Title: Paywallnews.com Source:
[None] URL Source:[None] Published:Feb 5, 2018 Author:Paywallnews Post Date:2018-02-05 19:53:13 by A K A Stone Keywords:None Views:422 Comments:4
When The New York Times discovered that a site was sharing copies of their articles without permission, it demanded the associated domain registration service to identify the owner. While some companies may be eager to comply, Njalla is not. The anonymous registration service replied with some unusual responses instead, reminiscent of TPB's infamous 'legal threats' section.
Back in the day, The Pirate Bay was famous for its amusing responses to legal threats. Instead of complying with takedown notices, it sent witty responses to embarrass the senders.
Today the notorious torrent site gives copyright holders the silent treatment, but the good-old Pirate Bay spirit still lives on elsewhere.
Earlier today the anonymous domain registration service Njalla, which happens to be a venture of TPB co-founder Peter Sunde, posted a series of noteworthy responses it sent to The New York Times’ (NYT) legal department.
The newspaper warned the registration service about one of its customers, paywallnews.com, which offers the news service’s content without permission. Since this is a violation of The Times’ copyrights, according to the paper, Njalla should take action or face legal consequences.
NYT: Accordingly, we hereby demand that you immediately provide us with contact information — including email addresses — for both the actual owner of the paywallnew.com website, and for the hosting provider on which the paywallnew.com website is located.
If we have not heard from you within three (3) business days of receipt of this letter, we will have no choice but to pursue all available legal remedies.
Njalla is no stranger to threats of this kind but were somewhat offended by the harsh language, it seems. The company, therefore, decided to inform the NYT that there are more friendly ways to reach out.
Njalla: Thanks for that lovely e-mail. It’s always good to communicate with people that in their first e-mail use words as “we demand”, “pursue all available legal remedies” and so forth. I’d like to start out with some free (as in no cost) advice: please update your boiler threat letters to actually try what most people try first: being nice. It’s not expensive (actually the opposite) and actually it works much better than your method (source: a few tens of thousands years of human development that would not have been as efficient with threats as it would have been with cooperation).
Unfortunately, you aren't protected by Njalla from, say, the legal staff of the Old Gray Whore the same way that paywallnews is. Or maybe you are. This is domain renewal time for LF.
