Nintendo Wii Doesn't Infringe On DVD Playing/Parental Control Patent

Michael Savage Threatening Sites That Connect Him To Rockstar Energy Drinks?

from the too-many-lawyers dept

Fri, Jun 12th 2009 1:23am — Mike Masnick

Controversial "shock jock" DJ Michael Savage (real name: Michael Weiner) last year made some news for threatening critics with copyright infringement for posting a segment of his radio show and providing commentary on it (while also suggesting his advertisers drop their sponsorship). A court eventually explained fair use to Savage, though it didn't stop his representatives from continuing to threaten others over nearly identical situations.

Now, a bunch of folks have been sending in the story from Consumerist about how Savage's lawyers are apparently sending legal nastygrams to a variety of sites that have noted Savage's connection to the popular "Rockstar Energy Drink." Apparently, the company was founded by Savage's son, and Savage's wife is a director of the company -- as she is for Savage's company, Savage Productions. Both companies share the same address as well. That allowed a few sites to point out these connections, suggesting that Savage was also involved in Rockstar, which brought out the legal nastygrams, leading to a deleted Facebook group and a "retraction" from another site. The specific claim is that despite the family connections, Michael Savage himself has nothing to do with the drink company.

Of course, it's difficult to see the reasoning here. If Savage is not connected to Rockstar, that's fine, but why send out threatening legal nastygrams? A simple note explaining that the companies are separate would seem to suffice. One possible reason to lawyer up so quickly is that Savage wants the close connections (if not a direct connection) kept entirely secret -- except, of course, that's now backfired in a big way, since the threats themselves are making a lot more news than the original claims ever did.

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Filed Under: michael savage, rockstar energy drinks, threats

45 Comments

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Anonymous Poster, 12 Jun 2009 @ 1:30am

Which just goes to prove that Michael Savage is a huge idiot (and his legal department isn't much better).
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Anonymous Coward, 12 Jun 2009 @ 2:17am

What a loser!
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Anonymous Coward, 12 Jun 2009 @ 2:18am

Michael Savage is a big fat loser.

Get a life, Oh, And your DJ'ng Sawks too!
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Wolfy, 12 Jun 2009 @ 2:19am

Legal "departments" can't bill for hours they don't "work".
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Anonymous Coward, 12 Jun 2009 @ 2:29am

Wonder if Michael Savage is connected to the stolen credit card issue and if not, how he feels about it being mentioned with his name in the mention. Hmmmm, Screw you Michael Savage

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090611/0906405197.shtml
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Nate, 12 Jun 2009 @ 3:17am

Or it could be just one big publicity stunt... we are all talking about it, doing searches to find out the details.
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Barbara Streisand, 12 Jun 2009 @ 3:29am

Shhhh!
He says there is nothing there, so obviously, there is nothing! Quit being such putz's internet!
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Known Coward, 12 Jun 2009 @ 3:34am

Savage
I don't listen to Savage often, nor do I agree with his rants.
But a loser he is not. He's crying all the way to the bank.
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Duane, 12 Jun 2009 @ 4:16am

You forgot to mention...
I think we need some additional context here:

Micheal Weiner "Savage" (Weiner is his legal last name) is a disgusting homophobe who has his own radio show. The sites in question were gay blogs, trying to point out his connection with Rockstar and incite others in the gay community to boycott the product. His "lawyer up" response makes sense in the context of promoting his hate-filled agenda against the gay community. He's nothing more than a rich bigot who enjoys making his living off the hate of others. Of course he sends his lawyers after those sites, using any flimsy justification he can. He knows, just as regular readers of this site know, that at least 75% of the effect of "rolling out the lawyers" is achieved before any court document is ever written. In the face of the threat of legal action, most people fold up their tents and go home. He doesn't care about the "bad press", because with his core audience, it's a win for him. Bullying gays into taking down content from their sites, and getting Facebook to unilaterally delete accounts and groups is right up his alley. What a Weiner.
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Anonymous Coward, 12 Jun 2009 @ 4:33am

Ever hear him when a gay or lesbian caller call his show? He goes from ranting lunatic bigot to somewhat respectful immediately. Maybe he just needs a little sodomy.
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Shmo, 12 Jun 2009 @ 4:43am

Re:
Well, he is a Weiner Savage...
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Anonymous Coward, 12 Jun 2009 @ 4:59am

Well, he is a Weiner, that is for sure. But if he has no direct relationship to Rockstar, then he is within his rights to complain.

What really should make people wonder is WHY he is so agressive about it. Perhaps Rockstar is worried their sales would collapse if an idiot like him was directly related to the product? Are groups opposed to Weiner's radio persona attempting to create financial havoc for Rockstar, creating guilt by association?

Sounds a bit like extortion to me.
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Anonymous Coward, 12 Jun 2009 @ 5:35am

I can see Savage now:
Damn you, Masnick...will you stop with the Rockstar/Savage connection already...don't make me send a nastygram...
You haven't gotten a nastygram about this article yet, have you?
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yonatron, 12 Jun 2009 @ 5:41am

Re: (anonymous coward @4:33, #10)
Maybe he gets somewhat respectful for some of the gays or lesbians who call his show. But I don't think he ever apologized for the time he told a gay caller something like "go get AIDS and die".

He needs to not have a career anymore, but somehow, we're not there yet.
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Dark Helmet (profile), 12 Jun 2009 @ 6:19am

Re:
More importantly, what is Michael Savage's connection to Fred Savage and Macho Man Randy Savage, who recently double-teamed Winnie in the doodoo hole...
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Overcast (profile), 12 Jun 2009 @ 6:22am

He needs to not have a career anymore, but somehow, we're not there yet.

Yes, luckily our right to free speech is still partially intact. Agree with him or not, he should have the right to say what he wants.

Don't like it? don't listen.
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Dark Helmet (profile), 12 Jun 2009 @ 6:24am

Re:
"Don't like it? don't listen."

That's one choice. The other, thanks to those same free speech rights, is listen and bitch about it. And then you can bitch about him bitching. And then he can bitch about you bitching about him bitching. And then...
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The Cenobyte, 12 Jun 2009 @ 6:37am

I wish they where not so good
Worst part about this assclown being involved here is that I like Rockstars.
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minijedimaster (profile), 12 Jun 2009 @ 6:57am

Re: You forgot to mention...
...of promoting his hate-filled agenda against the gay community.
You're just another idiot liberal that uses the age old tactic of dismissing any argument that doesn't jive with your own as a "hate-filled agenda". I don't hate a person because they're gay, but I sure as hell don't agree with the lifestyle. That doesn't make me "hate-filled". I'm not a fan of Savage, and he may well be hate filled over certain things. But his arguments against the Gestapo like Gay community in San Francisco do have many valid points.

So instead of burying your head in the sand and saying "oh he's just a hate monger, lets ignore all of the very valid arguments he's made against the gay community's behavior", maybe you should look at those arguments and try to debunk them. Otherwise, just piss off and stop leaving hate filled comments about people on the internet.
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minijedimaster (profile), 12 Jun 2009 @ 7:04am

Re: Re:
All you do by bitching is feed the fire and make him even more popular. If you and everyone else that didn't agree with him just ignored him, guess what? His career would shorten significantly.
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Dark Helmet (profile), 12 Jun 2009 @ 7:07am

Re: Re: You forgot to mention...
God Damn I hate hate-filled hate comments...
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JT, 12 Jun 2009 @ 7:20am

Stupid
he is probably worried his extreme views will end up hurting the company. Savage is his own worse enemy with some of his wacky statemnts that overshadow his great points which he does have time to time.
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Anonymous Coward, 12 Jun 2009 @ 7:37am

The day is soon coming when all of you who laugh, ridicule and despise a man like Savage for having the guts to speak out about "(fill in the blank)" and open himself up to your ridicule will be snatched away from you.

Yes it may sound cool to say he shouldn't have a career anymore, but just remember he is exercising a god given right to free speech, just as you and I are. He doesn't anymore deserve to be run out of business than ANYONE on this mindless dribble of a website.

So when the socialist regime changes the USA into the USSA and blocks YOU from speaking your mind.... Remember people like Michael Savage warned you it was coming. But then I guess you all believe Obama is a nice gentle guy and deviant lifestyles make our country strong and open borders have nothing to do with terrorists smugglers and the free flow of drugs into the nation doesn't have any impact on your children's lives and hospitals have no problem taking care of illegal aliens for free and you and I have limitless supplies of tax money ready to give for the cause and I while I'm sure you all agree that Bush should have been strung up for tapping phones in the country, you'd have no problem with him tapping Michael Savage's phone cause he's a "right wing nut job".... I can't wait until the utopia you people seem to believe we are building is complete. It's gonna be one hell of a show watching you all pull your heads out of your asses.
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ceril, 12 Jun 2009 @ 7:39am

The day is soon coming when all of you who laugh, ridicule and despise a man like Savage for having the guts to speak out about "(fill in the blank)" and open himself up to your ridicule will be snatched away from you.

Yes it may sound cool to say he shouldn't have a career anymore, but just remember he is exercising a god given right to free speech, just as you and I are. He doesn't anymore deserve to be run out of business than ANYONE on this mindless dribble of a website.

So when the socialist regime changes the USA into the USSA and blocks YOU from speaking your mind.... Remember people like Michael Savage warned you it was coming. But then I guess you all believe Obama is a nice gentle guy and deviant lifestyles make our country strong and open borders have nothing to do with terrorists smugglers and the free flow of drugs into the nation doesn't have any impact on your children's lives and hospitals have no problem taking care of illegal aliens for free and you and I have limitless supplies of tax money ready to give for the cause and I while I'm sure you all agree that Bush should have been strung up for tapping phones in the country, you'd have no problem with him tapping Michael Savage's phone cause he's a "right wing nut job".... I can't wait until the utopia you people seem to believe we are building is complete. It's gonna be one hell of a show watching you all pull your heads out of your asses.
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Anonymous Coward, 12 Jun 2009 @ 7:58am

Nice rant ceril, spot on. We have to fight at every turn the limiting of our rights.
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Dark Helmet (profile), 12 Jun 2009 @ 8:03am

Re:
"The day is soon coming when all of you who laugh, ridicule and despise a man like Savage for having the guts to speak out about "(fill in the blank)" and open himself up to your ridicule will be snatched away from you."

I've reread that sentence like fifteen times, and I still have no idea what you're saying. Particuarly since you never say WHAT will be snatched away from me.

"Yes it may sound cool to say he shouldn't have a career anymore, but just remember he is exercising a god given right to free speech, just as you and I are."

Yay, we agree the system is generally working just fine.

"He doesn't anymore deserve to be run out of business than ANYONE on this mindless dribble of a website."

Yay, you're overgeneralizing the people on this website.

"So when the socialist regime changes the USA into the USSA and blocks YOU from speaking your mind...."

Yay, you don't have a basic understanding of the difference between Socialism and Communism, particularly since true socialism doesn't ban free speech, Communism does. In it's most general definition, all socialism does is grant the state power of corporations. If I have to choose between that and granting the corporations power over the state, sign my ass up for some socialism!

"...and I while I'm sure you all agree that Bush should have been strung up for tapping phones in the country, you'd have no problem with him tapping Michael Savage's phone cause he's a "right wing nut job""

Question: didn't those NYC security guards already put you down?
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Matt Tate (profile), 12 Jun 2009 @ 8:18am

Michael Savage...
Wasn't he banned from England?
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anonymous, 12 Jun 2009 @ 8:24am

Idiot.. or brilliant?
As I was reading this article, it occurred to me... Perhaps this guy is smarter than people give him credit for. I know techdirt has been hammering the fact that trying to supress information with lawsuits usually backfires, but what if this Savage guy realized this and sent off "nastygrams" to bring attention to the product he is not so secretly involved in?

If it was intentional, Savage could be ahead of the curve and exploiting it.

Just my 2 cents.
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minijedimaster (profile), 12 Jun 2009 @ 8:35am

Re: Idiot.. or brilliant?
He does have a Dr degree and several best selling books... I'd say he definitely not a stupid person. Whether or not this whole stunt was on purpose, who knows if he's THAT clever.
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Anonymous Coward, 12 Jun 2009 @ 8:47am

ha. it must have been getting made fun of as a kid for having the last name Weiner that turned little Michael into such a big prick.
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Josh Saviano, 12 Jun 2009 @ 8:53am

Re: Re:
you keep Winnie's beautiful name out of your dirty mouth!
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Anonymous Coward, 12 Jun 2009 @ 8:55am

Re: Shhhh!
These are not the Energy drinks your looking for.
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Dark Helmet (profile), 12 Jun 2009 @ 9:08am

Re: Re: Re:
HAha, she was pretty hot on that show. What the hell ever happened to her?
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Kubrick, 12 Jun 2009 @ 9:14am

Rockstar Secret?
One possible reason to lawyer up so quickly is that Savage wants the close connections (if not a direct connection) kept entirely secret
Now, I don't listen to his radio show, but from what I've read, he has not kept the fact his son runs Rockstar a secret and has mentioned the fact on his show so I don't think this is the reason.
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Anonymous Coward, 12 Jun 2009 @ 9:17am

Re:
We currently live under a corporate regime and our enjoyment of these so-called God-given rights you're so worried about will only last as long as it's still profitable for the corporations that hold us hostage.

Believe whatever you want...when the men in suits (or uniforms) tell you to shut up and you don't, prepare to be tased, waterboarded, and ultimately killed.

And I didn't need Michael Savage to warn me - in fact, he and his ilk are profiting under the current corporate regime. They are part of the problem...part of the system of hindrances holding us back from our full human expression.
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Yakko Warner, 12 Jun 2009 @ 10:20am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
Doing a lot of miscellaneous TV work, apparently.

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0005211/

And still looking pretty. ;)
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Yakko Warner, 12 Jun 2009 @ 10:22am

Re: Re: Re: You forgot to mention...
You take your hate-hate-filled hate comment hate agenda elsewhere, mister!
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Anonymous Coward, 12 Jun 2009 @ 10:28am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
Whatever happened to http://www.danicamckellar.com/ you mean?

She grew up to be smarter than she is beautiful. In 1998 she graduated summa cum laude from UCLA with a degre in math. She has authored scientific papers (Chayes-McKellar-Winn theorem) and two books, Math Doesn't Suck and Kiss My Math, which encourage girls to study math.
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Dark Helmet (profile), 12 Jun 2009 @ 10:30am

Re: Re: Re: Re: You forgot to mention...
My comment hate agenda hate isn't a hate hate comment hate, which you would hate realize, if you hate understood hate how much I hate hate hate hate comments.....hate.
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Idiot In A Hurry, 12 Jun 2009 @ 6:19pm

I'm Confused
Why would Rockstar allow the use of their trademark on a canned beverage ?

In addition, why would Rockstar allow themselves to be associated with the likes of savage ?
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Pro American, 14 Jun 2009 @ 10:24am

Re: commi
Shut up communist, Mike is a patriot and your a left wing that is killing this nation, with your perverted gays and no brains.
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Randall Love, 8 Jul 2009 @ 10:33am

Re:
You seem like a very nice guy. I wish there were more people like you around during the 50's and 60's when black civil rights leaders were being threatened and assassinated by people who think like Michael Savage. What a waste of a human being he is.
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bev rivers, 8 Jul 2009 @ 2:09pm

Michael Savage
Savage being called "doctor" is a joke. His 2 Phd.s are in a very obscur,low "au currant field. My CV: I have a masters. My 2 kids: one is an attorney, one, scholarship from MIT, and scholarship to Stanford for his much much more important doctorate, and he refuses to use the "Doctor" stuff. My kid, scholarship at UCBerkeley, has just been the recipient of a reknowned national award. God == who on earth would believe that bugs and plants are of such import?\ He allows no one on his screaming program that disagrees with him. No one. Michael Jackson is 'out of his league'...would HIS kid cry for HIM as did princeess Jackson...

Michael Savage is a disgrace. Do you believe his son(s) would have cried as humanely as did that little ll year old when her daddy dies... the singer/entertainer, that he couldn't be bothered with.

Bill O'Reilly actually reads and publishes negative letters and reads them on TV.Savage cannot tolerate one minute of opposition to his views.
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Jeff North, 11 Sep 2009 @ 1:44pm

Michael Weiner
There is a publicly traded company New Frontier Media Inc. (stock symbol NOOF) where there is an officer named Michael Savage. NOOF provides pay per view porn to hotels. Is this Michael Weiner of NOOF also Michael Savage ?
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Anonymous Coward, 29 May 2013 @ 4:20am

say kill potus
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