The National Debate has attained legal counsel and responded to the New York Times' deep-pocket bullying-by-lawyer regarding a recent satire piece. They have also published their legal response to the Times (it's a PDF, you'll need a reader if you want to view it).
Robert Cox, The National Debate's publisher, has also informed those web sites which have mirrored the satire piece that the Times may be sending them threatening letters similar to the one Cox himself received.
I've worked in publishing long enough, as it happens, to know when someone's full of crap. And the New York Times, in this case, is pretty clearly full of crap. Stuffed to the gills with crap, with extra crap pouring out of their ears and nostrils. I wouldn't even bother retaining legal counsel unless the extraordinarily unlikely were to happen and I was served with papers. Why? Because the Times' case is so fatuous on its face it's likely to be laughed out of court, and their ability to prove monetary damages is beyond laughable and approaches the genuinely surreal.
As such, I would probably be much less cordial than Mr. Cox, and would likely draft a response reading more like the following:
To: New York Times' Hired Thug ShystersBut then, I do have a bit of a barbarian streak in me, and unfortunately I'm nowhere near as clever as Groucho Marx was. (I'd kill to be a quarter as clever as that, really.)
From: Dean Esmay, Publisher, Dean's World
Re: Satire That Hurt Your Clients' FeelingsHi Sweeties!
Got your note on that satire piece that pokes fun at your client. It's satire, boys. Try heading back to law school and asking one of the professors at whatever diploma mill you crawled out of about the concept.
No hard feelings, but it ain't coming down. Maybe if you'd asked nice we could have worked something out so everyone would be happy, but since you clearly have the manners of the trolls who pestered Billy Goat Gruff, you've gone and made me feel kind of ornery.
So do me a favor, boys: kindly ask your client to pucker up and kiss my pimply white butt.
Love and Squishy Good Feelings,
Your pal Dean (XOXOXOXOX)
By the way, more mirrors of the satire piece that The New York Times is afraid you will see have sprung up around the internet, more every day.
Man. You gotta hate when that happens!
God bless Groucho Marx.
P.S. Al Franken is calling his new show (if you can believe it), "The O'Franken Factor." I'm just saying.
The "Satire" lable standard has been pushed to new lows by Franken. I hardly see where the satire of the NYT even comes close to the libel that Franken has written.
I think I'll name my first child "Groucho." Especially if it's a girl.
To mock the New York Times, or any other similar news gathering and news dissemination organization, is fair game.
But to copy their logo, advertisements and other materials right off their online or print pages is indeed a violation of their copyright. If Robert Cox wants to try this, good luck to him. My guess is that he may need if they pull him ass-first into a court of law.
My advice to you is avoid trying the same stunt.same thing. Or you may well find yourself with an entirely new, unwelcome, time-consuming and expensive set of personal troubles.
I imagine it goes against the grain of the rebel buried not too deep inside you to back away from this kind of fight. But if you push the envelope in copyright issues, the holder of the copyright gets you every time. Especially if they are a large corporation with sufficient budget to afford the high-ticket corporation lawyers that you could not even begin to match with mere online rhetoric.
Remember that the golden rule is that he who has the gold rules. That doesn't sound very heroic. But it largely describes power relationships in the world in which you live and work.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
Wouldn't it be "obtained" legal counsel?
Arnold, I'd suggest you read the legal reply.
a. the times has a very weak case to begin with.
b. from a public relations standpoint, this is the *worst* thing the times could do.
c. If they lose - when they lose - the times will lose even more of what little reputation they had.
Dave,
What makes you think Franken's doing satire?
God bless Groucho Marks.
Bryan,
Let me tell you about a local case from Madison WI some 20 years ago.
There was this sort of upscale restaurant an old factory building on east Washington Av in Madison called the "Washington Post". That's right. Even used the same gothic letters used by their ostensible namesake, the Washington Post.
Well, they went on serving their upscale sandwiches, salads and other food items until one day when they received a letter from the Washington Post company's legal staff, advising them they must immediately drop use of their name or face legal action.
So then and their they had to change it. Or at least, they changed one letter, and renamed it the "Washington Host". After that, for whatever reason, things went steadily downhill for the restaurant. Chances are they were spending too much time corresponding with attorneys located a thousand miles away, and had less time to devote to their chili, burgers and fries.
The point is this. If you clearly violate someone else's copyright, you have no defense whatsoever except either to give up and desist, or fight it out and lose in court, sometimes after great expense. Because nobody wins who pushes their luck in court just to prove a point. Public opinion? Good will? All this counts for nothing after people forget about the brief story they read about it in a local newspaper. After a while, nobody gives a damn.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
The courts have made it clear, repeatedly, that almost anything is fair game in satire. Including using someone's copyrighted and trademarked images.
You also have to be able to prove damages from something like this before you can get anywhere with it.
You also have to be suing someone who's got something--i.e. suing an empty pocket is a quixotic gesture at best.
A restaurant's a business and if a business is trying to make a profit by identifying itself with a completely separate business entity, it's probably in the wrong and will probably lose its fight.
Cox won't lose this fight. I've been in the publishing game long enough, and will stand with Cox. The Times is in the wrong, and what's more, they know they're in the wrong.
Unfortunately, lawyers today aren't intimidated as easily as they were in the forties.
Good for you, Dean!
The big newspapers like "The New York Times" and "The Wall Street Journal" are all for the First Amendment -- for the big newspapers like "The New York Times" and "The Wall Street Journal".
Ah, as it turns out, Arnold & maor, the debate is now moot: the New York Times has backed down, acknowledged that they had no case and withdrawn their complaint.
I personally prefer the letter to his lawyers that Groucho dictates in Animal Crackers:
It gets funnier, and when Zeppo reads back the beginning as "To Messrs. Hungadunga, Hungadunga and McCormick" Groucho upbraids him for leaving out a Hungadunga. "And the most important one, too!"
I firmly believe that most international treaties can be understood properly as variations on the contract scene: "The party of the first part shall be known...."