Dear Mr. Mitchell,
I am writing to you as the registered agent of DDBLG LLC, the registrant of the domain CompanyNameSucks.com, and I am copying Mr. XXXXX as the registered agent of XXXXX Services LLC, the entity responsible for the Company Name Sucks Web Site, according to the Company Name Sucks Web Site Agreement & Terms of Use, to follow up on my January 31, 2011 letter received by Mr. XXXXXX on February 2, 2011.
In this letter, I informed Mr. XXXXXX that the posting on the Company Name Sucks Web Site of the complaint regarding my business constituted, among other offenses, interference with the contractual rights my company has with Ms. Baldwin as well as copyright infringement. I demanded the immediate removal of the offending content from the Company Name Sucks Web Site, including but not limited to the following URLs:
1. http://www.companynamesucks.com/david-lombardino-and-associates-sucks.html;
2. http://www.companynamesucks.com/david-lombardino-and-associates-does-not-suck-5267.html; and
3. http://www.companynamesucks.com/david-lombardino-and-associates-sucks-5003.html.
However, we have verified that the offending content has not yet been removed. I hereby reiterate that this content and all associated comments be removed immediately from the Company Name Sucks Web Site, as well as from current and all future dissemination, including but not limited to that which is currently posted on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/pages/Company-Name-Sucks/90524784486. This removal should be complete and confirmed by you by no later by noon CT tomorrow, February 4, 2011.
I thank you in advance for your time and consideration in this matter. If you have any questions regarding this demand, please do not hesitate to let me know.
Regards,
David Lombardino
David Lombardino & Associates
1330 Post Oak Blvd., Suite 1600
Houston, TX 77056-3072
877-454-4957
www.The-Draft-Editor.com
CONFIDENTIALITY STATEMENT
This message is sent by a document editing and proofreading company and may contain information that is privileged or confidential. If you received this transmission in error, please notify the sender by reply email and delete the message and any attachments.
Company Name Sucks Response
David, as Mr XXXXXX has informed you he is no longer the owner of Company Name Sucks, nor is he part of its current operations. The information you refer to was left on the site by mistake, and will be cleared up soon by our development team. In regards to your demands for removal the answer is no. If you have read our terms of service which you refer to, I imagine you have also seen our removal policy. We are violating no laws, copyright or otherwise and the review/s you refer to contain no slander and or personal attacks. Please note that our terms of service also indicate that all communication will be posted in our blog for our readers enjoyment.
Thanks
Chris Mitchell
Company Name Sucks
RE: David Lombardino & Associates
Dear Mr. Mitchell,
Thank you for your email and for correcting me with regard to the proper owner of the CompanyNameSucks.com website. I apologize for my initial confusion and sending my initial request to the wrong person. Since you did not receive that initial request, I will copy it here so that you can see in more detail how the posting of the content to which I referred is a violation of the law.
Specifically, on or about January 9, 2011, Bridgette Baldwin posted a review on CompanyNameSucks.com, which in a January 27, 2011 email to CompanyNameSucks.com, via their Contact Us page located at www.companynamesucks.com/blog/contact-us, she requested to be removed. However, our investigation into the matter shows that her review has not been removed and continues to be posted at the following URLs:
1. http://www.companynamesucks.com/david-lombardino-and-associates-sucks.html;
2. http://www.companynamesucks.com/david-lombardino-and-associates-does-not-suck-5267.html; and
3. http://www.companynamesucks.com/david-lombardino-and-associates-sucks-5003.html.
For your information, the content of the review is: “Hired to format my footnotes. When I received the document the footnotes had not been formatted and they charged me $860.”
The content of her follow-up to that review is: “Initially the company failed to format footnotes, but after investigation they agreed to refund the money I paid for footnotes.”
If you like, I can forward to you a copy of Ms. Baldwin’s January 27, 2011 email to me stating that she had contacted CompanyNameSucks.com to request the removal of this review.
As a follow-up to Ms. Baldwin’s January 27, 2011 email, I am writing to request that Ms. Baldwin’s complaint, follow-up, any responses and any other information regarding Ms. Baldwin’s complaint be removed immediately and permanently from the CompanyNameSucks.com website, as well as from any other website or location under the control of DDBLG LLC, including but not limited to the URLs listed on the first page of this letter, and from any current and future dissemination by CompanyNameSucks.com and DDBLG LLC for the following reasons:
1. CompanyNameSucks.com’s posting or other dissemination of Ms. Baldwin’s complaint and/or any information related to Ms. Baldwin’s complaint constitute interference with the contractual rights my company has with Ms. Baldwin.
2. The extent to which CompanyNameSucks.com’s posting or dissemination of Ms. Baldwin’s complaint cites the name of my business, my business’ website or any text from my business’ website, that posting or dissemination constitutes copyright infringement.
I will be happy to explain in more detail these violations of the law upon your request. I will also be happy to explain that no company’s terms and conditions can supersede the law. For example, according to the law, CompanyNameSucks.com’s posting of my company’s name (David Lombardino & Associates) constitutes copyright infringement. This is because my company’s name, along with all the other content on my company’s website (www.the-draft-editor.com), is protected by copyright. Since I have not provided CompanyNameSucks.com with written permission to use my company’s name, CompanyNameSucks.com violates my copyright. This is true regardless of what is written in CompanyNameSucks.com’s terms and conditions, even if these terms and conditions were to be considered a contract between CompanyNameSucks.com and my company. The reason for this is that, according to the law, no contract between two entities can be upheld if it violates the law.
For these reasons, I hereby demand that any reference to my company’s name in Ms. Baldwin’s complaint, follow-up, any responses and any other information regarding Ms. Baldwin’s complaint be removed immediately and permanently from the CompanyNameSucks.com website and any other website, location or current or future dissemination, including but not limited to that which is currently posted on Facebook, under the control of CompanyNameSucks.com or DDBLG LLC.
I thank you in advance for your time and attention in this matter.
Regards,
David Lombardino
David Lombardino & Associates
1330 Post Oak Blvd., Suite 1600
Houston, TX 77056-3072
877-454-4957
www.The-Draft-Editor.com
Company Name Sucks Response #2
Just in case you are unaware of the law you may wish to contact an attorney who can better explain things to you, The CDA is part of our federal laws. An excellent Wikipedia article discussing the history of the law can be found
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications_Decency_Act.
In short, the CDA provides that when a user writes and posts material on a website such as Company Name Sucks, the site itself cannot, in most cases, be held legally responsible for the posted material. Specifically, 47 U.S.C. § 230(c)(1) states, “No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.”
Because the reviews on Company Name Sucks are authored by users of the site, we cannot be legally regarded as the “publisher or speaker” of the reports contained here, and hence we are not liable for reports even if they contain false or inaccurate information.
So, why should you care about the CDA? Well, it’s simple — if someone posts false information about you on Company Name Sucks, the CDA prohibits you from holding us liable for the statements which others have written.
If you file a lawsuit which you know contains false claims, or if you sue without first conducting a reasonable investigation as to the law as it may pertain to the facts of your case (such as determining the identity of the author of the Review(s) you are concerned about), you and/or your attorney can be subject to serious sanctions at the judge’s discretion.
In addition to penalties a judge may issue, those who would threaten us need to be aware of another law which imposes civil liability on anyone who files a frivolous lawsuit. This claim is known as “wrongful use of civil proceedings” and it is defined by § 674 of the Restatement (Second) of Torts as follows:
(a) he acts without probable cause, and primarily for a purpose other than that of securing the proper adjudication of the claim in which the proceedings are based, and
(b) except when they are ex parte, the proceedings have terminated in favor of the person against whom they are brought.
Thanks for your time.
Chris Mitchell
Company Name Sucks
David Lombardino & Associates Response #3
Dear Mr. Mitchell,
Thank you for this information. I will look into the matter further and contact you again if necessary.
Regards,
David Lombardino
David Lombardino & Associates
1330 Post Oak Blvd., Suite 1600
Houston, TX 77056-3072
877-454-4957
www.The-Draft-Editor.com
CONFIDENTIALITY STATEMENT
This message is sent by a document editing and proofreading company and may contain information that is privileged or confidential. If you received this transmission in error, please notify the sender by reply email and delete the message and any attachments.
David Lombardino & Associates Response #4
Dear Mr. Mitchell,
I am writing to you to request the immediate removal of the private and confidential correspondence that you posted without permission at http://www.companynamesucks.com/blog/. I expect your full and immediate compliance in this matter.
Regards,
David Lombardino
David Lombardino & Associates
1330 Post Oak Blvd., Suite 1600
Houston, TX 77056-3072
877-454-4957
www.The-Draft-Editor.com
CONFIDENTIALITY STATEMENT
This message is sent by a document editing and proofreading company and may contain information that is privileged or confidential. If you received this transmission in error, please notify the sender by reply email and delete the message and any attachments.
Company Name Sucks Response #3
David, I at no point agreed to make anything private and or confidential. All corespondence is posted to our blog at our sole discretion.
http://www.companynamesucks.com/blog/contact-us/
Please note the last sentence on the page. It reads * If you ask about removing a review and have not read the remove review page from above we may post your email on the blog, fair warning. So once again, please read the remove review Page
Thanks
Chris
Company Name Sucks
David Lombardino & Associates Response #5
Dear Mr. Mitchell,
I am writing to reiterate my request that the emails I sent to you be removed immediately from everywhere you have posted them.
Any emails that I send and have sent to you are confidential, proprietary and/or protected by intellectual property laws. All emails that I send and have sent to you are labeled clearly as confidential by the confidentiality statement at the bottom of each email. By responding to these emails, you have implicitly accepted the statements in the message as confidential. It is not UP TO YOU to decide what is confidential. Confidential information is “proprietary” information. Any unauthorized use, disclosure or transmission of, or reference to, my confidential and/or proprietary information is a violation of the law. The unlawful and inappropriate “conversion” of confidential information can amount to civil theft. Accordingly, you are prohibited by law from posting, distributing, publishing, transferring, transmitting, disclosing, or otherwise using my information that is confidential, proprietary and/or protected by intellectual property law.
This is not a first amendment issue; rather, it is a primate matter, involving private subject matter. As the owner of confidential information, I have a fundamental right to control the dissemination of my confidential information. A “trade secret” (e.g. KFC chicken recipe), for example, is confidential information. An email detailing a company’s client list is confidential information. An email negotiating contract terms is confidential information. You have no right to unilaterally covet someone else’s confidential information.
With that in mind, I have become aware of information that suggests that you have disclosed, or attempted to disclose, my proprietary and/or confidential information to a third party.
I have an interest in protecting my confidential and/or proprietary information as well as any information that is protected by intellectual property laws. The unauthorized use, disclosure or transmission of, or reference to, my confidential and/or proprietary information is a violation of Texas law.
You are hereby instructed to cease immediately any further attempts to post, distribute, publish, transfer, transmit, disclose or otherwise use my information that is confidential, proprietary and/or protected by intellectual property law. If I confirm on Monday, February 21, 2011, at 12:00 PM CT that you are engaging in, or have engaged in, any conduct that violates your legal obligations, I will be forced to take all actions necessary to protect my information that is confidential, proprietary and/or protected by intellectual property laws. Should you fail to comply with these requirements, or should I learn that you are continuing to use my confidential information, I will be forced to take all actions necessary to protect my information that is confidential, proprietary and/or protected by intellectual property laws. In either case, if I am required to file a lawsuit against you, I will seek monetary damages, injunctive relief, and all attorneys’ fees and costs incurred in the litigation of such a lawsuit. I will also forward this issue to the Better Business Bureau and any other similar establishment, as well as the entity that maintains the Company Name Sucks domain, to put them on notice of your intentional breach of my proprietary rights.
Please respond to this email no later than Monday, February 21, 2011, at 12:00 PM CT and confirm that the information that is confidential, proprietary and/or protected by intellectual property laws has been deleted, destroyed or removed from everywhere it has been posted and that you will not use any of my property from this point forward.
Regards,
David Lombardino
David Lombardino & Associates
Company Name Sucks Response #4
David, if you do not wish your emails to be posted, quit sending them. Its very simple. You know the following 1 the terms of my site, and 2 my past actions what is going to happen to each email. We do not hide our communications here.
Thanks
Chris