Threats due to official LL surname........

[Countess Foulsbane]

So today I log in to SL for the first time in several months to find a notecard with the following (I have removed the identifying name with xxxx):

Dear [xxxxx or Foulsbane]

My name is xxxxxx Foulsbane ©.  You are hereby notified that your account name is infringing on my intellectual property for which I own copyright.

"You may not select as your Account Name any name that Linden Lab determines may cause deception or confusion; may violate any trademark right, copyright, or other proprietary right or mislead other users regarding your identity or affiliation."

http://secondlife.com/corporate/tos.php

"3.2 You agree to use an Account Name in Second Life that is not misleading, offensive or infringing. You are responsible for activities related to your Account Name, and for keeping your password for this Account secure.

You may not select as your Account Name any name that Linden Lab determines may cause deception or confusion; may violate any trademark right, copyright, or other proprietary right or mislead other users regarding your identity or affiliation;"




You have three options.

(Option One)
We can settle this together.  The problem is that other users may be confused or mislead that you are connected to my (product name of some unheard of thing)
This will cause my business financial loss as well as loss to the secondlife community due to the denied access to an extremely beneficial algorithm that speeds up rez time.  The solution for me to allow your continued use of my copyright, is for you to come to my store

 and create a new pick linking to the (product name) in your profile so that users may find it.  This pick must be at the TOP of your picks page on your profile, and must read exactly as the top pick in my profile does.


(Option Two)
Login to your account at http://Secondlife.com
Click "Account" on the top left of the page.
Click "Cancel Account" and confirm.

(Option Three)
I will file a DMCA with Linden Labs against your account.
I will subpoena your real life personal information from Linden Labs.
Then I will file a class action lawsuit in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania against anyone that uses my Intellectual Property in their account name.  You will be required to appear in person or I will win my case by default.  I will sue for damages times ten, attorney fees, and financial loss of my business.


I will be automatically checking your (and other accounts) profile picks in mass with a program.  Failure to post my pick at the top of your profile picks page will be considered a violation and I will take FULL legal action against you to the maximum amount the law will allow.


I have hopes that we can work this out to both of our benefit.
Sincerely,
xxxxx Foulsbane

Now since the surname Foulsbane was available circa 2008, and there was indeed 1672 avatars given that surname I would consider this notecard to be harrasment and making threats. I find it impossible to believe that a person can copyright a legitimate LL surname.

Can anyone shed some light on whether this is in fact possible?

I have absolutely NO intention of creating a pick in my profile to some product I have never even heard of linked to what I can only say based on this notecard is a shady type of business. Nor do I have any intention of deleting this account regardless of the fact that I rarely log in nowdays.

[Tiffy Vella]

They are ridiculous, and you should completely ignore them.

[Tiffy Vella]

Also, as a Countess, I'm sure you trump any of their claims.

 

 

Just going to edit to add that I see very few Vellas about the place these days, because maybe we have all grown a little aged. But when I do, I feel a little joy, and always like to see a cousin Vella doing well. None of us own our names, or can copyright them. In fact, I know some of us have RL humans with our exact names, and if anything, they own them first. Not that they even can, but if anyone could, they would have first dibs. This guy/chick sounds like an out and out scammer, trying to see what he/she can get. It would be interesting to see if he/she is trying it on all the Foulsbanes.

[Syo Emerald]

Ignore that idiot. You can't own a lastname, especially one that is given out in a virtual world. I also don't believe this person has a serious business, that is registered anywhere. Just block that person and don't care about it.

[Bellusdae]

If it was me, I would tell the person 'go **bleep** yourself' and report this idiot.

 

Don't let this **bleep** try and push you about...

 

 

Much love to you, and always ask if you want any help ingame.

 

Bellusdae.

X

[Countess Foulsbane]

Thank you for the replies. I was pretty sure he had no legal leg to stand on and were trying to use bully-boy tactics to get hits for his obviously failing business. But wanted to check for sure.
I did report them as I believe that this form of behaviour is unacceptable, and possibly breaking TOS itself.

 

To Tiffy, oh I am absolutely sure my Countess trumps any commoner name :womanwink:

I am pretty sure he is trying it on all the Foulsbanes (the notecard was sent today as I got the email message for it). Also is sending it to all avatars with his First name as well. I really hope none are intimidated and fall for this scam.

 

My main still plays on a daily basis and this is the first time I have heard of anything like this happening. I would hope it is the last also.

hugs to everyone that replied
xoxoxox

 

 

[Tiffy Vella]

---

Countess Foulsbane wrote:

 

I am pretty sure he is trying it on all the Foulsbanes (the notecard was sent today as I got the email message for it).

Also is sending it to all avatars with his First name as well.

I really hope none are intimidated and fall for this scam.

 

 

---

Crap.....hope this wasn't a Tiffy Foulsbane! Dude will get a mouthfull from me if so!

[Bellusdae]

If he did have a legal leg to stand on then based on my RL surname I could easily trump myself over many companies and become one of the richest people alive....

It's the same principles as writing a letter to Ferrari saying : 'My name is Smith and Ferrari is a translation of Smith, which means you have been earning money in my name, so I want all profits the company generates.'

 

Court wouldn't even let the case waste their time.

 

And Countess, do you need some loyal subjects to chase this ne'er do well with torches and pitchforks?

 

X

[Tamara Artis]

I have recently opened a store. Should I copy the text you got, paste it into a new notecard and send to 691 people that I found in search, that have the same surname as mine? LOL yeah right

[Bellusdae]

Being a 'Resident' I think I would crash the servers sending out that many notecards....

[Qie Niangao]

I think I can guess which Foulsbane is stirring up trouble. Again.

[Countess Foulsbane]

Hi Qie, yeah you are right. The notecard is created by him, and sent out by an object created by her.

So wait, these ninnies are trying to intimidate people over something from 2010? Don't they have lives...........or even hobbies? Sad really, almost feel sorry for people so stuck in the past and so obsessive..... almost. But don't.

I call this bizarre!

I may make an account and go post this latest piece of stupidity for their amusement.

[Tiffy Vella]

Oh God I remember all that! And something about leopards and spots.

[mikka Luik]

Talk about a lack of imagination - I mean word for word From 2010

[Innula Zenovka]

He's an idiot and a bully who has tried this stunt before, and dropped it when it became clear people were prepared to call his bluff.   See this thread at SLU (not the same one as referenced above) for further and better particulars of how the matter resolved itself).

 

[Countess Foulsbane]

So wait...

This guy and his female offshoot are serial losers?

I think it is called mental illness when you get this obsessive over something, particularly a name.

[wesleytron]

Ah I see. He/she once developed a bit of code to automatically control your draw distance from low to higher to improve rez times of closer objects. Someone called Winter Ventura notes in one of the threads referenced above "I wish LL would just change the "interest" algorithm so that close prims and textures load first."

That is of course pretty much what they are now doing with Project Interesting. I wonder if this person is coming out of the woodwork now in a last-ditched attempt to promote and sell products that are going to have no use to anyone who buys them after the release of some upcoming viewer update?

[Countess Foulsbane]

Yep that is the exact notecard that was sent today prior to me logging in. 4 years later....

[Celestiall Nightfire]

Extortion.  On the Internet.  Report it to the FBI:

"Persons who have committed or are planning to commit bank robbery, kidnapping, extortion, or thefts of valuable art, large interstate shipments of goods, or monetary instruments; and Activities of violent gangs."

http://www.fbi.gov/contact-us/when

 

Or report it to the IC3 division of the FBI.  "Online Extortion" is specically listed.

http://www.ic3.gov/default.aspx

 

 

 

 

[Celestiall Nightfire]

---

Qie Niangao wrote:

I think I can guess which Foulsbane is stirring up trouble.

Again

.

---

Thanks.  Adding that person to my bann list. 

[Bree Giffen]

That letter sounds serious and may actually convince some people to cancel their accounts. I wonder how LL will react to someone trying to make people cancel their revenue generating accounts. The last thing they would want is to give this person any legitimacy and establish a precedent. If I were LL, I'd be banning that person asap.

[Bellusdae]

Bann and hang the avatar by the ankles (all limp) over a public area.... Like what used to be done with pirates and thieves...

[Pussycat Catnap]

Al those other Catnaps in SL are in for it now.

/wheremahlawyerz@?

 

I think I'll trademark the name 'BabyGirl' in SL, and then send all the avatars on XXX sims with that name a demand for a one time 1L liscense.

I'll be able to afford buying ALL of Blake Sea in about a day.

And then I will send the rest of the notices, to the female avatars with that name - and have enough to buy the entire rest of SL.

 

Yeah... trademarking a common name. Not going to work.

 

[bigmoe Whitfield]

Ah yes, I firmly remember when this person went on a tangent with the emerald speed rez....  

 

suffice to say, he can not make any real legal threat upon you, he can try scare tactics, but that is all they are.   since he's had other cases dismissed for such things it seems by reading whats on SLU, then I can pretty much say he's not got a leg to stand on. 

so, hun, just ignore the person and mute and what ever else you have to do.  it's proven, there nuts.

[Kelli May]

This is possibly the stupidest attempt to make some kind of IP-based threat I've ever read. 

If his SL surname is Foulsbane, all Foulsbanes were infringing IP of the first person to create an account using that surname by merely creating that account. I seriously doubt *he* was the first to create a 'Foulsbane' account (it's possible, but given that there are so many, not likely). By extension, anyone using an SL surname is breaching some kind of IP right if they weren't the first to use that surname.

If his RL surname is Foulsbane, he'd have more of a chance. It's still cosmically unlikely. If anyone has a claim, it's Stephen R. Donaldson, who wrote the novel "Lord Foul's Bane" in 1977. I suppose I (and all other Mays) had better watch out in case Vannessa, Brian, James or Imelda try to claim against me.