Being Stupid And Litigious Is No Way To Go Through Life

In the past we’ve posted communications whenever someone has threatened to sue us. I think it’s entertaining, and it hopefully makes people think twice before firing up the legal machine with ridiculous claims. So when YouTube sent us a cease and desist letter, I posted it. And when that asshole Shannon Terry threatened to sue us out of existence, I posted that too.

Now the most ridiculous claim yet. Richard Figueroa, who claims to have the rights to this image of Ashton Kutcher, is demanding that we pay him $150,000 immediately or else he’ll sue us for $1.5 million.

Hi Michael, My name is Richard Figueroa and I am contacting you on behalf of the image you are using of Ashton Kutcher that Beth Boldt had taken. Beth is upset that your company has been using his image to generate traffic and revenue to your company without her permission.We are asking that you pay Beth $150,000,00 for the image that you have been using to generate business. If you choose not to settle this bill now we will ask for $1,500,000 in damages in loss of income form the image you have been borrowing for creating traffic to your website with here picture.if you google Beth Boldt you will get an idea of who she is in the modeling and entertainment industry.We would like to settle this quietly without the media getting involved however if you choose not to agree on these terms we will file a lawsuit against your company for copyright violation and we all know how that’s going to turn out since she’s the photographer of the image you are using.
So here is her invoice: Please make check out to Beth Boldt in the amount of ($150,000,00) send it to
[deleted contact information]
And after payment is made you may not use the image of Ashton anymore unless you want to negotiate a contract.

Thank you
Richard Figueroa
BethBoldt

Here’s the problem: we never used that image of Ashton Kutcher on any of our websites. The one image we did use (in this post) was supplied by Ooma (Kutcher is the creative director for Ooma), and Ooma says they own that image.

The problem turns out to be that if you do a search on Google (or “the Google” as Figueroa calls it), the image in question appears at the top of the results and is linked to TechCrunch. Why? Well we did some digging and it turns out that someone linked to the image in a comment to one of our posts.

I explained all of this to Figueroa on the phone but he insisted that Google bought us and that we need to remove the image from Google immediately. Sadly, Google has not acquired us, and I have no easy method for removing images from Google’s servers.

Normally I’d just let something like this drop since this guy doesn’t understand anything about copyright law or the Internet, but he has also been calling and emailing our advertisers and threatening to sue them, too (listen to the voicemail below). They are understandably concerned, and Heather and I now have to spend time today calming everyone down.

Don’t be this guy.

The voicemail below is to one of our advertisers. Listen to a second one, sent to Ooma, here.

Update: Starting at comment #79 below it looks like Richard weighs in with a number of comments. In comment no. 113 he tried to post my phone number and get people to call me and complain but I just deleted it.

Update 2: Richard has been calling me this evening saying people are crank calling him and that he will take “legal activation” against everyone who calls him. I’ve removed the phone number above. Please stop calling him because he just calls me afterwards.

Update 3: So the link to TechCrunch on Google’s search results is gone and the picture now links to Yahoo Answers. Richard still isn’t happy and is demanding I link that search result to him. I’m just speechless.

Amazon Fresh Shopping Bag Spotted In The Wild

Finally, pictures are starting to come in of Amazon Fresh, the new Webvan-like grocery delivery service that launched in Seattle last month. What I’d really like to see is a review of the service by someone who lives in Seattle. And a picture of the delivery van everyone keeps spotting. Or even better, just video the whole delivery experience. I have very fond memories of Webvan and I can’t wait until this thing hits silicon valley. I’ll never have to leave my computer again.

Update: Here’s the truck - photo credit to Jeff Sandquist:

• Sphere It
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Posted in Company & Product Profiles |

Afghan, Pakistan Talks Boost War on Terrorism, Musharraf Says

By Paul Tighe Aug. 13 (Bloomberg) -- Pakistani and Afghan tribal leaders took a ``positive'' first step in the fight against terrorism by agreeing at their peace council to boost cooperation along the border, Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf said.
Musharraf vows to fight extremism CNN International
Pakistan President Talks at Meeting ABC News
International Herald Tribune - Scotsman - Christian Science Monitor - Malaysia Star
all 634 news articles »


http://news.google.com/nwshp?hl=en&tab=wn

Sell Your Digital Wares Through Edgeio Paid Content

Classified listing service Edgeio now lets you sell content through your listings. The new type of listing called “Paid content” consists of the same listing Edgeio already hosts, but comes with an embedded digital locker. Through the locker, users can securely sell text, file downloads, and streaming media through a widget hosted by Edgeio.

It seems a good fit for selling podcasts or research reports. Affiliates can also grab the widget code to sell your product on their own sites as well for a revenue share determined by the content owner. Michael Arrington, the editor of this blog, is a founder and investor in the company.

Digital lockers are nothing new. E-Junkie, Payloadz, Tradebit, and Bitpass (shutdown) have done it for a while. However, Edgeio has the added advantage of leveraging the paid listings through their existing listings network and providing a very straightforward product.

It’s pretty simple to get started. You sign up to create a listing like any other through the “Paid Content” link. Next, select your content type, price (currency), affiliate percentage, and coupon code. Finally, Edgeio lets you make a teaser “preview” for the content to give buyers an idea about what they’re purchasing. Once completed, you get some embed code and the listing is placed in Edgeio’s index, linked to the page where the widget is embedded.

An example of one of the widget embeds is included below. The other version of the widget initially shows visitors a teaser, until the content is purchased and unlocked. Use the coupon code “vgforfree” to unlock the content. To purchase the content, you need to sign into your Edgeio account and to pay by credit card or PayPal. The content is then unlocked for your Edgeio account.

Edgeio splits revenue from sales through the widget 80/20 in favor of the content creator. The creator can then split that 80% for sales through affiliates at any percentage they like.

Update (Arrington): This is a company that I co-founded in early 2005 with Keith Teare, months before I started TechCrunch. There is a clear conflict of interest, although I did not write, edit or give input on this post. For a balance of viewpoints, see Techmeme.