Thread: ALIPAC Responds to Ambush Lawsuit Filed by RightHaven

Just another reason to hate Harry Reid and the left wing liberal newspapers. Going to be funny seeing him defeated and a nobody here soon. Maybe him and Nazi Pelosi can hand out gift baskets at the border when they are both unemployed.

Thursday, September 2, 2010
Righthaven: A Blitzkrieg War on Internet Speech
What do you call a thousand lawyers chained together at the bottom of the ocean? A good start.

But let's begin with just three lawyers:
Barak Obama, Michelle Obama and Steve Gibson.

All three worked for Chicago Law firm Sidley Austin LLP, where Gibson and Michelle Obama specialized in "intellectual property" law for the firm. You know..... copyright law and such.

Now, in a totally coincidental move, Steve Gibson, via his Righthaven firm, has launched a salvo of legal suits demanding a payoff of $75,000 from internet websites, for alleged copyright law infringements incurred when the sites posted extracts from major media news articles.

The tactic is designed to severely damage internet free speech; and to bolster the declining fortunes of major media --while also raking in the RICO dollars for Mr. Gibson. When I say 'RICO,' I mean: as in racket.

The clever part that only a lawyer could have thought up, is that Gibson's firm first identifies news articles which have been widely reprinted in part or in full on internet sites. Gibson then buys the copyright for these news articles from a major media client. Finally, as new owner of the copyright for these articles, Gibson launches lawsuits against bloggers and websites.

The firm does not first issue any "cease and desist" notice warning bloggers that they are infringing copyright. No, step one is straight to court --for maximum intimidation and a sure shakedown.

Gibson's opening tranche of 107 lawsuits to date, features articles first published by the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

Now it gets chilling:

The Review-Journal’s publisher, Stephens Media in Las Vegas, runs over 70 other newspapers in nine states, and Gibson says he already has an agreement to expand his practice to cover those properties. (Stephens Media declined comment, and referred inquiries to Gibson.)

Newspaper Chain’s New Business Plan: Copyright Suits
from Wired, by David Kravets - July 22, 2010


So if Gibson gets away with this first nibble at internet websites, he can scale up to target many more websites based on articles from 70 further Stephens Media online newspapers. Theoretically this might inflate the number of websites targeted by suits to around 7,000.

Doubtless other corporate media conglomerates are waiting in the wings to contract with Gibson. All this could rival in scope the infamous RIAA music copyright issue, with likely tens of thousands of lawsuits coming down the legal pipe and striking websites of whom most would lack the financial resources to fight.

Already, the websites targeted in the first wave are settling the lawsuits, with reported payments to Gibson's firm averaging around $2,500. It's a well chosen settlement amount by Gibson. Small enough to encourage websites to settle -large enough to act as a intimidating threat.

If all this goes to plan, many bloggers and website owners will not be exercising their free speech online. They will be too busy scrambling to trawl back through their archives and delete major media articles which might make them a target. If they don't simply decommission their blogs and websites entirely, that is.

The music industry challenge to downloader's was innocuous in it's effect, by comparison to this gambit. The difference is that many of the news articles on blogs and sites are about political issues as blogger's debate the content of online political news topics. So this is likely to deeply affect the kind of open debate we have taken for granted.

Until now.

This is a war on free speech. A political war, led by a member of the Chicago legal mob who has close connections to the Obama's.

If you think it's only about money and not about politics you need to factor that the second ever Gibson's lawsuit was against the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws. You might know them better by the acronym NORML.

The fourth Gibson target was Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, Inc.. Other political targets of this internet witch hunt include:

Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada
Independent Political Report
Free Republic
Americans For Democratic Action
Americans For Immigration Reform
Democratic Underground
American Political Action Committee
Americans for Legal Immigration PAC
Americans Against Food Taxes
Michael A. Nystrom of DailyPaul.com


These are the opening salvos in a war on internet free speech.

One effective defensive measure by the internet blogging community would be to blacklist media outlets who join as clients with Gibson and his Righthaven firm. Another would be to ensure reputational damage to corporate media which participate. Another would be so-called 'Google Bombing' to associate such media outlets with derogatory search terms like "hates internet free speech."

Whatever it takes, must be done --and quickly. This is a blitzkrieg war, and before you know it this devious plot will have deeply damaged the cause of free speech online.

By the way, you can republish some, any or all of this article.

I won't be suing you.

http://fintandunne.blogspot.com/2010/09 ... ernet.html

A little back door censorship and free speech gag to go
with your back door amnesty?
Is Becks new site a cut paste news stories or does the staff there write them? Just curious on the timing of his theblaze.com.
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/hawking ... -creation/
I hope they are baiting these Marxist law suit crazy scum.
What no law suit from Holder or the ACLU? "Yet".

Righthaven sues Sharron Angle

LAS VEGAS (AP) - A company has sued Republican U.S. Senate candidate Sharron Angle, claiming she reprinted two Las Vegas Review-Journal articles on her campaign website without permission.

http://www.kolotv.com/home/headlines/102229084.html

The Angle story just made it to Fox News, which is why I signed on tonight:

Nevada GOP Candidate Faces Copyright Lawsuit

Published September 04, 2010
Associated Press


LAS VEGAS -- A company has sued Republican U.S. Senate candidate Sharron Angle, claiming she reprinted two Las Vegas Review-Journal articles on her campaign website without permission.

Las Vegas-based Righthaven is seeking unspecified damages in its complaint filed Friday in U.S. District Court in Las Vegas.

The suit alleges Angle neither sought nor received permission to display a Review-Journal article and editorial on her website this summer.

An Angle spokesman says he would not comment until the campaign's lawyers have reviewed the suit.

Righthaven tracks Internet traffic for copyright infringements of Review-Journal stories. It then buys the copyright for a story from the newspaper's owner, Stephens Media LLC, and sues the alleged infringer.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/09 ... latestnews
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It seems that there should be some kind of clause (or, if such a clause does not currently exist, perhaps a precedent should be sought), where, if a story is already copied to another site, prior to a sale of the rights, then the new copyright owner, especially if they apparently and obviously bought rights to it specifically for monetary gain through intimidation (RICO act coverage eligibility?), and/or for the sole and express purpose of censorship, by whatever means, should have to forfeit any claim(s) for any and all supposed damages related to the old posting made before said ownership changed, and should only have the right to have it removed from the unauthorized site, within a reasonable amount of time. It should also then be required that the original disputed article must remain available, in its original and unaltered entirety, and with completely unhindered public access, for as long as the copyright is valid. Let them clog up Their servers and/or other archives, keeping all of that stuff available for a minimum of 26 or 52 years, long after much of it has slid down into irrelevancy. Hey. You wanta play rough? Okay. We’ll do that.

Otherwise, since websites, such as Alipac, will be forced to only print part of the article, or only a link to it, then the relevant “evidenceâ€

which of our rights under the constitution,(with this Administration), are still going to be left? We as a country,need to stand up now,before we have no rights and our Constitution lies in tatters.Our founding fathers and anyone who fought for it, are rolling in their graves. Change.... Believe it!

If I am going to buy a car I will go to automobile row. Most large cities have one - an area populated by many auto dealerships. This gives me the opportunity to condense my search as much as possible. Likewise with the news - I am most likely to come to a site like ALIPAC to get an overview of important news - NOT TO A NEWSPAPER OR RADIO SITE. If I like a particular journalist or a particular article - then I will visit the source site in the future and possibly even make them part of my regular search. Another way of getting my attention and my loyalty is to have an article about a subject nobody else is touching or has touched yet - breaking news - or an opinion piece about a recent event or chain of events that I think merits attention. In that case whoever comes up with the best article first captures my attention and thereafter I might become a regular visitor. Places that try to propagandize may gain my attention if I wish to be a thorn in their side and feel that it is important to show another POV in the comments section. Matter of fact, I think that I recognize a couple of people from here that way. (When I have time and am able to do it.) I think that most people resent authoritarian entities that decide in advance what news is important or insist on continuously presenting only a slanted view of an issue.

So this liar is a sinister guy. I doubt that I would be surprised at his funding sources. To save markets for publishing entities is a stupid reactionary effort imho and it is healthy to rebel against it. What a creep!

This looks like nothing but people getting angry because we do a good job here of standing up against the illegals.

Somebody wants their "viva la raza" reconquista agenda and because we won't stand for their crap they are trying to shut us down!

FIGHT BACK! I know i won't be supporting illegals or illegal immigration and threats and lawsuits won't scare me into doing so EVER!

Well at least we know the white house logs on to Alipac. Michelle's been a busy girl between helpin' with this bogus law suit and yellin' at fat kids, no wonder she needed a vacation to Spain. Looks like you guys and gals piss everyone off! I LOVE IT! Big roofer hug for all ya all.