Messages

196

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: ELI Factor - Oscar, Robert & Matthew Threesome!

« on: August 31, 2012, 11:27:22 AM »

Now I see where a bit more than two thirds of all the ELI testosterone comes from.

Can't wait for this episode!

197

Legal Controversies Forum / Re: The Power of the Internet when used correctly!

« on: August 18, 2012, 05:44:39 PM »

Getty Images or its "outside counsel," copyright troll, and collections agent lawyer Timothy B. McCormack or his paralegal Ashanti A. Taylor will at some point send one of their ugly letters to a victim who'll have a story like this one.

And on that day the national media will blast the story everywhere and perhaps put a dent in the success of the payment extraction scheme from which these greedy trolls profit so hugely.

I physically shudder when I think of the pain these letters have caused so many people over the years. And, frankly, I wouldn't be at all surprised if a few of them had not been responsible for heart attacks or strokes or disabling stress from worry.

National attention focused on these trolls will one day educate many more people to stand up and refuse to pay the vultures who demand money without providing a shred of proof of their right to make such a demand.

And on that day, I'm confident ELI and its wealth of information will be mentioned.

198

Legal Controversies Forum / Re: Registering blog posts: Individual? Collective? What?

« on: August 17, 2012, 10:38:00 AM »

My post was not meant to be mean-spirited or upsetting, and I'm very sorry that it upset you the way it did, Lucia. My apologies.

199

Legal Controversies Forum / Re: INteresting Friday nugget

« on: August 17, 2012, 10:34:52 AM »

“The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of a copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by fines and federal imprisonment.”

I wonder if copyright troll and collection agent Timothy B. McCormack will now have his paralegal Ashanti A. Taylor add a couple of sentences to their form letters that they'll turn this matter over to the F  B  I  (spoken in a slow Hannibal Lecter cadence) if individuals don't cough up their exorbitant extraction payment?

200

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Don't Pay Getty - Thank you ELI

« on: August 16, 2012, 04:48:41 PM »

Peeved, now you have me thinking of something Mark Twain wrote in Letter X of his controversial "Letters from the Earth":

Some Midianite must have repeated Onan's act, and brought that dire disaster upon his nation. If that was not the indelicacy that outraged the feelings of the Deity, then I know what it was: some Midianite had been pissing against the wall. I am sure of it, for that was an impropriety which the Source of all Etiquette never could stand. A person could piss against a tree, he could piss on his mother, he could piss on his own breeches, and get off, but he must not piss against the wall -- that would be going quite too far. The origin of the divine prejudice against this humble crime is not stated; but we know that the prejudice was very strong -- so strong that nothing but a wholesale massacre of the people inhabiting the region where the wall was defiled could satisfy the Deity.

Take the case of Jeroboam. "I will cut off from Jeroboam him that pisseth against the wall." It was done. And not only was the man that did it cut off, but everybody else.

The same with the house of Baasha: everybody was exterminated, kinsfolks, friends, and all, leaving "not one that pisseth against a wall."

In the case of Jeroboam you have a striking instance of the Deity's custom of not limiting his punishments to the guilty; the innocent are included. Even the "remnant" of that unhappy house was removed, even "as a man taketh away dung, till it be all gone." That includes the women, the young maids, and the little girls. All innocent, for they couldn't piss against a wall. Nobody of that sex can. None but members of the other sex can achieve that feat.

A curious prejudice. And it still exists. Protestant parents still keep the Bible handy in the house, so that the children can study it, and one of the first things the little boys and girls learn is to be righteous and holy and not piss against the wall. They study those passages more than they study any others, except those which incite to masturbation. Those they hunt out and study in private. No Protestant child exists who does not masturbate. That art is the earliest accomplishment his religion confers upon him. Also the earliest her religion confers upon her.

Being the thoughtful sort in my younger chauvinist swine daze, I extrapolated a corollary from Twain's pissing observations before meeting my old lady blushing bride of 40+ years: That members of the fairer sex would also find it hard to piss into the wind.

201

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Don't Pay Getty - Thank you ELI

« on: August 16, 2012, 03:22:28 PM »

Robert, keep those rants coming!

I too am surprised at the amount of passion I still have for getting the word out about Getty Images' copyright trolls and its collection agents like intellectual property lawyer Timothy B. McCormack of Seattle and his copyright trolling paralegal Ashanti A. Taylor.

202

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Getty Images Sold!

« on: August 16, 2012, 10:00:53 AM »

The Carlyle Group has a plan to make money with these images, have no doubt of that.

Indeed, my sources tell me they're going to license the one million lamest images to the military who will then subcontract back to one of the Carlyle Group's subsidiaries the job of reproducing ten thousand copies of each of those million images on heavy stock paper.

A second Carlyle Group company will then airlift the images to our bases around the Middle East where a third Carlyle Group contractor will distribute the "GI 'Roids" (as they've been named by a Carlyle Group marketing firm) to our troops who will then throw them like Ninja Stars at terrorists and other evil doers who hate freedom.

Any terrorist who duplicates the image on the Internet on a website will then be contacted by the license compliance department for the usual round of letters... BUT in addition to that, the new Carlyle Group owned Getty Images will also sell the names of those infringing on the GI 'Roids to the CIA, NSA, and other agencies and independent contractors.

Lose money on this deal... no way in hell. Not the Carlyle Group.

203

Legal Controversies Forum / Re: Registering blog posts: Individual? Collective? What?

« on: August 16, 2012, 09:49:04 AM »

Lucia, wouldn't it be easier (and perhaps smarter) and certainly less time-consuming to simply monetize in some way each blog post you make instead of getting into what could become a pissing contest with a fellow programmer, where you both end up spending all kinds of time trying to outwit the other? 

In just about every blog post I put up, I have a link to something that helps me pay the bills around here as well as a link to an article or another blog post on one of my other sites. For me, much of my time is spent writing to generate traffic and name recognition.

You're a lot smarter than I am, so I only throw this out as a suggestion to maybe help you save some time and energy trying to defeat a trend of taking other peoples' work without permission, a trend that I don't see disappearing... and in a way, that's good, because that's kind of the idea the Internet was founded on anyway... free information for everyone.

I think one of the key principles for earning a living on the internet is to never spend a minute worrying about copyright and stealing but instead to figure out how to embed my work with clever stuff so that innocent and well as intentional infringers and downright thieves end up helping me expand my brand, so to speak.

204

Getty Images Letter Forum / Getty Images Sold!

« on: August 15, 2012, 09:11:38 AM »

Well, our pals at Getty Images are now owned by the Carlyle Group.

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/1343682c-e6d2-11e1-965b-00144feab49a.html#axzz23cV3U6Dy

205

Legal Controversies Forum / Re: Kirstie Alley Sued Over Weight-Loss Supplement

« on: August 12, 2012, 09:35:24 AM »

Robert, I couldn't even get a calf through the elastic body band of my petite little woman's undies, much less one of my massive man thighs!

And to return this thread to a serious note, I wonder if Jessica Simpson is in for a legal battle given that she's apparently earning approximately $4,000,000 from Weight Watchers to lose the 70+ pounds she put on while pregnant.

Is a law suit in the works if she fails to lose at the contracted rate?

Finally, now that my friend Robert has called me a "suck up" and questioned my male chauvinist pig creds, I point any fellow swine reading this to view Jessica Simpson's body evolution at

http://www.usmagazine.com/celebrity-body/pictures/jessica-simpsons-body-evolution-201297/23569

I admit to particular fondness over Image No. 4. Or, as some were said to have said during the Spanish Inquisition: "What a rack!"

206

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Masterfile's Copyright Registration Method Held Invalid by California Court

« on: August 12, 2012, 09:16:55 AM »

Those documents made wonderful reading this Sunday morning. Thanks for posting them.

207

Legal Controversies Forum / Re: Kirstie Alley Sued Over Weight-Loss Supplement

« on: August 11, 2012, 04:28:02 PM »

Since I've been told by my old lady blushing bride of 40+ years to spend more time bringing out my inner woman and less time being a chauvinistic swine, I'm not going to enter into this discussion other than to say I support whatever Peeved has to say in this thread!

208

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: An Experiment Against Getty

« on: August 10, 2012, 12:16:31 PM »

Anyone have an idea on how many similar complaints it takes to form a "trend" for the ATG to investigate?

The cynic in me says it will take 68,327 complaints before any Attorney General begins to think about taking any action against a company as big and as rich as Getty Images.

209

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Haters

« on: August 10, 2012, 12:14:08 PM »

The people who write such comments have obviously never been nailed with a Getty Images' extortion letter for $980 for a thumbnail they found on a public domain site.  You can be sure they'd be singing a different tune if they were on the receiving end of such a letter.

Some of these photographers have an unrealistic and highly inflated sense of what a lot of these lame images are actually worth.

Indeed, with more than 40,000,000,000 images available on the Internet in 2008, it's hard for me to believe an innocent infringement of a fuzzy thumbnail on a mom and pop website is even worth a cease and desist order, much less an extortion letter trying to extract close to a thousand dollars.

For what it's worth, I'm a professional writer and my stuff is all over the Internet, both the things I've written and posted on my website for free as well as PDFs I sell to pay the bills around here. When I started on the Internet many years ago, I recognized even then that my stuff would be passed around, and I loved that because it was free publicity and would help me build my brand. If someone likes one of my paid products and downloads it from a Torrent site, more power to them. If they like it, and if they have some kind of a feeling for reciprocity they'll eventually end up buying something of mine. If they don't, no harm done because I wouldn't have made that sale anyway.

Those who defend extortion letters are those who don't "get" the Internet.

Of course, it goes without saying that willful infringement of copyright to make money off the work of someone else is wrong.

Moral issues aside, however, the evolution of copyright law has a long way to go before the laws meet the reality of the Internet and the ease of sharing everything digital.

210

Getty Images Letter Forum / Re: Another Victim

« on: August 09, 2012, 03:17:35 PM »

In my case, I'm about to celebrate my one year anniversary with these trolls. After telling Getty, "No proof, no money," Getty "escalated" to copyright troll Timothy B. McCormack.

After telling McCormack and his copyright troll paralegal Ashanti A. Taylor, "No proof, no money," Ashanti wrote back that they would recommend litigation to Getty Images.

At this point, I'm once again in limbo, waiting for the next round of bullshit.

It doesn't go on forever, but Oscar says he's seen from half a dozen to a dozen letters from Getty and its assorted compadres before the end is reached.

The statute of limitations runs out after three years, so be prepared for periodic threats and warnings from these clowns for that length of time.

At this point, I will repeat my "No proof, no money" mantra to any new Getty collection types who contact me by postal mail. I do not do email or phone calls with these folks.

The stress with all this wears off pretty quickly once you realize it's nothing but a manipulative game these people are playing to extract exorbitant payments from honest and easily intimidated people.

Whereas I used to shit my pants when the first few letters arrived, I don't even hiccup when a new letter comes in -- sweetly timed, it seems, to arrive just when I'm starting to think, "Ah, the bastards have given up."