You're probably right about the WaPo article being the trigger. I received a C&D from a massive company shortly after a mainstream news outlet covered a competi

You're probably right about the WaPo article being the trigger. I received a C&D from a massive company shortly after a mainstream news outlet covered a competitor that was engaging in shady tactics. As the entire sector depended on non-copyrightable factual data that was only available from the large company's site, everyone was shut down by a wave of C&Ds that hit over a span of 3 days. Makes me wonder if PR firms are complicit with large companies looking to shut down small players. They feed a story upstream to someone and then the company can pursue legal action without looking petty or like they're picking on the little guy, providing some defense against the negative PR of "punching down" while still allowing them to accomplish their goal of harassing/silencing defenseless bloggers and entrepreneurs. May also help them if they get to the stage of assessing damages, since they can say "This was not just some obscure thing in the corner that nobody noticed; they got national press exposure."