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Hold them accountable? For what? Anyone can set up a storefront at CafePress and sell t-shirts, mousepads, etc with any graphic on them you want. This is an e-business - I doubt a human being ever saw the graphic in question until (I'm guessing) someone complained, and they apparently did the right thing and removed it.

I'll hold them accountable for allowing it to be posted. Such a thing as corporate ethics. I've already started my chain letter...

Allowing it to be posted? This is an automated web site, with nobody, as far as I know, policing what's offered. How about the posts on FR? Who allows those to be posted? This works the same way - Use their equivalent of the abuse button and it will be elevated to human attention. I'm sure at that point it will be removed, if it hasn't already

I have bought and sold from them in the past, as do many on FR (they print up all of Registered's stuff for purchase)

I received the following e-mail from CafePress today:

Thank you for your email to CafePress.com regarding the merchandise promoting the recent tragedy in NYC and Washington DC.

CafePress.com agrees that the design was in poor taste, and we have removed it from our service. CafePress.com allows users to design and sell their own merchandise. As soon as we learned of the offensive merchandise being sold through our service, we immediately closed the store and removed the member from our service.

We would like to extend our prayers and thoughts to the victims of the recent events in NY and Washington D.C. and their families. Many members of the CafePress.com community have been directly affected by the tragedy - we even have employees that have losses in their own families.

Briefly:

* CafePress.com does not design the merchandise on our site. We host online stores and help people sell their own merchandise. It is impossible for us to monitor everything that gets posted on our service as it gets posted.

* We DO have a high standard for what stays on the site - and remove things that are not up to that standard. In this case - we removed the store within minutes of the first person reaching our offices this morning.

* And in true American spirit, we refuse to chase negativity with more negativity. Thus we've turned the link around into a positive message. Please feel free to take a look:

http://www.cafepress.com/cp/store/productdetail.aspx?prodno=1468594&zoom=yes

Out heart-felt wishes go out to everyone affected. The strength of America, and of freedom world wide, is in banding together in times of need and supporting positive growth, healing, and rebuilding. If you feel the new page helps support a worthy cause, please let others know.

And as always - we at CafePress.com support our community, and always welcome suggestions. If you have any positive ideas on how we might be able to help out more, please let us know.

With Best Wishes,

CafePress.com

I hate to say I told you so, but...