Canon Tries To Shut Down Fake Canon Parody Blog

from the fake-fake-fake-fake dept

Mon, Feb 16th 2009 3:35pm — Mike Masnick

Thomas Hawk writes "An interesting twist over at the Fake Chuck Westfall Blog. Fake Chuck (like Fake Steve before him) has a blog out parodying Canon's real Technical Information Advisor Chuck Westfall. It seems that Canon and their lawyers over at Loeb & Loeb are none too fond of all the fun that Fake Chuck and DSLR geeks everywhere have been having at their expense and have sent Fake Chuck's blog hosting company, WordPress, a notice to take the blog down. Canon's lawyers cite that Fake Chuck's blog is "calculated to mislead recipients," even though the blog has "fake" in the title, "fake" in the URL and "fake" just about everywhere else in the blog. What in the heck is wrong with Canon, do they really think that trying to shut down a parody blog is going to make their new 5D Mark II ship any faster?"

It's hard to understand Canon's reasoning here -- other than maybe to pull a "reverse" Streisand Effect and try to get more attention to the blog. After all, before this, who actually cared about a fake blog of a guy most people had no clue even existed?

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Filed Under: fake blog, fake chuck westfall, lawyers, takedown
Companies: canon

11 Comments

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Fake Johnny Canada, 16 Feb 2009 @ 4:24pm

I never heard of either sites and I own a Cannon :)
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Anonymous Poster, 16 Feb 2009 @ 4:33pm

It should be pointed out that the blog removed the Canon logo, and WordPress' parent company refuses to remove the blog at Canon's request; quoting Automattic CEO Toni Schneider's response to Canon: We [...] reject your [...] complaints regarding the blog being confused with an official Canon site given that the blog name and URL contain “Fake”, the about page starts with “Hi, I’m not actually Chuck Westfall.”, and the tone and content of the whole blog are clearly satirical.
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xippie, 16 Feb 2009 @ 4:42pm

To Canon and Loeb & Loeb: Thanks for the traffic!
See the Traffic

http://fakechuckwestfall.wordpress.com/2009/02/16/to-canon-and-loeb-loeb-thanks-for-the-t raffic/
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David Hobby, 16 Feb 2009 @ 5:11pm

Three cheers for Wordpress
Thanks to WP for not caving, which would have created a chill for any other parody WP blog.
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Heavy Artillery, 16 Feb 2009 @ 5:33pm

Re: I own a Cannon
You own a Cannon! What bore size? Can I take a picture of it with my Canon G10?

It is good to see that WP didn't cave If it were Google that site would be gone.
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Roger Harris, 16 Feb 2009 @ 6:59pm

Imitation...
is the best form of flattery? If Canon was smart, they might figure out ways to reach out to Fake Chuck and take advantage of the publicity.
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Frank Rich, 16 Feb 2009 @ 7:52pm

The Loeb & Loeb attorney is an expert on the First Amendment so you should try to find some publications by him or others in his firm supporting your position. Historically, Japanes companies do not like litigation so they may back down or compromise...but when they sue, there can be no stoppong them so this may present you with a financial hardship.
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Something odd ...., 16 Feb 2009 @ 9:39pm

Canon's attorney
On the Loeb & Loeb Site for the attorney that sent the takedown notice to WP states:
(http://www.loeb.com/douglas_mirell/)
"Mr. Mirell regularly reviews film footage, Internet websites, motion picture/television scripts, stage plays, newspapers, magazines and books to avoid infringing intellectual property rights and potential publication tort claims."
I can read this a few ways:
- He has a intense natural inclination to infringe and he regularly reviews various media to avoid his propensity to infringe.
- Mr. Mirell's clients have him review ......
- He is a high tech ambulance chaser.

If you read a little more on the site, he represents the MPAA and the big studios in ".... nationwide litigation against computer users who are illegally trafficking in these studios’ copyrighted motion pictures on so-called “peer-to-peer” file trading networks." So-called peer-to-peer ... Illegally trafficking ... rather inflammatory I'd say.

A interesting tie in to one of the main themes of Techdirt.
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Fake Loeb, 17 Feb 2009 @ 2:08am

Hi this is Fake Loeb
I demand that you take our names out of this story. It's bad press for our good name.

signed,
Fake Loeb
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Anonymous Coward, 17 Feb 2009 @ 4:45am

Thanks for pointing this out to us Canon, You just gave the blog more traffic.

DOH!

Dumbasses!
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JB, 17 Feb 2009 @ 8:33am

Traffic!
The blog has a new post showing that traffic went from 200 page views a day to 20,000 a day thanks to the takedown notice.
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