Continue reading »]]> As many of you know, I am still in the process of writing my special report titled “Beat the Getty Images Extortion Letter”. And although I am about 35% complete and NO ONE has seen it yet, I received a negative and critical comment to that announcement.

http://www.extortionletterinfo.com/pre-announcement-beat-the-getty-images-extortion-letter-special-report/

I have just read your letter responses to Getty (as per the link on your home page) and can’t believe how bad they are – they serve as excellent examples of how NOT to write a letter when confronted by a legal situation. If you don’t know how to write such a letter you should get a lawyer to do it for you. if you did consult your lawyer before sending these letters – sack him!

Based on how poorly you have handled your own case, you really shouldn’t be offering advice to anyone else and certainly shouldn’t be looking to charge for such a ‘service’.

I did not delete that comment. It simply gave me the opportunity to acknowledge those that would criticize the project, the price, or my efforts.

======

Jackhammer,

There is no question that the letter I wrote in 2008 had a lot of rough spots in it. In fact, if I were to do it again, I would have written a different letter. But it was what I knew at the time and I muddled my way through. Nevertheless, that is what I wrote with all its ugliness and imperfections. Even when my Special Report comes out, my ugly, imperfect letters will still be available for all to read. They can copy or emulate it (or from your comment) they should use it as an example of what NOT to write and what NOT to do.

When I write, I aim to be effective and get my objective accomplished. I am not trying to win literary awards or impress English majors. Either someone gets my intentions and what I am about or they don’t. Either it gets the desired result or it doesn’t. As you have alluded to, my letters don’t necessarily paint me in a positive light and they don’t make for elegant reading. But when I am in fighting mode, I am not trying to look good or impress people, I am looking to win the fight and get what I want at nearly all costs. I can be nasty, get personal, and vindictive and I want my opponents to know that.

Regarding lawyers, I value their knowledge and advice but I also don’t blindly follow their advice. I have learned from experience that just become someone is a lawyer doesn’t mean they have wisdom or can get the job done. I also happen to know that many lawyers come from a very narrow perspective and don’t always see the big picture.

There is no end of people who come through the ELI website and ELI Forums trying to find this magical pill or learn how to write a dazzling, legalistic letter to stun Getty Images (or other stock photo company) into submission. That almost never happens. For nearly 4 years now, I have tried to tell them there was no such animal. There are many other factors and forces at play. I have written and provided free posts, articles, and videos over the years to mostly a grateful audience. However, for some, that has not been enough. People continue to email and call me even when I have intentionally left out my personal email address and phone number.

You notice I have left your negative comment up. I do so because I stand by what I say and do. I don’t claim to be perfect but I know what I know and I experienced what I experienced. I have no special claim to be smarter or more qualified than anyone else on the subject except that I have lived this subject for nearly 4 years with literally over 100+ people who have communicated with me through the forum posts, emails, phone calls, and submissions. Further, I work with a team of ELI volunteers that have supported the ELI cause with their insights, research, and commentary. For better or for worse, I have gathered all this commentary, research, and information from the myriad of sources and incorporated them into the Special Report.

Let me go on record and say that 75%-80% of the information is freely available on the ELI Website and ELI Forums. However, that information is scattered across thousands of posts and many hours of videos. This Special Report is “essential information presented on a silver platter” plus extra goodies and the glue to connect it all together. Further, the Special Report is a way to encourage our readership to financially support the ELI cause. Make no mistake, my time and resources are valuable. If there were zero dollars that came in month after month, ELI would have to come to a stop. There would be no new articles, new website updates, and no ongoing forum. I would freeze and lock the whole thing down because I already donated hundreds of hours during many late nights since this thing began.

I never planned nor wanted to get into phone consultations or publish this Special Report. But the need appears to be there. It is for those who are interested in what I have to say, not for people like you who are not. I don’t ever do a hard sell, only soft sells. I make a resource available and let people decide for themselves. I am even telling people that the majority of what I write is already freely available IF you want to take the time to sort and find the information. I am charitable but there is a limit to how far I will go. If people want free, they need to go dig out the information themselves and NOT consult me. However, for those who want to save a ton of time and do want to hear what I have to say, that resource is there also.

Regarding you specifically, my information says your IP address is from the U.K. specifically London. This report is for primarily U.S. letter recipients, not anyone else outside the U.S. although I feel that some of my insights and my approach will be applicable to many outside the U.S. The reason I can say this is that I don’t fight exclusively on the legal front. Most people think this is entirely a legal fight when it is not.

And while I appreciate your comment and contribution to the discussion, you will have to forgive me if I don’t take your negative advice. As an independent publisher & blogger, I write and publish what I want. I decide what I will make available for free and what I won’t. I decide what business I will get into and what business I won’t. I decide which people I want to help and acknowledge and those I don’t. You or anyone else don’t get to tell me what I should or should not do. I get to decide for myself. The ELI readers and community members get to decide for themselves. I stand by my reputation, credibility, experiences, and accomplishments. Anyone who isn’t interested in contributing to the ELI cause or otherwise see no value in this Special Report are welcome to ignore it and move along. I am not twisting anyone’s arm to buy it or contribute to it.

My responses and rebuttals to Getty Images was not my first or last rodeo. I have been in business for 20+ years (both in corporate America and as a self-sustaining entrepreneur). I have dealt with all kinds of issues and scenarios both legal and not legal. I have successfully represented myself “pro se” on many occasions mostly as a plaintiff but also as a defendant. I have written several hundreds of letters, memos, and other written communications in that time to persuade or influence people, so I know something about how to get favorable results.

Bottom line, your opinion is your opinion. I allow others to form their own. And if they don’t like what I offer, I say go offer something better.

Continue reading »]]> Having my roots in I.T. and interests in media of all kinds (software, books, movies, music, etc.)  I am a big believer of cross-pollination of ideas. I take a concept that seems creative/innovative to me and then twist and adapt it into somewhere different.

In that spirit, I was inspired with an idea for retaliatory action against copyright trolls (or any other large company for that matter) if things got bad enough and someone was angry enough to do something about it.

In the recent Liuxia Wong vs. Hard Drive Productions case, Wong was not going to stand for the ongoing harassment and pressure to settle by Prenda Law that is representing HDP.  Prenda Law was trying to use the embarrassment factor to try to pressure Wong into settlement.  This older woman was not going to have any of that and she went public.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/80436912/Liuxia-Wong-vs-Hard-Drive-Productions-Complaint-Exhibits-A-B-C-D

And very creatively, she (with her lawyer Steven Yuen) filed a creative lawsuit against THEM in HER jurisdiction. Suddenly, the copyright troll now has to spend money to answer and defend this case.  Originally, it was probably a contingency case where Prenda Law got a percentage slice of any successful collection effort. However, with this lawsuit, Prenda Law now has to charge billable hours to Hard Drive Production and suddenly both the lawyers and the client are under a worldwide microscope watching intently where a ton of people are wishing for bad things to happen to both the opposing lawyer and the copyright troll client.  Karma gets nasty that way.

So the Wong case shows that a claim can be creatively flipped the other way especially when the other party keeps harassing you for a settlement. Something to think about.

On a different front, the other interesting twist in legally fighting a party that is much larger than you is the recent case in small claims court by a California woman, Heather Peters, against Honda for making false mileage claims about a Honda Civic.

http://bottomline.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/02/07/10342080-honda-civic-mileage-verdict-has-industry-sweating

She very astutely realized that any legal fight against Honda would be a tough one if she followed the traditional road with traditional legal advice. Instead of trying to get EVERYTHING she might be entitled to and fighting an incredibly difficult and expensive uphill battle, she decided to file her case in small claims court

The 46-year-old Peters, herself a former corporate attorney, chose to take her dispute to a small claims court in suburban Los Angeles. While Peters says she recognized she wouldn’t be able to collect all the money she insists she lost on added fuel costs and a lower trade-in value, she felt she’d have a better chance of getting a reasonable judgment in small claims.

Such courts are typically used for minor disputes – and they normally bar the use of attorneys, meaning an individual can sue a large corporation without facing a bank of legal experts – or running up bills that would far exceed the maximum claim, which ranges from $2,500 to $15,000 depending on the state.  In California, the cap is $10,000, and Peters was awarded $9,867 this month by Superior Court Commissioner Douglas Carnahan.

By going to small claims court, Honda couldn’t hire an army of lawyers to overwhelm the plaintiff. In small claims court, is quite customary for plaintiffs to prosecute or defend themselves. Further, small claims judges are accustomed to this and give every benefit of the doubt to non-lawyers.

Ultimately, Peters won her case. However, Honda is appealing the decision and they are sweating bullets over this.  Because if they lose the appeal, there will be a TON of small claims suits against Honda.

The bottom line is this is a very interesting concept to consider. Small claims cases don’t cost very much to file. But it can be expensive to defend for a large company with headquarters hundreds or thousands of miles away.

I recently helped a friend file a small claims lawsuit against a woman that just would not pay pay him what she owed for nearly a year and she simply ignored him.  But the lawsuit woke her up a few weeks ago and suddenly she is asking for a way to settle.

I know the potential power of small claims court. It can be a legal power equalizer.

Continue reading »]]> One “mystery” appears to have been solved to my satisfaction.  I believe Hawaiian Art Network LLC is solely owned by Glen Carner. I believe this because the Hawaii Business Registration reveals it to be a single-member LLC which essentially means a single-owner. How much business or revenue he does, I cannot say.

http://hbe.ehawaii.gov/documents/business.html?fileNumber=72605C5&view=officers

I believe HAN is a small, privately-held company with relatively few employees (less than 5 employees). Because of the relatively few employees, I believe Glen has created a “virtual” company using the Internet, joint ventures, partnering, vendors, and independent contractors. I know something of creating a virtual organization because I have done so myself.  It would explain HAN’s ongoing “dependency” on outside lawyers that have come in and out of ELI’s field of reporting.

And since we are on the subject of using outside lawyers, I believe the lawyers Glen hires are contingency lawyers that work approximately on a 60/40 basis. 60% goes to HAN, 40% goes to the lawyer. I make this estimation because I have dealt with other lawyers who do collections work for similar splits that vary from 70/30, 65/35, or 60/40 splits.

Regarding the recent HAN lawsuits, I am guessing that Glen had to front the court filing fees but Lawyer J. Street might split any settlement that comes from the lawsuit filing. Of course, the purpose is to try to “force” a settlement as a sustained fight in the courts would not make it worthwhile for a collections lawyer.  I base this scenario on my own experiences with law firms that did collections.  They would not front the court filing fees but would put their staff’s time to prepare the paperwork.

At the end of the day, as far as I am concerned, any actions or decisions HAN makes boils down to Glen Carner.  Up to now, we have referred to actions taken by HAN as one decided by a faceless entity. The reality is all corporate entities are managed by people. He is ultimately accountable and he knows a lot of the issues we discuss here on ELI. In fact, since he is “the man”, he reads nearly everything we post and monitors ELI as much as we monitor him and his cohorts.

As far as I am concerned, HAN being associated with the whole free wallpaper baiting issue is a disgrace to his actions as a business person.  It is my guess that Glen knows about it but I do not feel he is directly responsible for it. He just turns a blind eye to it. I believe the wallpaper seeding that we have seen rests on Vincent Tylor.

Continue reading »]]> AS many extortion letters as we have revealed, there are still many more to come from the stock photo industry. With every extortion letter that has been reported, all of them can be traced back to a client to PicScout.

Alaska Stock, Corbis, Getty Images, Masterfile, NordicStock, Stock Food, and Hawaiian Art Network all appear on the PicScout website in one way, shape, or form.

Conveniently, PicScout has a link to many of their more visible clients. I feel like we need to go ahead and make room for the future extortion letters.

http://www.picscout.com/client-list/

Continue reading »]]> ELI is a bit late to the party on the P2P Lawsuits & BitTorrent Lawsuits controversy. However, in light of the near-death of the Righthaven Lawsuits controversy, the P2P & BitTorrent Lawsuits controversy has attracted more of our attention.

It appears this is much larger than anything we have ever seen. According to U.S. News & World Report, since mid-2010 more than 220,000 people have been accused of illegally downloading movies. Ironically, that is about when Righthaven ramped up its operations.

The extortion letters being sent out are heavy-handed and  takes it a step further to include movie titles that are meant to embarrass the alleged infringer.

Our main fight has been against the stock photo companies with their heavy-handed ways. But we feel with our experience in fighting the stock photo companies, we have something to offer to assist those caught up in the P2P & BitTorrent scandal.

As always, we do not condone copyright infringement or digital piracy but what these content producers are doing is simply extortionistic and outrageous.

I would like to give credit to FightCopyrightTrolls.com and DieTrollsDie.com for having done so much work on that forefront. I consider them the leaders on this copyright troll niche and I am opening up the ELI community as a resource to serve the greater good. Likewise, the ELI Community would be well-served to learn the lessons coming from the P2P & BitTorrent Lawsuits Controversy.

Continue reading »]]> It appears that the folks at Steele-Hansmeier have become Prenda Law. I think how interesting it is that the new law firm avoids listing any of the lawyer’s names. Very rare do you see a law firm that do not proudly list their roster of lawyers.  Maybe because it is the line of sleazy work they do.

In any case, there are a number of lawsuits being listed by the Prenda Law website.

http://wefightpiracy.com/litigation.php

However, we have assembled our own lawsuit document collection on the ELI Document Library on Scribd.

http://www.scribd.com/my_document_collections/3473333

It appears they are trying to embarrass the plaintiffs. In that regard, we are NOT going to list the defendants but focus more on Prenda Law and their exploits.

Continue reading »]]> We have traditionally not gone outside the realm of stock photo extortion letters with the except of the newspaper-oriented Righthaven lawsuits. But in recent months, there have been more discussions about how adult video companies are using extortion letter techniques and going after peer-to-peer users and alleging digital piracy of adult videos.

MSBNC has picked up the story of the ongoing battle by adult video copyright trolls against peer-to-peer network users.

http://technolog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/07/20/7113220-porn-piracy-wars-get-personal

http://openchannel.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/02/03/10312840-internet-piracy-suit-asks-can-you-even-copyright-porn

These stories has revealed copies of the Steele-Hansmeier Settlement Demand Letter, similar in many respects to those used in the stock photo industry. Two examples can be found here:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/80437326/Steele-Hansmeier-Settlement-Demand-Letter-First-Time-Videos

http://www.scribd.com/doc/80436331/Steele-Hansmeier-Settlement-Demand-Letter-Wong-case

What is interesting is that it includes settlement agreement attachment not normally done by the stock photo industry.

As always, our friends and allies at the Electronic Frontier Foundation is at the forefront fighting this.

We would also like to do a shout-out to our brother-in-arms  http://fightcopyrighttrolls.com for their ongoing efforts on this front.

Continue reading »]]> An ELI Forum reader has graciously submitted their copy of the NordicPhotos Settlement Demand Letter for commentary and analysis.

It’s interesting in that this foreign company is directly contacting a U.S. citizen.

The NordicPhotos FAQ is strangely similar tot he Getty Images FAQ. It looks like NordiPhotos plagiarized Getty Images approach.

You can follow this thread of discussion on the ELI Forums.

Continue reading »]]> Because of my personal distaste and dismay of the Stock Photo industry which started with the Getty Images Extortion Demand Letter, I have taken steps to personally boycott the Stock Photo Industry and advocate not using stock photos altogether.  The stock photo industry seems to be rapidly consolidating into two companies:  Getty Images and Corbis, as they buy their way into near-monopoly status with them setting outrageous rules, policy, and pricing.

This article will not give you all the information necessary to entirely eliminate the need for stock photos in every situation.  However, this article will give you some ideas and strategies to wean yourself and perhaps altogether eliminate your need for stock photos.  I firmly believe that if you put your intentions behind the idea, you can make huge strides towards eliminating the need for stock photos altogether.

The very first thing you need to think about is whatever media project you are working on is, do you truly need a photo at all?  Chances are that you are working on a website, book, magazine, brochure, news story, banner, or some other media project.  Alternatives to photos might be diagrams, cartoons, illustrations, and drawings that you or a graphic artist you hire can create.  Can you take your own photo to fit the need?

If you hire a graphic artist to create your own artwork, do not hire anyone in China or India where there is very little respect for intellectual property.  They may be inexpensive but you can never be assured that their work is original.  There is little recourse for their bad behavior because they are so far away.  I recommend hiring graphic artists from the U.S. because as a professional community, they have a greater respect for intellectual property than their Chinese or Indian counterparts.  They will think twice before using pirated material.

I would avoid hiring any company that outsources their work to graphic artist worker bees.  In other words, I always want to deal and negotiate with a graphic artist professional themselves, not some agent or agency that farms out graphics art work.

If you do want to use and take your own photos, I highly recommend investing in a good digital camera so that you can begin taking your own photos.  I also recommend getting to know amateur hobbyist photographers who have access to good cameras and enjoy taking photos.  Very often, amateur photographers with good cameras are trying to find a way to justify the costs of their hobby.  By hiring them inexpensively, you can get some great looking photos but also help the amateur photographer pay for his hobby.  Make sure they understand that you are they are working for hire and that you will have full ownership and rights to the photos.

Professional photographers can be expensive depending on what you want and who you use.  For these folks, I recommend bartering with them for exchange of services if you have talents in your profession.  I find many professional photographers finicky.  They will sometimes not give you full ownership or rights of the photo even though you paid them to take a photo.  They are quite protective and their thinking is aligned to many in the stock photo industry.  Admittedly, this is a broad generalization and based only on my experience.  I am simply not optimistic that you will get good value from a professional photographer but it certainly does not hurt to try and negotiate with them.

Another source of quality photos is product photos from product manufacturers.  Often, they are happy to have their products publicized and placed in a positive light and will give you free rights to use their photos.  Product companies mostly police and control their photos because they don’t want their photos used in a manner they did not intend or in a way that paints their company or products in a negative light.  Many will grant you free usage of their photos if you approach them the right way.  However, large companies can be a challenge sometimes because of their size.  They may be so large that they may not even get back to you.  Again, it never hurts to try.  Product companies are in the business selling more of their products, not sue people who use their product photos.

If you choose to take your own photos, invest in a digital camera that can take a resolution of 4 megapixel images or higher.  You want to take high-resolution photos as your master copy.  You can then “downsize”, crop, and enhance the photos for your websites or other uses.  I recommend buying an easy-to-use photo editor such as Adobe Photoshop Elements 7 or Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 that allows you to crop and resize photos easily.  The photo editor can greatly enhance the quality of the master photos you take.  You can also enhance colors and adjust lighting with the software.  Special effects such as blurring, stretching, pixelating, framing, adding captions, etc. are included with photo editing software.

I truly believe that with the increasing power and technical capabilities of digital cameras, cell phone cameras, and camcorders, the value of stock photos and stock photo companies will eventually decline.  It is going to be a losing business to be in.  This whole notion of extorting your way to profitability is distasteful and eventually will fall by the wayside much like what has occurred in the music recording industry.  One only has to look to RIAA for that lesson.

Along the “do-it-yourself” philosophy, you should have the mindset that you will fit images or photos you create to your media project, not let your media projects deciding the specific images you need.  Stock photo companies are trying to brainwash you the idea that THEY have the perfect photo for your particular needs.  If you are creative, imaginative, and resourceful enough, you will almost always find an alternative or work-around solution that does not require the use of stock photos.

If you want to show the stock photo industry you don’t need them, the best way is to simply generate more of your own photos to devalue theirs and then use your own.  I have published two books recently and have been able to successfully avoid using stock photos of any kind.  I used my own photos as well as authorized product photos.  I created my own artwork.  If more publishers, graphic artists, and graphic designers started doing this, I truly believe the stock photo industry could be brought down to their financial knees very quickly.

Many years ago, people said that we would run out of .com domains available because all the good ones were taken.  It is true it has become more challenging to find a good .com domain name.  However, I have made it my policy to not deal with any domain speculators or domain squatters.  I won’t be extorted into paying thousands of dollars for an available domain I can register for less than $10.  And because I have set that restriction and policy for myself, I have always been able to find many suitable .com domain names for my various websites.

It is the same principle here.  Think abundantly.  Think creatively.  Tap into your imagination.  There are many ways to implement a visual concept besides a specific photo you might have in mind.  There are many ways to implement a concept visually. Do not let the stock photo companies brainwash you into thinking you have to use their particular photos because there are no other ways of finding an image for your particular website, logo, banner, sign, book, magazine, or other product.

The best kept secret that the stock photo industry hates are government websites and their photo collections.  Great public domain photos can be found from U.S. government agency websites.  “The people” own the photos, not any one individual or organization.  USA.gov is a government-operated website that was launched to help U.S. citizens have better access to various government agencies and resources.  Specifically, USA.gov has a page called U.S. Government Photos and Images which contains links to government agency websites that have public domain images.  The diversity of images available is quite impressive.   An off-shoot of that page is the State Photo & Multimedia Galleries which links to public domain images at the State level.

Some of the more notable ones I like and found impressive are listed below:

• NASA Images has space-related photos.
• Our Earth as Art has photos relating to the earth, weather, oceans, and nature.
• U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service’s National Digital Library has photos relating to animals, plants, nature, and wildlife.
• NOAA Photo Library has several collections of photos relating to nature, weather, oceans, and wildlife.
• U.S. Department of Defense DefenseLINK has photos relating to the military, war, politics, and the President.
• Library of Congress Geography & Map Reading Room has images relating to historical and current maps.
• National Archives America’s Historical Documents has images relating to history, politics, and historical events.
• National Park Service Digital Image Archives has images relating to nature, history, and national parks around the U.S.

Are you impressed with these websites?  I was.  It is all free and much of it is available in high-resolution.  However, you should realize that not all images from government websites are public domain.  You will need to seek out the image usage rights notices on each website.  As I said USA.gov is a great starting point to a wealth of high-quality public domain photos.

If there are any other great public domain or government photo sites, please let me know and I will add them.  If you have any additional tips to stop using stock photos and boycott the stock photo industry, send them to me and I will incorporate them into this article.

Continue reading »]]> Hawaiian Art Network continues to issue settlement demand letters (aka extortion letters) through its network of attorneys and lawyers. Because ELI readers have submitted  many “extortion letters” (relating to Hawaiian Art Network) to us in the last year, we are going to update this page of lawyers and attorneys that work with them as it is reported to us.

Lawyers with settlement demand letters seen thus far:

• Brandon S. Sand
• Peter Holt of Holt Law Firm
• Julie Stewart of Blackline Art & Entertainment Law
• Gil Zvulony of Zvulony & Co.
• Christian P. Martinen by CPM Creative
• Russell Aldrich of Aldrich Law Firm

Litigation Only (no settlement demand letters)

• J. Stephen Street (Litigation Only)