Lucha Underground Wrestling Sends Legal Threat To Journalists For Publishing 'Spoilers'
from the it's-fake dept
Spoilers suck, sure, but this is the internet and some things cannot be avoided. Still, for those that produce content, there are better and worse ways to handle the issue of spoilers. Some large entertainment groups try to sue over spoilers, but it rarely works. Others settle for mere DMCA takedowns. Most entertainment groups, meanwhile, don't do a damn thing about spoilers, because that's the correct course of action.
Still, even with that wide spectrum of past responses, sending legal threats to journalists over spoilers, such as the Lucha Underground wrestling show has done, is a new one for me. The legal threats rest on the NDAs the audience has to sign before attending a show.
Since the series started filming in late 2014, it has always required audience members to sign non-disclosure agreements. But with hundreds of fans there, spoilers always get out.
This week, Lucha Libre FMV, a joint venture of Factory Made Ventures and Mexico’s AAA promotion, went a bit further than it had before, sending legal threats to wrestling reporters who published spoilers from the first tapings of Lucha Underground season four. Letters from attorney Paul D. Supnik were emailed on Wednesday to former TMZ producer Ryan Satin, now of Pro Wrestling Sheet, and to Steve Bryant of SoCal Uncensored. Satin published his on Thursday morning and Deadspin obtained Bryant’s around the same time. Reading the effectively identical letters, it seems as if the fact that both Satin and Bryant live in the Los Angeles area, where Lucha Underground is shot, may have played some role in them being targeted. It may just be that all the spoilers from the February tapings are attributed to their reports, but the letters do pointedly ask if their recipients attended the shows. Both Satin and Bryant maintain that they did not, and since FMV would have the NDAs, the implication is that they think both may have attended using aliases.
Interestingly, the letters assert that the reporting done by these journalists violates the NDA even if the journalist hasn't signed an NDA. This novel legal theory is predicated on Lucha Underground asserting that the spoilers, or event results, are trade secrets. The letter goes on to say that the journalists are or should have been aware of the status of event results as trade secrets, which opens them up to liability.
Spoiler alert: none of that is true.
The first amendment is quite clear on the matter of a journalist's right to report factual information, even factual information that an individual or company would rather keep hidden. If the Pentagon Papers can be published, surely so can the results of an underground wrestling event. And, even if that fact were more in question than it is, journalists, who rely enough on these protections to know their ins and outs, are the exact wrong people to try to threaten into silence. As one would expect, the end result of these threats is that both these journalists and their work has gotten far more attention that it would have otherwise.
Nacho Libre, meet Senorita Streisand.
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Filed Under: contracts, free speech, journalism, ndas, spoilers, underground wrestling
Companies: lucha underground
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Dammit, and I like Lucha Underground. This is such a dumbass move.
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There does seem to be a trend to extend the reach of customer agreements.
Like the binding arbitration agreements that Wells Fargo customers agreed to when opening accounts. Extended to cover the 2 million deposit and credit-card accounts Wells Fargo created that customers never agreed to.
Now it appears that driverless car legislation will allow binding arbitration. It's not clear whether that applies to non-passengers ("By being hit by this car, you agree to binding arbitration") but it appears to apply to passengers, even non-owners who never signed any agreement.
Add that to shrink-wrap licenses on inkjet cartridges and software that the customer only sees after the transaction is completed. After opening the package, and it's too late to return the item. And DMCA laws preventing customers from fixing security holes that become apparent in devices only after they're brought home.
It's getting rather one-sided.
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Re:
It's easy when it can be hidden away on a webpage nobody ever sees, and there's maybe an "I agree" checkbox or just a sentence saying "submitting your order indicates you agree". I never thought I needed a law degree to shop at Walmart, but for walmart.com I kind of do. (...So I don't shop online much.)
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Re: Re:
Now, if it's a document you have to physically *sign* (like presumably those Wells Fargo documents) that's a different matter.
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i got this
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We Dont Need No Stinkin Lawsuits!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrX9Ca7LSyQ
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Re:
Y’know, I was gonna let this pass, but because I am in a bit of a foul mood…
You can stop referring to pro wrestling as “fake”. We all know that the match results are fixed. We all know the feuds are (mostly) scripted. We all know the characters portrayed in the ring are not truly representative of the people who portray them. This is common knowledge and acting like it is not just so you can feel a smug sense of superiority over the people who enjoy the performance art of professional wrestling makes you an asshole.
You are not smarter than wrestling fans when you say “LOL it’s all fake”. You are not a better person than a wrestling fan if you have to look down upon them as idiots and fools because they enjoy pro wrestling in the same way some people enjoy Game of Thrones or The Walking Dead. So when you feel another urge to call out pro wrestling as “fake”, ignore itas hard as you can.
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Re: Re:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyTBHQPSG5k
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This is the magical thinking that what corporations want should be the law...
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Barbara hasn't been a "señorita" since 1963, Tim,…
:P ;]
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Re: Barbara hasn't been a "señorita" since 1963, Tim,…
Are you trying to suggest the good lady has gained some weight?
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Nope.
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Re: Nope.
Or has the SJW nonsense not yet infected the Spanish speaking world?
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Being majority Catholic countries…
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So your legal theory is: Professional Wrestling is Factual?
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Re: So your legal theory is: Professional Wrestling is Factual?
The legal theory is not that “professional wrestling is real”. The legal theory is that the events of the Lucha Underground tapings—e.g., who wrestled who, which wrestler won, who cut promos—are facts that cannot be disseminated prior to the airing of the episodes in which those events took place. And yes, that theory is as shitty as your “oh I’m so much smarter than these rubes because I know pro wrestling is staged” attitude.
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:)
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Re:
I’mma give you a sincere answer: Lucha Underground tapes groups of matches over several days with the intent of editing those matches together with separately-filmed “storyline” footage to create a fictional show with serial storytelling that follows the goings-on in an underground “fight club”. People who attended the show can spoil match results such that people can get an idea of how various storylines might turn out.
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Nice Reverse Streisand Play by Lucha
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