Found this story on Likelihood of Confusion (highly recommended blog, by the way).
The Democratic National Committee has a pretty good horse in the contest for most ill-considered demand letter of the year. His entry is here.
Here is the post he is complaining about. I didn’t need to get more than one sentence into it before I was able to tell that it has as much credibility as George W. Bush.
In a nutshell (in pertinent part): 47 U.S.C. §230(c)(1) provides that “No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.” That means that you can’t sue the Free Republic for something a member posted on that site.
Forgot about New York Times v. Sullivan? Okay, I can live with that. (No, I really can’t, but I believe in forgiveness). Good luck suing a political website for defaming a political party.
But how can anyone have such poor judgment that they would send this dreck? While you read this, do that Carlos Mencia doo doo dooo sound. (I have seen worse demand letters, so, the DNC will not be winning the gold medal this year, but he’s likely to have a strong showing for the Silver!).
Hey, how’s this? The DNC is obviously run by a bunch of nincompoops if they asked or permitted their lawyer to write that demand letter. Do you not have publicists there?
The lawyer who wrote it? I dunno… maybe he has a master plan. I just don’t get it. Yes, the letter is “correct,” but just foolish. I suspect that this is another one of those times that counsel will say “I was just executing my client’s wishes.” Listen up…. YOU DO NOT DO EVERYTHING YOUR CLIENT TELLS YOU TO DO . YOU MUST EXERCISE INDEPENDENT PROFESSIONAL JUDGMENT. If it were me, I would not have let any client convince me to affix my signature to this foolishness.
- If you’re worried about the DNC’s reputation on the Free Republic, you’ve made a blunder.
- Nobody takes the Free Republic seriously. It is a collection of morons who don’t believe in evolution because it hasn’t happened to their family trees yet.
- What are you gonna do about it if they don’t comply? Sue the Free Republic on behalf of the DNC? What are they, the Democratic Party or the People’s Action Party? (To see how the PAP rolls in circumstances like this, click here.
- Congratulations on getting the Free Republic a slew of good publicity and probably a pile of donations.
- Nobody had heard of this “story” until this ill-considered demand letter. Now everyone is going to hear about it.
- See New York Times v. Sullivan
- See 47 U.S.C. §230(c)(1)
- Doo doo doooo
