's where the world is going I will fight with every ounce of force in this 5'11 180 pound frame against it. I've got the energy, and I've got the time.' Well it appears that Carreon has filed suit over these matters alleging 'trademark infringement and incitement to cyber-vandalism.' Speaking of douchebaggery, Charles Carreon curiously fails to mention that he first incited all of his users to harass The Oatmeal anyway they can which they dutifully did. One last juicy detail is that Carreon is also suing the National Wildlife Federation and the American Cancer Society to which Inman's crowd sourced money is going. Luckily, Inman's lawyer appears to be fully competent and able to address Carreon's complaints."

Comments

Obligatory

[suso]

"Carreon is also suing the National Wildlife Federation and the American Cancer Society"

That can't be good for business

Re:Obligatory

[telekon]

Neither can being an "Internet lawyer" with absolutely no understanding of the Streisand Effect.

Re:Obligatory

[Mitchell314]

Yeah, at this point it's just a publicity stunt. The cynic in me doesn't believe Carreon is dumb; look at all the extra attention and internet traffic this little affair has started.

Re:Obligatory

[durrr]

He's a run of the mill moron that have an overinflated ego and sense of competence. The Dunning-Kruger effect in play more or less.

Re:Obligatory

[Anonymous Coward]

He's a run of the mill moron that have an overinflated ego and sense of competence. The Dunning-Kruger effect in play more or less.

I was thinking more along the lines of the Peter Principle.

(Get it? Peter, FunkyJunk? Oh, never mind...)

Re:Obligatory

[BenJury]

And if that's where the world is going I will fight with every ounce of force in this 5'11 180 pound frame against it.

It maybe anecdotal, but I've often found the people who feel the need to mention this sort of metric in an argument like this are actually pretty dumb.

Re:Obligatory

[gl4ss]

yeah, if it was something like 12 feet and 500 pounds.. now that would be impressive.

Re:Obligatory

[Saint Fnordius]

Well, from what we know of this guy, it seems he really is the internet version of an ambulance chaser. He got a lucky break in the sex.com brouhaha, and now like a gambler that won a lottery jackpot he's scratching every card he can buy, desperate for the next big win. After all, look at this line from the Comic Riffs blog report:

Carreon tells Comic Riffs one of his goals is to become the go-to attorney for people who feel they have been cyber-vandalized or similarly wronged on the Internet.

Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/comic-riffs/post/funnyjunk-lawyer-suing-the-oatmeal-cartoonist-inman-over-indiegogo-charity-drive/2012/06/18/gJQAbZhDlV_blog.html

We can only hope that his hubris will soon make him the disgraced pariah that he needs to be.

Re:Obligatory

[mjwx]

Yeah, at this point it's just a publicity stunt. The cynic in me doesn't believe Carreon is dumb; look at all the extra attention and internet traffic this little affair has started.

Which is why you need a loser pays system. Right now he can hire 1 shmuck lawyer for $100 and tie up (potentially) good companies in the defence of a frivolous suit who have to pay $500 p/h lawyers to debunk the 1 shmuck. Under a loser pays system, FunnyJunk would be liable for the court costs of the people he sues if he didn't have a water tight case (Read: Just doing this for publicity).

Personally I've never heard of FunnyJunk before a few days ago, but I've just added it to the blacklist of my routers DNS relay, just in case I accidentally visit it.

Re:Obligatory

[telekon]

While the Dunning-Kruger effect may be thought of as related to the Peter Principle, I think Dunning-Kruger is more apt in describing this case.

While the Peter Principle is the observation that in hierarchical organizations, individuals tend to be promoted to the level of their own incompetence, Dunning-Kruger relates more broadly to the pattern that the less competent one is, the more likely one is to over-assess one's own level of knowledge or skill.

Sounds like Carreon to me.

Not that I would ever nitpick on /.

Re:Obligatory

[TheSpoom]

The best part is that according to TFA, Carreon (fitting name) is representing himself.

Re:Obligatory

[TheSpoom]

Never mind, misread that bit, Carreon is the lawyer.

Re:Obligatory

[Vintermann]

Probably, he lives by the idea that all publicity is good publicity. Hey, it worked for SA founder Richard Kyanka, no? Clearly, Commander Taco's unwillingness to engage in such antics are responsible for slashdot's decline in importance.

Re:Obligatory

[NevarMore]

So in a loser pays system, what happens if you're on the wrong end of a lawsuit from one of those $500/hr lawyer teams and you can only pony up for a $150/hour lawyer and you lose?

Re:Obligatory

[Anonymous Coward]

The Dunning-Kruger effect in play more or less.

"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts." -- Bertrand Russell

Re:Obligatory

[Medievalist]

...a human that, at approximately 6 feet tall weighed 180 pounds would not be 500 pounds. He would be 1,440 pounds (again approximately). Don't forget that the size (and hence the mass / weight) doubles in each of the three dimensions (what we could call height, width, and thickness). This is why we have the cube square law that shows how that impressive 12 foot, 1,440 pound human would be unable to walk.

Unless such a human were made of delicious lemon meringue! There, I've run rings around you logically. And now the penguin on top of your television set will explode.

You have to admit this post makes at least as much a sense as Funnyjunk's lawyer's claims.

Re:Obligatory

[jythie]

Yeah, looking at the guy's interview he really comes across as not being all that in-touch with the internet. He might know the letter of the law but he is really out of his depth putting any of it into context and seems to lack even basic mechanical knowledge of what he is dealing with.

Which kinda makes sense, from what I gather he usually represents 'businessmen' who are trying to get IP, so outsiders trying to push their way in to a community that is rubbed the wrong way by them... I doubt he has actually done any cases between knowledgeable parties.

Re:Obligatory

[MacGyver2210]

As your client should know, the internet does not like censorship, and does not react kindly to it. Bringing a lawsuit against The Oatmeal is ill advised. Not only are FunnyJunk's claims meritless, FunnyJunk will surely lose in the court of public opinion and cause itself reputational harm. We are also deeply skeptical that a nameless, faceless, business that hosts third party content will be able to demonstrate much if anything by way of damages as a result of The
Oatmeal’s allegedly defamatory statements. At the end of the day, a lawsuit against The Oatmeal in this situation is just a really bad idea.

I actually like this lawyer. Now there's a sentence I thought I'd never write.

Re:Obligatory

[mjwx]

So in a loser pays system, what happens if you're on the wrong end of a lawsuit from one of those $500/hr lawyer teams and you can only pony up for a $150/hour lawyer and you lose?

Here is where lawyers do something called "no-win, no-fee". If you've got a semi-decent defence (remember that the plaintiff has the burden of proof, they must prove what they say you did, you need only provide enough evidence to cast that into doubt) a high priced lawyer may choose to take on your case on a no-win, no-fee basis as he's got a good chance of winning his high price off the plaintiff. A lot of firms do no-win no fee in Australia.

No-win, no-fee can be used in the reverse (by a plaintiff of "claimant") but 1. they need rock solid evidence and 2. I'm assuming in your example that the lawsuit is a sham and the defender is innocent.

Loser pays is not perfect and by far not impossible to game but it's a hell of a lot better then the alternatives. It's been working in Australia and other nations for over 20 years now, if it were that easy to game someone would have done it by now. Instead people who launch frivolous suits like the MPIAA/RIAA are afraid to do so in Australia as they would be responsible for the costs, they tried suing one ISP and are currently trying to get the amount they have to pay for the defendants lawyers reduced.

Lets try this scenario again except changing the "loser pays" system to the "American rule" where each side is responsible for their own fees.

what happens if you're on the wrong end of a lawsuit from one of those $500/hr lawyer teams and you can only pony up for a $150/hour lawyer and you lose?

So what happens here, you can only afford a cheap lawyer regardless of your chances of winning?

Not only have your chances not decreased because they can afford better lawyers and are at no risk from losing, your chances of being sued frivolously have increased because they will never be punished for it.

Re:Obligatory

[Belial6]

Yep. That is why we need an equal pay system. Each side pays the other side's lawyer an equal amount to what they pay their own. That way if Super-Mega-Corp want's to bring in $500/hour lawyers to crush Working-Two-Jobs-To-Make-Ends-Meet-Joe, Joe will have just as good of representation as Super-Mega-Corp.

Re:Obligatory

[Hotawa Hawk-eye]

No, but it's GREAT for taking a substantial lead in this year's "Jack Thompson's Legal Career" Memorial Award for Bad Legal Interaction with an Website, Online Forum, or Service Provider.

Re:Obligatory

[gl4ss]

Assuming even scaling - a human that, at approximately 6 feet tall weighed 180 pounds would not be 500 pounds. He would be 1,440 pounds (again approximately). Don't forget that the size (and hence the mass / weight) doubles in each of the three dimensions (what we could call height, width, and thickness). This is why we have the cube square law that shows how that impressive 12 foot, 1,440 pound human would be unable to walk.

who said human? obviously he's a massive boa constrictor packed full of shit.

Re:Obligatory

[MisterSquid]

As William Butler Yeats puts it in his apocalyptic vision of "The Second Coming"

The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Re:Obligatory

[__aawmso8327]

Yep. That is why we need an equal pay system. Each side pays the other side's lawyer an equal amount to what they pay their own. That way if Super-Mega-Corp want's to bring in $500/hour lawyers to crush Working-Two-Jobs-To-Make-Ends-Meet-Joe, Joe will have just as good of representation as Super-Mega-Corp.

Actual outcome: $500/hour lawyers get "paid layman rates," while their uncles/children/foreign bank accounts collect the remainder. See college athletes.

Re:Obligatory

[idontgno]

"A lawyer who represents himself in court has an idiot for a lawyer and a fool for a client."

Re:Obligatory

[jeff4747]

"Loser pays" has a lot of issues. For example, not all lawsuits are frivolous. Sometimes there is a genuine dispute on the law.

A better system is to let the judge award attorney's fees to the defendant when they dismiss a case with prejudice.

From what I'm told, in the current system you have to continue the suit to win attorney's fees even when the original case has been tossed for lack of merit. Meaning the defendant has to continue the suit and rack up more fees in the hopes that eventually the plaintiff will pay.

That way there's a human in the loop instead of an automatic "loser pays".

Re:Obligatory

[Belial6]

That would be another alternative. I would say that the solution to the scaling fee isn't to have the legal consultant decide if they will wave the fee. It would be to have the fee rise (points against your fees) when you lose cases. So, each case you lose, the cost goes up for the next one. This would prevent spamming the legal system, while not harming those that are most targeted. I would also stipulate that subsequent lawsuits against the same defendant count as points against your fees whether you win or lose. And that dropped cases count as points as well.

Re:Obligatory

[Khyber]

No-Win, No-Fee is almost universally used in personal injury lawsuits across the globe, and not much else.

Speaking from relevant business experience across UK, AUS, NZ, Morocco, China, etc.

Re:Obligatory

[Khyber]

We seriously need to create a trophy for this, to send to idiot lawyers.

Re:Obligatory

[Translation Error]

But... but what about NewYorkCountryLawyer?

Re:Obligatory

[amoeba1911]

Lawyers are especially good at finding loopholes to abuse. You pass a law saying megacorp has to pay joe's lawyer expenses to match their own lawyer expenses, it wouldn't take long until megacorp finds a way to funnel huge amount of cash to their own lawyers through some special undisclosed ways. Megacorp then would hire a team of dozen lawyers for the bargain price of about $20/hour while you get screwed because you can't afford even a single lawyer on that price.

The legal and tax codes are chuck-full of stupid laws like this that are almost designed to be abused. In the end it will not solve anything, just make a bigger mess.

Re:Obligatory

[JTsyo]

It wouldn't be a jury trial.

Re:Obligatory

[Goobermunch]

Obviously written by someone who has no experience with the legal system.

Look, the fact of the matter is that litigation necessarily involves disputed facts. I say you violated your non-compete, you say you didn't. You say I appropriated your trade secrets, I say I discovered them independently. That's why we have juries, to help establish an "official" set of facts.

The reality is that the best cases settle out of court before trial. Hell, in the U.S. over 97% of cases resolve prior to trial. That's because if it's a slam dunk case on liability and damages, the defendant (or his insurer) will pay to end the lawsuit. On the other hand, if the case is obviously frivolous, the plaintiff or his lawyer will dismiss the case as that becomes clear. Plaintiff's lawyers don't generally enjoy spending hours and hours of time that could be put to productive uses working on B.S. cases. We'd really prefer to take cases that have a chance of turning into revenue.

This means that the cases that are most likely going to go to trial are the rare close ones. These are generally cases where there is evidence on both sides, and no clear, slam dunk winner. In other words, these are the cases that most need a jury's input so that the parties can at least resolve their disputes and move forward.

A loser pays system does nothing to eliminate frivolous claims or defenses. It just further punishes a person who had an intractable dispute and was wrong about who the facts favor.

--AC

Re:Obligatory

[Goobermunch]

Actually, in the United States, barring a contract or statute to the contrary, the rule is that each party pays its own attorney fees.

In many jurisdictions, there are statutes that permit the judge to award fees if the case is groundless, frivolous, or vexatious. A few states have statutes that permit an award of fees if the defense is groundless, frivolous, or vexatious (but nobody ever thinks about that side of the equation).

If the original case is "tossed," then judgment enters for the defendant, and the case is over (unless there are counterclaims, or only some of the plaintiff's claims were tossed). A court cannot continue to hear a case that has been fully resolved (where there are no remaining claims between the parties), because there is no longer a case or controversy before it. I am not aware of any system in which the defendant must continue incurring fees in the hopes of making a losing plaintiff pay them. That's a catastrophically stupid way to run a legal system.

--AC

Re:Obligatory

[DMUTPeregrine]

Noooo! My penguin!

Re:Obligatory

[arose]

There's probably a lot of good lawyers out there, but "Lawyer fairly represents client, achieves reasonable result" is not exactly headline material nor memorable in case we hear about it anyway. Cue huge amounts of selection and confirmation bias.

Re:Obligatory

[DarwinSurvivor]

"There is nothing worse than aggressive stupidity." ~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe - German dramatist, novelist, poet, & scientist (1749 - 1832)

"Charles Carreon (the man who has FunnyJunk)"

[Anonymous Coward]

I see what you did there! Nice.

captcha: excites. Lol.

Re:"Charles Carreon (the man who has FunnyJunk)"

[yincrash]

The summary is incorrect. Carreon is not FunnyJunk, and probably not the owner of FunnyJunk (I couldn't figure out who is). He represented FunnyJunk in the legal threats sent to Inman. There doesn't appear to be any lawsuit against Inman by FunnyJunk, but there is a lawsuit by Carreon, a lawyer, (who is representing himself pro se) against Inman, IndieGoGo, ACS, and NWF.

Associations

[Rei]

You can't encourage people to ... associate me with incompetence with stupidity, and douchebaggery.

No, only you can do that. ;)

Re:Associations

[ancientt]

That doesn't mean you can just declare netwar,

I guess I missed that part... maybe it depends on what you define as 'netwar'

that doesn't mean you can encourage people to hack my website,

Oh, that. Well, I'm pretty sure he didn't do that so I don't see the relevance.

to brute force my WordPress installation so I have to change my password.

Seriously? That's a terrible example of hacking. I might disagree with the term use generally because it ignores the honorable history of the word, but I can accept modern usage. That's not hacking by either definition. Seriously, shouldn't you use a good password anyway?

You can't encourage people to violate my trademark

Has anyone done this? Now that I think of it, actually he could, couldn't he? I don't think it would be illegal to encourage other people to take that action.

and violate my twitter name

Somebody violated your twitter? Shocking! Outrageous! Somewhat humorous!

and associate me with incompetence with stupidity, and douchebaggery.

Well, technically that's freedom of speech. There are some limits on it but I'm pretty sure you can call someone stupid, incompetent and a douchebag. Lets try it: You, Charles Carreon, are a stupid and incompetent douchebag.

Note that I didn't say anything about bravery. I think it takes an amazing level of bravery to set yourself up as the target instead of your client for the rage of a good old fashioned flame war. Bravery and stupidity are not exclusive, in fact, I think they may have a very open relationship. (I do see that there is a tempting reference there to Kodiak romance, but I'm not quite willing to make it.)

Re:Associations

[postbigbang]

This very post, and all of the clicks behind it, are just kerosene to pour on the flames. Carreon isn't a twit, he's getting lots of free stuff from the crowds that go Fight! Fight! Fight! in the lunchrooms of their high schools, where their maturation process stopped.

Bravery? Douchebaggery? This is the Internet, where World==Dog. He's manipulated you, and a jillion others into clicking over truly stupid stuff. His lawyer==PR manager. Just by foisting/hoisting the argument, look at all the ostensible do-gooders he got to be sucker-baited into mess. Add in a little bit of testosterone, and you can almost smell the napalm.

Re:Associations

[Theaetetus]

You can't encourage people to violate my trademark

Has anyone done this? Now that I think of it, actually he could, couldn't he? I don't think it would be illegal to encourage other people to take that action.

Actually, that's the only one that would be legitimate*... Intentionally inducing infringement creates liability.

*But there's no evidence that Inman did induce anyone**.
**Plus, he's claiming his name is the trademark, but people using his name are (a) not using it in commerce, and (b) even if they are, it's nominative fair use.

Welcome to the internet

[f3rret]

Where everything always turns into a complete shitstorm.

fun place.

Re:Welcome to the internet

[LordLimecat]

Someone should let Zuckerberg know that it isnt worth it. Im sure he will find that fascinating.

Re:Welcome to the internet

[Anonymous Coward]

Stuff like this is actually the reason why I don't run any large public sites. The legality of it all is just crazy and policing the world at large to prevent them from posting illegal material or causing other issues is an impossible task. All this for very little payoff and high risk. It's just not worth it.

Yeah. That and lack of any good ideas.

Re:Welcome to the internet

[Skarecrow77]

Amusement value of that statement aside, I don't doubt that his company employs/retains one hell of an expensive legal team, who are no doubt kept quite busy.

for every site like facebook or youtube that "makes it", how many sites are there that go under not because of lack of good ideas, or good management, but because of legal action (be it legit or otherwise)?

To this day I still remember the story of small upstart hardware manufacturer Aureal, who in the late 90s/early 2000s produced the first true competitor to Creative Lab's dominance of the PC sound card market. The hardware was cheaper, the features were more advanced, and the company was a hell of a lot better to deal with. Creative Lab's solution was to sue, sue, and sue some more. Aureal won every single time, but the cost of continiously defending themselves pushed them into bankruptcy, where they were purchased for pennies on the dollar... by Creative Labs.

so yeah, fuck that.

Suing the ACS, really?

[JoshuaZ]

I'm not a fan of the American Cancer Society. They are a highly inefficient charity and very little of their money goes to things like research. But, really suing a charity that's at least trying to fight cancer? I thought FunnyJunk was engaging in really poor PR but that's even worse. I can't even begin to think of a legal argument for why they should sue the ACS in this context, and even if they had a marginally plausible argument that didn't immediately invite Rule 11 sanctions ahref=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_11%23Chapter_III_-_Pleadings_and_Motionsrel=url2html-23882http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_11#Chapter_III_-_Pleadings_and_Motions>, any sane lawyer would say that this would just be a bad idea. The lack of awareness here was impressive before but has no crossed over into a whole other level of stupidity and douchebaggery.

Re:Suing the ACS, really?

[Anne_Nonymous]

So you're saying Funky Junk is worse than cancer?

Re:Suing the ACS, really?

[crazyjj]

But, really suing a charity that's at least trying to fight cancer?

If he thinks he's under a shitstorm now, he just better hope it never hits the mainstream press.

Re:Suing the ACS, really?

[SJHillman]

In other news, cancer has decided that the enemy of its enemy is its friend and has thus teamed up with FunnyJunk. The resulting entity has not yet been named, but FunCancer is currently favored.

Re:Suing the ACS, really?

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't be too quick to judge the ACS. There's already a shitton of money being thrown at research. They do other things with the money as well, like supporting families while their loved one is in treatment, or helping terminally ill people have a chance at a semi-normal last few months of life.

The issue is not as cut-and-dried as "very little of their money goes to things like research".

Re:Suing the ACS, really?

[Anonymous Coward]

Cancerjunk was rejected on the grounds that they might face trademark conflicts from Lance Armstrong.

Too Soon?

Re:Suing the ACS, really?

[JoshuaZ]

Some of their money does go to things that are arguably worthwhile. But a lot of it isn't even going to things like family support or end of life quality care either. The Relays for example often cost almost as much money to run as they get out of them, so the Relay for Life ends up having no substantial amount of money go anywhere useful http://www.jafsica.com/2010/04/26/life-death-cancer/. This is a big part of why the ACS only gets three stars on financials by Charity Navigator http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=6495. Many other groups dedicated to fighting cancer get better numbers from Charity Navigator, either in the financial category or for overall, or both.

Re:Suing the ACS, really?

[bws111]

The Relays for example often cost almost as much money to run as they get out of them

So what? Not everything is measured in dollars. I have several people close to me who have or had cancer, and I can't tell you how much things like Relay For Life mean to them.

Re:Suing the ACS, really?

[JoshuaZ]

Are we really going down the personal anecdote road? Because if so we can. My mother is a cancer survivor. Both my grandmothers died of cancer. My aunt is as we speak recovering from a relapse of stomach cancer. My little brother's nanny has cancer and they just made the decision to only give palliative care because there's not much else they can do. So if we're going down that road, I think I'm allowed to say that just because some people feel good from Relay for Life doesn't mean tat Relay for Life is the best or most efficient way to do so. It is possible to do almost everything Relay for Life does and still actually raise money. In fact, many Relay participants don't realize how little money actually goes to anything other than Relay expenses. Whether that's because they haven't looked into it or have been actively misinformed seems to vary from person to person, but either way, lying by either omission or commission to cancer survivors isn't good behavior.

Re:Suing the ACS, really?

[Shatrat]

I suspect it means a lot less than more effective treatment would...should we coin a new term, "Charity Theatre"?

Re:Suing the ACS, really?

[JWW]

Hits the mainstream press? He was on MSNBC last week.

Oh wait, yeah, just wait until this hits the mainstream press.

I need to patent...

[DWMorse]

I need to file a patent on frivolous lawsuits. I know exactly how I'd word the letter announcing my intent to protect my IP.

"Yo dawg, I heard you like to sue, so I'm suing you for suing, so you can go to court for going to court..."

Re:I need to patent...

[ZeroSumHappiness]

Methods are, models are not. You could only patent the infrastructure and search techniques you use to find your targets, I believe.

Re:I need to patent...

[hvm2hvm]

No, it was some guy on a TED talk that wanted to abolish patents or something like that. And this was his plan, patenting frivolous lawsuits. Everyone laughed and cheered.

Oatmeal stumbled here

[hsmith]

Honestly: He messed up.

He should have gone on the extreme offensive and sued the shit out of Funny Junk once he got that letter. I found what he did amusing, as well as good for humanity (with his charity) - but in the end he let a useless website continue on churning out stolen content.

Granted, Inman said he seeked council before doing what he did, so perhaps he knew it was inevitable. The court case should be amusing, to say the least. I hope he counter sues for 200x the amount.

Re:Oatmeal stumbled here

[jimicus]

ISTR the US legal system is notoriously reluctant to award costs, mainly to prevent cases where huge companies can use "We'll claim costs against you!" as a tool to intimidate smaller organisations and individuals.

Re:Oatmeal stumbled here

[closetpsycho]

I think that being awarded legal costs should be more common, but only up to the amount that the loser spent. So if side A has a fairly average costing lawyer and loses to the ultra high priced legal team of side B, then side A still only has to pay as much to side B as he paid for side A. So basically, at worst, the loser would have to double his legal costs.

Re:Oatmeal stumbled here

[gbjbaanb]

unfortunately, this also means that big corporations can use "our highly trained team of lawyers will tie you up in legal processes that it'll cost you far more than you can afford.... and you can't even claim costs when err, if you win, haha" as a tool to intimidate smaller organisations and individuals.

Re:Oatmeal stumbled here

[bws111]

If you know you are going to lose anyway, just settle.

The main problem though is that you are starting from a faulty premise. The number of times 'Big company sues little man' is tiny compared to the number of times 'Little man sues big company'. And the number of times Big company files a suit that is doesn't have a very good chance of winning is even smaller than that.

Today, most cases of 'little man sues big company' are on a contingency basis. If the plaintiff doesn't win, he has no expenses. However, if the plaintiff does win, he may have to give 30% to the lawyer. So how does your 'loser pays' idea work with that? A losing plaintiff has zero expenses, so will never have to pay.

If we do away with the contingency fees, then someone who is truly harmed by another party must first weigh what will happen if they lose. They can not mount the best possible case because if they lose they will be out twice the money.

These types of proposals harm the little guy far more often than the big guy.

Re:Oatmeal stumbled here

[zeon]

That is incorrect for several reasons. Without going into detail, there is no blanket rule in California for cost/fee shifting. Statutes provide for costs and fees only under certain circumstances. IAAL

Wrong

[Anonymous Coward]

FunnyJunk isn't suing.
FunnyJunk's Lawyer is suing.

Re:Wrong

[Penguinisto]

FunnyJunk's Lawyer is suing.

Then maybe the douchebags at Funnyjunk should publicly disavow any connection to the douchebag who's doing the actual suing?

You know, like, sometime before the folks at CNN, BBC, et al decide to pick up the story and broadcast it with the lede: "...and in other news, the internet site funnyjunk.com is suing some comic site and TWO BIG CHARITIES today..." (followed of course by the charities giving a ton of damning soundbites that make the site and its lawyer look like massive, well, you know, douchebags...)

('course, there's still that whole douchebag factor, but that's not my problem. I'm only here to offer helpful advice about that lawyer vs. reputation thing).

I think a countersuit is definitely in order

[crazyjj]

I hop Oatmeal countersues that 5'11 180 pound frame prick into oblivion.

Re:I think a countersuit is definitely in order

[steveo777]

I accidentally red that as "all of the furry my..."

I'm sure either way Inman will be all about that "support"

Re:I think a countersuit is definitely in order

[Anonymous Coward]

5'11 180 pound frame

Pfft. Is that supposed to be impressive? My wife is 5'4 and 200 lbs!

Note: She was 120lbs when I met her though.

PS: i'm depressed.

This is fantastic.

[p0p0]

I love it. It's so open and shut in favor of The Oatmeal. He never incited anyone. He in fact mentions that he DIDN'T incite anyone and that it was FunnyJunk who messaged their userbase to confront The Oatmeal, or at least very heavily implied they should. Everything The Oatmeal has done is retaliatory, in defense, and FJ has been on the offense for the entire situation.
God knows why. Money I suppose. The Oatmeal's comics are popular and probably bring a lot of traffic when the comics are linked to FJ and not The Oatmeal.

Everytime the owner of FJ speaks he tries to paint himself as the one being hurt, but all the damage is self-induced by the bad PR he's constantly causing by sending rude messages and generally un-gentlemanly behavior.

Now if this ever does reach court, I'm sure it'll be decently long as FJ tries to throw everything it can at The Oatmeal because if they lose the Streisand Effect will hit even harder. I'm sure at least some users will leave, but more importantly they'll lose many potential users just because of they'll be shown beforehand how FJ operates.

Either way, I'm going to just grab some popcorn and enjoy. I can't wait for The Oatmeal's response to this. Should have just complied with the takedown request (it was a request, The Oatmeal never once filed a DMCA) but apparently the owner of FJ just can't stand being told (asked) what to do.

Re:This is fantastic.

[Adambomb]

Before everyone finishes patting themselves on the back about how stupid Carreon is, how he has invoked the Streisand effect and a bunch of bad PR ask yourself this: How many of us had honestly even heard of Funnyjunk before today.

Given that it contains so much user submitted content, imagine how many ads have been served on pages where people have gone to flame them, despite the bulk of slashdot readers using adblocks on unfamiliar sites.

I wonder if his ego might still have them laughing all the way to the bank depending on how long it takes them to drop or settle the suits. Even before the internet its been known in marketing that the only bad publicity is no publicity.

Re:This is fantastic.

[hsmith]

Never heard of Funny Junk before this. But, I still have never visited their site. So, no gain for them really.

Re:This is fantastic.

[aaron552]

I knew that FunnyJunk was basically the new ebaumsworld - or at least the subsequent iteration (9GAG is the next one) of the "take other people's content, add advertising, profit" business model - but little more than that. Now I also know that its lawyer is unbelievably ignorant about the internet and the Streisand Effect.

Re:This is fantastic.

[Jumperalex]

I may now have heard of it but I can promise you one thing: I have never visited nor will I ever. No click counts, no ad impressions, nothing. The only thing they might get from me is a bump in google ranking due to links (if I actually created links) but that would ONLY be the result of propogating this very story, a story that is not going to help them in the long run, even if it helps them in the short run. I do however now know who The Oatmeal is :)

Re:This is fantastic.

[Anonymous Coward]

I visited for you. It's really shitty. Basically, it's all the racist and stupid shit that your idiot high school classmate posts on facebook collected in one place.

For example, on the front page of funny junk right now there is a joke about black people who say "shizzle" and eat fried chicken. And, its not even funny. FunnyJunk is run by an idiot scumbag, for idiot scumbags.

Re:This is fantastic.

[Saint Fnordius]

I have a hunch that the FunnyJunk owner is not really all that interested any more, and that Carreon picked this fight as a way to gain a reputation. Now his ego won't let him back down, and in his world the Oatmeal is now the Moby Dick to his Ahab, with FunnyJunk tricked into being his Pequod.

Re:This is fantastic.

[Anonymous Coward]

Conversely... I had never heard of the oatmeal until this episode... but now i visit the site daily.

In fact... i might just order a couple posters.

Re:Only in 2012

[Internal Modem]

As an article, "the" is always lowercase in title case sentences...unless it is part of a proper noun. Samzenpus is one of the most illiterate editors ever.

That's not quite what's happening

[Roujo]

The title is wrong. FunnyJunk isn't suing, their lawyer Charles Carreon is. He's not representing them, he's representing himself. At least, that's what I got from the title of the case on Courthouse News Service, "Charles Carreon v Matthew Inman".

Re:That's not quite what's happening

[Rich0]

What is his standing then?

Can I buy $500 worth of Google stock and then sue Apple over their anti-Android tactics, since it has an adverse impact on my shares? If the company isn't suing, then Charles is just suing as a shareholder as far as I understand the law. I can understand shareholder suits against the company they own shares in since that is a direct relationship.

Yeah, He's Also the Lawyer for FunnyJunk

[eldavojohn]

Submitter here. I forgot to mention in the summary he's also the lawyer for FunnyJunk.

Re:Yeah, He's Also the Lawyer for FunnyJunk

[Theaetetus]

Submitter here. I forgot to mention in the summary he's also the lawyer for FunnyJunk.

You got this part wrong, though: "Charles Carreon curiously fails to mention that he first incited all of his users to harass The Oatmeal anyway they can which they dutifully did."

He's FunnyJunk's lawyer, not FunnyJunk's owner. Carreon has no users.

Guess I'm the 13 Year Old Girl

[eldavojohn]

The summary is so poorly written, assuming that the reader knows and cares about tiny details and any of players, that I am finally convinced the real Slashdot is dead.

Sorry to suck so badly. I'll try harder next time. Thought my name was good around here but apparently I'm the end of Slashdot. Care to rewrite the summary in a concise manner so I can take notes? It's really really easy to leave empty criticisms with no valid critiques and rhetoric about how Slashdot is dead. But someone's modding you up so I'll bite. You have zero submissions and 150 comments? I hate to say it but I think I've been registered on here a bit longer than you and have been a little more active (that's me on the hall of fame list for submitters) ... but we who paraphrase, link, write book reviews and write comments with content, we're the ones who are ruining Slashdot? Got it.

Re:Guess I'm the 13 Year Old Girl

[Bad Ad]

How many submissions/comments and how short/long his UID is doesn't make you more literate than him.

Re:Guess I'm the 13 Year Old Girl

[RazzleFrog]

It really was very poorly written. Here are some tips:

- Get rid of the sarcastic editorializing like "FunnyJunk's extortion ... er ... threat of defamation". It is immature and doesn't help the summary in anyway. Right or wrong, you should keep your opinions to yourself.

- Formatting is your friend. A wall of text does not make for an interesting read. As somebody pointed out you quoted too much of the linked article. People know how to read for themselves.

- Some of your wording is awkward. "with 8 days left he has only garnered 900% of his goal". It makes the 900% look like a typo for 90%. You should have said "Even with 8 days remaining he has already surpassed his goal by $xx".

- Less links. I think you could have summarized where things stand more concisely and then listed links that people can reference for more information.

Hope that helps.

Re:Guess I'm the 13 Year Old Girl

[ColdWetDog]

Cut him some slack - Internal Modem is just a bit slow and behind the times. He can't help it.

You could have just flashed the phone line on him to shut him up.

So, when funnyjunks users upload false stuff its..

[djsmiley]

Ok, just copyright infringment by the users, but not the site.

However,

When Oatmeal users possibly libel/troll/flame/attack (ahahah yeah right) others, that IS TheOatmeals fault?

Double standards much?

Who did what to whom?

[biodata]

I don't know who FunnyJunk or TheOatmeal are, and this article doesn't inspire me to find out.

Re:Who did what to whom?

[Anonymous Coward]

FunnyJunk is like YouTube - a reasonably popular site where users upload content and other users view that content while advertisements around it garner YouTube some money for the service provided.

Somewhat true. The difference appears to be that funnyjunk is mostly other people's stuff and there's less user generated stuff.

TheOatmeal is like the RIAA - somebody who believes their content, in this case comics, was 'stolen' and sent a DMCA take-down notice while lambasting that very same system because it doesn't foresee in preventing the same or future comics from being uploaded by users again and is hoping for stronger measures to be available in the future.

False. He never issued a DMCA take down, and in fact said it wasn't worth it. He mocked the site for their business model and said it was difficult to try and work with them. Mostly, he vented about the situation.

The RIAA engaged in legal action. The Oatmeal never did. After they complained, the people at Funnyjunk threatened to sue him.

Then when he made fun of that threat and sent the money instead to two charities, the lawyer representing funnyjunk decided to sue the Oatmeal AND THE TWO CHARITIES.

There's no RIAA/Oatmeal comparison to be made. The RIAA are a bunch of litigious jerks. Charles Carreon is a litigious jerk. The Oatmeal has only reacted to funnyjunk and Carreon, and has been damned reasonable about it.

dumb fuck

[Legion303]

"You can't encourage people to [...] associate me with incompetence with stupidity, and douchebaggery."

No, that was all you. You vomit-smeared, feckless pile of yak shit.

Please Help Me Through Demonstration

[eldavojohn]

The quoted text from Carreon is too long and you get the feeling someone fell asleep writing it. I re-read it a second time, imagining better formatting and it read better, IMO.

So help me out here, can you show me what you mean? I basically grabbed those quotes from the two news articles where he gave interviews. I'm not one to change the language, punctuation or grammar of what someone is quoted as saying from a reputable news source. Please, if you want to help me, tell me what I was supposed to do with the quote in this article:

“So someone takes one of my letters and takes it apart. That doesn’t mean you can just declare netwar, that doesn’t mean you can encourage people to hack my website, to brute force my WordPress installation so I have to change my password. You can’t encourage people to violate my trademark and violate my twitter name and associate me with incompetence with stupidity, and douchebaggery,” he says. “And if that’s where the world is going I will fight with every ounce of force in this 5’11 180 pound frame against it. I’ve got the energy, and I’ve got the time.”

That's how it appears in Forbes and it's the entire basis for his lawsuit so I thought it was important. I took his words and left Forbes' interjections because that's their work and also when you're writing a summary it should be concise so I remove the "he said" and "she wrote" pieces.

I'm willing to learn and get better at this. It's really hard when people just say "You're a 13 year old girl, you're illiterate and other people's quotes are too long." Any helpful suggestions are greatly appreciated -- especially when they're more constructive than name calling.

Re:Please Help Me Through Demonstration

[Internal Modem]

Where in the summary did you provide any context for the news? You are not writing about a feud between well-known characters such as Steve Ballmer and Sergey Brin. There is no reason we should know who these people are and care about this issue solely based on your summary. Aside from the players, the issue being argued isn't clear, and the summary devolves into a he said, she said ramble.

Re:Please Help Me Through Demonstration

[PCM2]

Please, if you want to help me, tell me what I was supposed to do with the quote in this article.

That's obvious. Don't use it. It's not a quote that's suitable for reprinting. Paraphrase, in as few words as possible. If /. readers don't believe you, they have the link and they can read for themselves.

As far as Forbes being "a reputable news source," you should have done your homework and noticed that Dave Thier is a freelance "contributor" to a Forbes blog, not to the magazine. Blogs are generally given less rigorous editorial treatment than news articles. You don't need to take everything written as gospel, punctuation, capitalization and all.

Also, skip all the "well it appears," "speaking of," "one more detail," etc. All of these phrases are totally superfluous. All they do is add words to the summary.

And kill the adverbs. Nobody cares whether you think the details are "juicy," just like nobody cares whether you think The Oatmeal's lawyer is "fully competent" (are you a lawyer yourself?). What's more, the overall sarcastic tone ("he only garnered 900 percent of his goal") doesn't help your case much, either.

Finally, it is incumbent upon you, as submitter, to explain what the story is about. Your summary starts with, "You may recall the story last week..." Sorry, no. I don't. What now? I'm afraid your summary leaves me totally in the dark as to who the players are and who did what to whom.

In short, this is meant to be a summary of a news story, not a post on your personal blog.

Re:Class action...

[mumblestheclown]

what about TPB? class action too, by all rightsholders? remember the millions of ad revenue that pirate bay has gotten for playing the same two step.

Re:Do what I do -

[Penguinisto]

Sue early, sue often. Sue pre-emptively.

...until you stumble into the Righthaven Effect

Re:Here it is: the final nail in Slashdot's coffin

[macraig]

FYI, vapid whining about limited title space aside, here's a competent example of how it's done (for the exact same news quoting the same sources).

And throughout the whole kingdom of the internet

[tehcyder]

Not a fuck was given.

Best lawyer since Orly Taitz.

[MAXOMENOS]

Between the two of them, they make a compelling case for there being too many law schools.

Tomorrow's news

[telekon]

You may recall from last week the news item concerning FunnyJunk's extortion ...

Charles Carreon has filed suit in California court against Slashdot, alleging that an article appearing on the site defamed him by characterizing his lawsuit agains The Oatmeal as "extortion."

When reached for comment, Carreon stated, "They like to hide behind this claim that their content is all user-generated, but that certainly doesn't obviate their responsibility to... oh, fuck."

Re:Nice Op-Ed.. err i mean Summary

[flimflammer]

Charles Carreon, is that you?

No he didn't...

[nweaver]

Read the Oatmeal's lawyer's response. Its basically:

"You have no leg to stand on. Go away. But if you don't, know that a: The internet doesn't like this, you have been warned and b: Uhh, you never met the criteria needed for a DMCA safe-harbor defense. You don't want to start something here"

Whole Different Level of Lawyering

[Koreantoast]

One would think that organizations as large as NWF and ACS have their own in-house legal teams as well as powerful law firms on retainer who, just because of the level of money they operate with, are used to battling much larger and more dangerous legal threats than these jokers. Carreon may have just picked a fight with entities possessing legal firepower and political capital far beyond what he's capable of battling against, especially for a bs case like this.

Re:Slashdot hypocricy, Chapter MXMLVICIMWHATEVER

[Lithdren]

I see this complaint a lot, both here and other places, about 'hypocricy' of the users of a site.

I always wonder what is moving through that brain of yours. Yes, some users would jump at the chance to bash the RIAA in your example above, while other users would jump to the defense of TheOatmeal in this example.

That's not hypocricy, thats two different sets of users voicing opinions on an open forum. Because of the type of people a site like this brings in, you'll have a lot of people who hate the RIAA. And you'll have a lot of people who support someone like TheOatmeal in this situation. It doesn't mean its the same people however.

Its all togeather possible you have two subcultures that dont cross often, though im sure they exist. Hypocricy is owned on a personal level, you cant blame the entire site for it unless you're a fool.

Thats all I wanted to say, back to tilting at windmills as you please.

That's still evidence of stupidity.

[Max Threshold]

Negative publicity is only good if it's only viewed as negative by people who are not your customers or potential customers. Negative publicity that is viewed as negative by just about everyone is, well, negative.

Re:Conflict of interest?

[dex22]

No, it's not.

Carreon is suing the charities benefitting from the fundraiser - a deeply unpopular move bound to bring negative publicity, and quite likely against the wishes of FunnyJunk. FunnyJunk may take the view that this action is deeply harmful to their reputation.

The problem with owning an attack dog is that it might bite somebody, when all you want is a deterrent.

You could also just, you know, tell the truth

[Sycraft-fu]

Rather than trying to make up false analogies to stir people up.

Funnyjunk is an aggregation site, comics in this case, that takes user submitted content and hosts it. TheOatmeal is an online comics site for original material made by Mathew Inman. They are provided for free, without geographic restriction, with no ads other than for his own products (he makes money via selling prints, shirts, and so on).

Inman discovered Funnyjunk had a bunch of his comics on it about a year ago and found that they weren't good about taking them down. He wrote a blog post (http://theoatmeal.com/blog/funnyjunk) about it, asking his viewers what they thought he ought to do, if he should send them a C&D, since they didn't seem to respond to takedowns and so on. He did not in fact go after them, just wrote a post talking about how they operated and musing as to what he should do.

Funny Junk noticed this, and threatened to sue him (http://theoatmeal.com/blog/funnyjunk_letter) to which he responded in a goofy style. That has all lead to this current situation.

So really, no need for false analogies, no need to try and stir people up, no need to try and pretend like there is some special "two sides" way of viewing it, you can just present the story.

SLAPP

[MarkvW]

And Mr. Funkyjunk had better hope that his state does not have a SLAPP statute!

Re:Time for FunnyJunk to sue its lawyer?

[a90Tj2P7]

Related but nonetheless separate issues. Conflict A was that FunnyJunk had Carreon inform The Oatmeal that they were threatening to sue. Conflict B is that Carreon is suing Inman because he believes The Oatmeal incited attacks against him personally (defamation, hacking) for his involvement in Conflict A.

To make the GP clearer, this development has nothing to do with FunnyJunk suing anyone.

California

[IBitOBear]

California has the -best- SLAPP statute. Funny thing is that CC chose the venue while he himselve is in Tuscon and Inman is in Washington State. He's actually pivoting his lawsuit not on Innman but on the business location of Indegogo and -their- terms of service in the click-through agreement that Innman must have agreed to.

(He also talks about "Does 1 through 5" and "Does 1 through 100" in the intro but only then mentions "Doe 1" in the text. Its all quite badly done even for being a bad idea.)

He's really not a good lawyer.