LAWS THAT PERMIT BIG TO WIPE OUT LITTLE

FatWallet Files Lawsuit Challenging Both Retailers` Demands for Removal of Thanksgiving Sales Price Web Postings and Subpoenas Seeking Posters` Identities

ROSCOE, Ill., Nov 26, 2003 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Faced with demands by national retailers under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act to remove Thanksgiving sales information from its web site for the second year in a row, FatWallet, Inc. filed a lawsuit yesterday in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois seeking a declaration that these demands constitute an abuse of the DMCA and violate the First Amendment rights of both FatWallet and its users (FatWallet, Inc. v. Best Buy Enterprise Services, Inc., et al., Case No. 03C50508).

The lawsuit alleges it was a response to "takedown" notices received by FatWallet over the last few weeks from Best Buy, Kohl's Department Stores, and Target Corporation, each of whom demanded that FatWallet remove from its web site user postings containing Thanksgiving sales price information on the grounds that the information was protected by copyright. Best Buy took things a step further, sending FatWallet a subpoena requesting that it identify the person who posted the information. Because the subpoena was not properly served and suffered from other procedural defects, FatWallet notified Best Buy that it would not identify the poster. Shortly before Thanksgiving 2002, FatWallet received a similar subpoena from Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., as well as takedown notices from retailers including Best Buy, Target, K-Mart, Inc., and Jo-Ann Stores.

"The posting on a web site of sales price information is not the proper subject of a subpoena or a takedown notice under the DMCA. Hopefully, by filing this lawsuit, FatWallet will be able to put an end to this repeated misuse of the DMCA's special subpoena and notice provisions and ensure that its First Amendment rights, and the First Amendment rights of its users, are fully protected," said Rachel Matteo-Boehm, an attorney with Steinhart & Falconer LLP, one of the law firms representing FatWallet in the suit.

"Our users should be able to freely post and discuss factual information, like sales prices, without being sued or accused of copyright infringement, and we hope that by filing this lawsuit, we will be protecting these important consumer rights," said Tim Storm, FatWallet's founder and President.

FatWallet, Inc. is a venue for consumer-to-consumer communication as well as business-to-consumer marketing. FatWallet is represented by Ms. Matteo-Boehm, Roger Myers, and Eugene Pak of Steinhart & Falconer LLP in San Francisco, California, and Troy E. Haggestad of Williams & McCarthy in Rockford, Illinois.

Steinhart & Falconer LLP Rachel E. Matteo-Boehm, 415-442-0844 Fax: 415-442-0856 rmatteo-boehm@steinhart.com

Mixed feelings on this one. Fat Wallet relies on leaks from ad agencies, printers, and newspapers to "scoop" upcoming ad prices. One would assume that these retailers have non-disclosure agreements which are legally enforceable, if the perp can be fingered. Thanksgiving week is the most competitive retail week of the year and releasing prices early may give competitors an unfair advantage. That having been said, I read Fat Wallet, Anandtech, etc religiously.....

If ad agnecies, printers etc are the ones who leak info in violation of the agreements they have with companies who pay their rent, they are the ones who need to be sued, not consumers sharing "available" information.

To sue consumers for engaing in price shopping is stupid, and will wreck our economy. That is the "point" of consumers, to get the best deal they can find.

The country is filled right now with legal actions agaisnt the "wrong targets".

The story says:
Best Buy took things a step further, sending FatWallet a subpoena requesting that it identify the person who posted the information.

Can't plug a leak without determining who the leaker is. Best Buy's request seems a reasonable way to determine where the leak was.

Yes that is true, you need to get the data to backstep to the leak. But a consumer sharing "in the public domain and available" information should not be held accountable for the sins of the perps who "leaked" it. Getting that name should be a "request" (ask the operson responsible), not a "demand", with an offer of immunity attached to it as well.

I am damn tired of seeing innocents trampled because the powers that be are too damn arrogant to ask for permission first. Let's remiond them that their salaries come from "sales", and that means the consumer.

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