4 ms·

Amazon/Statsaholic Dispute Just Got A Lot More Complicated

14 points by Sam_Odio 20y ago

pg 20y ago
It seems suspicious to me the way Arrington phrases this news. "It has become known." Why can't he quote a source? Perhaps because the source was someone working for Amazon? To me, this information appearing at this time only adds to the appearance of Amazon's guilt.
- andreyf 20y ago
  "There are a number of rumors floating around that Hornbaker threatened Amazon with a PR smear campaign if they refused to increase their acquisition offer to well above $100,000, something Hornbaker flatly denies." Point 1 - reporting about "a number of rumors" has no place in a news article. Point 2 - how could he threaten Amazon with a smear campaign at that point... they hadn't sued him yet...
- brett 20y ago
  He denies that his source was Amazon in a comment: I have no evidence that Amazon leaked this. They certainly did not do it formally in any event. I got this on two email tips from sources unrelated to Amazon. Also, the Amazon lawsuit makes no mention of it. http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/04/22/amazonstatsaholic-dispute-just-got-a-lot-more-complicated/#comment-1345081 http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/04/22/amazonstatsaholic-dispute-just-got-a-lot-more-complicated/#comment-1345081
  - eli 20y ago
    The news story about it is on the Internet. This case got a lot of publicity so someone was bound to stumble across it sooner or later, leaked or not.
Sam_Odio 20y ago
Also see: http://news.ycombinator.com/comments?id=15845 http://news.ycombinator.com/comments?id=15845
eli 20y ago
And check the comments
truth 20y ago
Quite clearly, if you do something that violates the copyright of others, you have to use the fame you received to ask users to download your own toolbar because "company X is being mean to me." You have to be ready to switch business models. Get users fired up. Maybe even sell the company for $100,000 which Amazon offered and use the publicity with TechCrunch to start a new site, with his own statistics. So, although I think he's doing a good job getting Amazon some really bad publicity, even though this is a simple case of copyright violation which he is guilty of, he should be doing more than just ticking off Amazon. Instead of playing victim, he needs to get his toolbar out and compete with Alexa. Don't just say, their service sucks I'm going to copy it, but say, the service sucks, I'm going to replace it altogether. Amazon can't touch him with copyright suits. This is basically extortion at this point. Why? There is NO WAY he could have thought that Amazon (or any other corporation) would not be ticked off at him at some point on the first day he started doing this. In other words, he's moved onto "legal" extortion--trying to make the company he's copying to pay him more than $100,000 or else he will make them look like they are the evil ones. Had he sold his company and started his own stats company, fine. But since he doesn't know when to stop, this is getting ridiculous. Finally, the fact that this is Amazon should not matter. Everybody who develops IP (basically, everybody reading this) wants to be able to protect it. I don't care if it's Amazon or Microsoft or Google. Amazon didn't do anything wrong, and I don't agree that it should be spun that way. As far as their 1-click patent goes, there was nothing like it on the web OR real life until Amazon invented it. Finally, if people are going to bring up that Amazon had a famous patent, why can't Amazon bring up that the user allegedly extorting them, has served time for extorting users of another major internet company?

14 points by Sam_Odio 20y ago

pg 20y ago

It seems suspicious to me the way Arrington phrases this news. "It has become known." Why can't he quote a source? Perhaps because the source was someone working for Amazon? To me, this information appearing at this time only adds to the appearance of Amazon's guilt.

andreyf 20y ago
"There are a number of rumors floating around that Hornbaker threatened Amazon with a PR smear campaign if they refused to increase their acquisition offer to well above $100,000, something Hornbaker flatly denies." Point 1 - reporting about "a number of rumors" has no place in a news article. Point 2 - how could he threaten Amazon with a smear campaign at that point... they hadn't sued him yet...
brett 20y ago
He denies that his source was Amazon in a comment: I have no evidence that Amazon leaked this. They certainly did not do it formally in any event. I got this on two email tips from sources unrelated to Amazon. Also, the Amazon lawsuit makes no mention of it. http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/04/22/amazonstatsaholic-dispute-just-got-a-lot-more-complicated/#comment-1345081 http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/04/22/amazonstatsaholic-dispute-just-got-a-lot-more-complicated/#comment-1345081
- eli 20y ago
  The news story about it is on the Internet. This case got a lot of publicity so someone was bound to stumble across it sooner or later, leaked or not.

Sam_Odio 20y ago

Also see: http://news.ycombinator.com/comments?id=15845 http://news.ycombinator.com/comments?id=15845

eli 20y ago

And check the comments

truth 20y ago

Quite clearly, if you do something that violates the copyright of others, you have to use the fame you received to ask users to download your own toolbar because "company X is being mean to me." You have to be ready to switch business models. Get users fired up. Maybe even sell the company for $100,000 which Amazon offered and use the publicity with TechCrunch to start a new site, with his own statistics. So, although I think he's doing a good job getting Amazon some really bad publicity, even though this is a simple case of copyright violation which he is guilty of, he should be doing more than just ticking off Amazon. Instead of playing victim, he needs to get his toolbar out and compete with Alexa. Don't just say, their service sucks I'm going to copy it, but say, the service sucks, I'm going to replace it altogether. Amazon can't touch him with copyright suits. This is basically extortion at this point. Why? There is NO WAY he could have thought that Amazon (or any other corporation) would not be ticked off at him at some point on the first day he started doing this. In other words, he's moved onto "legal" extortion--trying to make the company he's copying to pay him more than $100,000 or else he will make them look like they are the evil ones. Had he sold his company and started his own stats company, fine. But since he doesn't know when to stop, this is getting ridiculous. Finally, the fact that this is Amazon should not matter. Everybody who develops IP (basically, everybody reading this) wants to be able to protect it. I don't care if it's Amazon or Microsoft or Google. Amazon didn't do anything wrong, and I don't agree that it should be spun that way. As far as their 1-click patent goes, there was nothing like it on the web OR real life until Amazon invented it. Finally, if people are going to bring up that Amazon had a famous patent, why can't Amazon bring up that the user allegedly extorting them, has served time for extorting users of another major internet company?