6 ms·
Sorry, Gas Companies – Parody Isn't Infringement (Even If It Creeps You Out)
- pif 2y ago[flagged]
- actionfromafar 2y agoWeird for Netlify to mistake trademark law for copyright law.
- amiga386 2y agoWeird for Netlify to be cowed by someone with deep pockets and, in the absence of a volte-face from those deep pockets, making the bullied party go through unnecessary steps, just in case the deep pockets became angrier and threatened Netlify some more. Ultimately the bullied party upped-and-left Netlify, after which Netlify wiped its brow and said "phew! that was a close one! i nearly got caught up in a dispute!" Netlify sound like cowards. I don't think they'd have my back if anyone objected to a website I hosted with them. I shouldn't purchase their services. Also, I should look at the track record of anyone else I'm thinking of using for hosting; do they have a good reputation for defending their clients' rights and telling barratrous lawyers to GTFO?
- tdeck 2y agoThis website is a gem. From the FAQ: Where does my money go? Your purchase is supporting Life-Positive projects that increase life among HLV individuals across the United States. These projects include massage, sauna, and vital fluid transfer.
- kreyenborgi 2y agohttps://repaer.earth/programs/ https://repaer.earth/programs/ omg the balloon there at the bottom hahaha :(((
- bdowling 2y agoWhy do they have to use actual companies’ exact names and logos to make their parody, which someone could confuse for a real product? Can’t they use slight variations (e.g., McDowels to parody McDonalds)? Wouldn’t everyone still know who they were referring to? Edit: Yes, this is satire, not parody, and satire needs to clearly identify its target to work properly. Here, however, the target of the satire appears to be carbon offset sellers, as a farcical “life offset” seller. The companies in question are linked as mere “supporters” of the satirical service; they don’t appear to be the direct target of the satire.
- naught0 2y agoThey shouldn't have to. Is silencing criticism with the threat of a frivolous lawsuit preferable to you? They feature human babies in test tubes on this page: https://repaer.earth/about https://repaer.earth/about To me, it's obvious parody
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- bastawhiz 2y agoPeople use parody names because they're afraid of getting sued, not because they have to. If the purpose of your website is activism, why water it down?
- bluGill 2y agoBecause trademark law is complex and you can be sued for using real trademarks if anyone could think this was real and not a parody. Generally using obvious parody names gets the point across better anyway.
- bastawhiz 2y agoIt's actually not that complex. They're not misrepresenting themselves as the brands. They're not in the same industry as the brands. The standard is not "if anyone could think this was real".
- shrubble 2y agoThey neglected to use the phrase "precious bodily fluids" in their Plasma Pals explanation, which is mildly disappointing.
- cwillu 2y ago“vital fluids of the children” is close enough for government work.
- ziddoap 2y ago>Frustratingly, Netlify made us go through the full DMCA counternotice process—including a 10-business-day waiting period to have the site restored—even though this was never a DMCA claim. DMCA is a scourge. I think the whole thing is dumb, but at the very least there should be some form of punishment for bogus DMCA claims, and purposefully labyrinthine DMCA processes. Edit: Just to be abundantly clear. My comment is a general comment on the DMCA, because the DMCA is mentioned quite a bit in the article, and the EFF was forced (erroneously) to follow the DMCA counter-notice process.
- bastawhiz 2y agoThis isn't DMCA, it's just Netlify having a silly process.
- ziddoap 2y ago>Netlify made us go through the full DMCA counternotice process
- tczMUFlmoNk 2y ago> —even though this was never a DMCA claim. (The DMCA is copyright law, not trademark, and TotalEnergies didn’t even meet the notice requirements that Netlify claims to follow.)
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- ziddoap 2y agoWith so many mentions of DMCA in the article, and the fact that the EFF had to go through a labyrinthine DMCA counter-notice process, you'd think I'd be allowed to comment about the DMCA... Apparently not. Sorry.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- hn_throwaway_99 2y agoI think this parody website is great, and I'm glad EFF went to bat for them, but (and I hope this doesn't sound semi-conspiratorial) I think this may have been the website creator's goal all along. If it was, congrats, I think you played the energy companies well. That is, my thought is that the website deliberately used real company logos and links (it would have been easy to use fake, similar-parody names) because they knew they'd be likely to receive C&Ds from these companies whose knee jerk response would be to demand their logos be removed. Then bam, the companies seem clearly in the wrong legally, the EFF goes to bat for them and also writes a long blog post like this, and instant Streisand Effect. I mean, I would have never heard about this website if it weren't posted here. FWIW I think this was a good strategy on the part of the website creators, so kudos.
- bdowling 2y agoStreisand effect bait?
- nneonneo 2y agoThe parody website in question: https://repaer.earth/ https://repaer.earth/ It uses real logos from three gas companies, two of which tried (unsuccessfully) to have their logos removed.
- Buttons840 2y agoThere's been a lot of talk about free speech on social media. A lot of it is bad faith political talk, but still, there is a lot of scrutiny of free speech on social media. Rightfully so, it's important for people to be able to speak in the modern "town square", but it's also important for people to run their own websites how they please. We're targeting the wrong layer with our concerns about free speech. We should regulate hosting providers and enforce free speech on hosting providers, not on social media websites. People should have a right to host their content somewhere, but not the right to violate Twitter's ToS. Unfortunately, relatively nobody cares about hosting. If Twitter bans a journalist people get upset, if Netlify caves to a slight bit of pressure takes a journalist's website down, nobody cares.
- amiga386 2y agoPeople should care: https://protectthestack.org/ https://protectthestack.org/
- aftbit 2y agoYes, 100%! We do not have a real "public square" on the internet. The whole thing is a private mall, owned and operated by a dozen or so large public companies. If I want to host something large-scale which is legal but unpalatable to those dozen companies, there is no real way to do that today.
- RunSet 2y agoThat parody website responds like it is mining crypto in the background. Not going viral when I can't share it in good conscience.
- pipes 2y agoI don't get this. If it was a person they were claiming was associated with their fictious programme surely that person could sue for defamation?
- glitcher 2y agoFrom my understanding parody is not defamation.
- hunter2_ 2y agoRight, plenty of the artists parodied by Weird Al are individuals. Any permission sought (or denials respected) are purely for goodwill, not legally required. That said, Weird Al hasn't actually distributed unmodified trademarks of other entities, to my knowledge. Even if that would generally be problematic, the context of a "featured partners" list as in TFA probably falls below a threshold of likelihood of confusion which arises in other unauthorized uses of trademarks.
- philipwhiuk 2y agoNo, wrong. The approval of that target of the parody (Amish, McDonalds, CIA etc) are not legally required. Case law suggests that he is required to (and he does), license artist's music. He's not parodying Miley Cyrus in 'Party in the CIA'. He's parodying the CIA. Because the lyrics and track aren't the subject, licensing of the track is required. Similarly, If Repaer used a licensed font on the site, they'd have to license it.
- tialaramex 2y agoRight. Protected uses are protected because they were necessary. The Weird Al track that comes to mind which could be protected (but does not need the protection because Al always secures permission for these works) is "Smells Like Nirvana" because that specifically needs to use Nirvana's track "Smells Like Teen Spirit" because it's a (well meant, like a comedy roast) critique of Nirvana and their song. "It's hard to bargle nawdle zouss / With all these marbles in my mouth" is about Nirvana and about Smells Like Teen Spirit. If you replace Smells Like Teen Spirit with Cliff Richards' "Saviours Day" it does not work, Cliff is not going to confuse and annoy your parents, his utterances aren't incomprehensible, and so on. The choice of song is necessary, which would justify protection.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- dangsucksdick1 2y ago[dead]
- JoeAltmaier 2y agoI kind of side with the gas companies on this one. They objected to their real names and logos being used to market a parody site. Their companies weren't being parodied; they were simply added to the site intact (to lure search engines to list their site? to add legitimacy?) The article doesn't touch this issue, they just mock the gas companies. Not a real article, just another slam piece couched as journalism.
- chmod775 2y ago> Their companies weren't being parodied They obviously were. It's a parody of carbon offsets.
- JoeAltmaier 2y agoObviously they weren't. As you so correctly point out, it was a parody of a government program.
- kyleee 2y agoOil and gas companies are just the type to buy things like carbon offsets, engage in green PR, etc. so they are definitely also targeted by the activism and satire.
- avazhi 2y agoNot a US lawyer but would love to hear from anybody that is: could the gas companies sue for defamation for this? In Australia I suspect defamation or misleading and deceptive conduct under our ACL might be possible avenues for the gas companies, although under the ACL the impugned conduct must be ‘in trade or commerce’ so that could be one problem with going after an ‘activist group’.
- rmholt 2y agoTried to do some online research (heh) and it would appear that satire of public figures is just straight up protected by the first amendment. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hustler_Magazine_v._Falwell https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hustler_Magazine_v._Falwell
- avazhi 2y agoI don’t think linking directly to real companies and referring to them as partners while using their logos is all that similar to the Falwell example. I haven’t visited the site from this story, but had they clearly marked the site as parody?
- OkGoDoIt 2y agoThe site is amusing, and sure it feels fairly obvious that it’s parody/satire in this context, but also I went through the FAQ and fine print and I don’t see any admission that it’s parody/satire. They seem to hold very true to the joke to the point that it does feel a bit worrying. At what point does parody/satire become misinformation and defamation? If my mom landed on this site after it was emailed to her from one of her Fox News-loving elderly friends, I’m not sure she would have enough context to realize it wasn’t real. It seems like it would be better if they at least had a disclaimer or notice or something on the bottom of the site. On a related note, I hosted The Empire Strips Back parody Star Wars burlesque show at my theater, and they had to have disclaimers everywhere explicitly saying it was a parody production. They got sued and won in court but the disclaimers were an important part of that. Of course if the main concern is the misuse of the DMCA to get this taken down by claiming copyright infringement, that’s clearly an abuse of the DMCA. But if the companies involved sued for defamation/slander/whatever, I think there’s at least a legitimate concern here.
- aidenn0 2y agoThe original A Modest Proposal[1] also didn't include any admission it was parody/satire, and held very true to the joke to the point that it seemed worrying. The more uncomfortable it makes you, the more it sticks. Also, the DMCA was not involved (though it's not clear that Netlify was aware of that). 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Modest_Proposal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Modest_Proposal
- hobs 2y agoThe disclaimers were an important part of that likely because it made it even easier to establish than using some sort of "reasonable person" argument - that doesn't make it the standard required though.
- ChoHag 2y ago[dead]
- neilv 2y agoI'm not thrilled with Netlify's behavior as claimed by this EFF post, but I'd like to speak on a different concern: Couldn't this activism have been just as effective, if done without libel? We're in the AI counterfeiting era now. It's time to be more conscientious about false accusations. "It's OK when I do it, because it's protected parody/satire! But when other people do it, to smear my business, or my friend, or my favored political candidate, by name, and they claim it's parody/satire, it's not OK, because... uh... reasons!" If we think we're entitled to do it, can we complain when millions of others then also do it?
- chatmasta 2y agoWho says the same people are advancing the conflicting arguments? I can only speak for myself, but my position is consistent here. (btw, what is the name of this logical fallacy that assigns two beliefs from a population to the population as a whole? It seems like a variant of No True Scottsman but maybe there’s a more precise label for it?)
- neilv 2y agoI'm not an expert writer, but I thought it was an OK way to say "these two beliefs we've heard are conflicting; don't hold them both", as part of an argument to say that we need to rethink and think more clearly about "parody" Obviously, we collectively have those conflicting beliefs. And I suggest that collectively resolving these is going to be forced by AI fakes and social media.
- feoren 2y agoNo. Poking the hornet's nest is an effective and sometimes necessary part of activism. The whole reason we've heard of these guys is because they poked those companies. That's why they used their real logos. Using fake logos makes no sense there, and if they had done that, neither of us would have heard this story. It's a bit like the argument "sure, Black Lives Matter, but do they have to be kneeling during a football game?" Protests are fine, as long as they never inconvenience anyone, are never loud or obnoxious, are never seen nor heard nor felt. Well, then, they're not protests, they're LARPing. I get the feeling that in practice, those "uh... reasons" will turn out to be blatant. As in: one is obviously an attempt to scam and defraud people, and the other is an obvious parody. And obviousness matters: the crux is whether it's likely to deceive a "reasonable person" or not. You can like or hate that criteria, but that's been consistent since trademarks were invented.
- olliej 2y agoI still don’t understand how these fraudulent DMCA claims aren’t outright criminal - I thought even the garbage state of the law at least made objectively false claims requires a statement under penalty of perjury that you have a good faith belief in the accuracy of the claims. Filing a DMCA claim over a trademark violation is a direct admission that that statement is false because the requirement is you identify the copyright violation and that you are the owner or representative of the owner of that copyright.