~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ eye WEEKLY September 1 1994 Toronto's arts newspaper .....free every Thursday ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ EYE NET EYE NET ALL HAIL THE CHIC GEEK! Scum-sucking weasel lawyers as fashion statements by K.K. CAMPBELL Coupla weeks ago, eye Net reported how North Carolina university student Joel Furr (jfurr@acpub.duke.edu) designed a popular collectible -- T-shirts about net.poltergeist "Serdar Argic." Furr promised to follow-up with a T-shirt featuring Arizona lawyers Laurence Canter and Martha Siegel. On June 18, eye Net reported how this wife-and-hubby law team sent an ad for the American "Green Card lottery" to thousands of newsgroups (win a work permit raffle run by the U.S. government; C&S offered to fill in a few forms for merely hundreds of dollars). This posting tactic is called "spamming." C&S did it twice. Spammers are loathed. Commercial spammers are loathed more. Snotty lawyer commercial spammers attain monumental loathing. So 'twas no surprise C&S were mailbombed into oblivion after each spam attack against Usenet. Both times, the lawyer's Internet providers terminated their account after a global deluge of complaints. The legal weasels squealed in anger and threatened to sue their Internet providers. But nothing came of it. Now they've threatened to sue Furr over his little non-profit T-shirt featuring the net.vermin. Shirt design features a four-color logo of a hand clutching a green card bursting forth from a globe. Around it: "The Green Card Lawyers -- Spamming the Globe." On Aug. 8, Furr publicly announced C&S had sent him private email, a standard nasty-lawyer letter. C&S asserted the "use of their names, likenesses or nickname is prohibited" -- meaning he couldn't even call them, "The Green Card Lawyers." Furthermore, Furr was informed "several large companies" had contacted the lawyers about a line of C&S T-shirts and Furr's plan to sell maybe 10 dozen shirts "would hurt their marketability." A clarification: Furr's shirt mocks C&S -- who the hell would wear it, let alone buy it, otherwise? The claim that "several large companies" are considering issuing a friendly C&S shirt is a source of much mirth and merriment about Planet Earth. Furr knew C&S was fullashit -- indeed, most of Usenet-reading Planet Earth is sure they're fullashit -- but, being a student, he knew he'd neither the time nor resources to fight a nuisance suit. Thus he concluded his Aug. 8 public post: "I think I have lots and lots of legal legs to stand on, but I can't afford to fight a lawsuit." The term "Green Card Lawyers" would be removed from the shirt. But Furr's mailbox soon brimmed with offers of legal assistance, even monetary help -- anything to thwart the most hated husband- wife team in Usenet history. (And Canter has said several times he's going to write a book about how to advertise on the net!) Electronic Frontier Foundation's chief legal counsel Mike Godwin (mnemonic@eff.org) advised Furr C&S "threats" were impotent bluster, Furr told eye in a telephone interview, because 1) C&S are not members of the Arizona bar; 2) they are under investigation by the Tennessee bar; 3) they can sue only in the state in which Furr does business; and 4) they have no trademark over the term "Green Card Lawyers." This last means that just because Usenetters call C&S the "Green Card Lawyers" doesn't grant them a trademark on the term. For instance, eye calls them the "Two-Bit, Suck-My-Left-Nut Lawyers" -- Martha and Larry don't own that name either. Bottomline: Furr's going ahead with the original design. "Green Card Lawyers" T-shirts are $11 U.S. -- XXL $1 more, XXXL $2 more. Canadians add $1. Write Furr for more details. To join the net.collectibles mailing list, send email with the message "subscribe netstuff" (without the quotes) to majordomo@acpub.duke.edu . For the latest on the net.vermin, read alt.flame.canter-and-siegel . YOU DON'T SAY?! 1. How many weeks did The Canadian Internet Handbook hold No. 1 on Canada's non-fiction paperback bestseller list? Six 2. How many email messages has the White House received since last summer? 200,000 3. How many were email death threats? One 4. How many companies registered on the net last April alone? 14,726 5. How many "Internet hosts" (that is, computer systems hooked directly to the net, like Internex Online) were there for June? 2.3 million 6. How many banned Paul Teale/Karla Homolka news stories were reprinted on the Internet? All of them 7. How many people on the Internet know you're a dog? 0 That's a sampling of The Internet Index, the one-man project of Win Treese (treese@openmarket.com). Treese came up with the idea last summer, when working at Digital Equipment Corporation in the U.S. "Some people wanted some fun Internet facts, and I tried to make the presentation amusing," he told eye. The Index first circulated inside Digital Corp., but employees launched it out to cyberspace, where it took on a life of its own. Treese began receiving hundreds of email queries from strangers because of newspaper references to it. So he's opened an official mailing list starting with the Aug. 2 Index. "It will come out about once a month now, the Internet seems to generate enough interesting facts to keep that up," he says. To get the Index, send the message "subscribe internet-index" (without the quotes) to internet-index-request@openmarket.com . Toronto news media should definitely subscribe. It's a treasure of interesting facts for the files. Web users can get the list, with sources, from http://www.openmarket.com/info/internet-index/current.html . MORE FREE EATS A new "alternative" genre online music publication just came up about a month ago -- Consumable Online features reviews, interviews, commentary, etc. Has a print version, about 32 pages. Electronic version is sent out every fortnight. To get it in your mailbox, write editor Bob Gajarsky in New Jersey (gajarsky@pilot.njin.net) personally, as it's not an automated mailing list. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Retransmit freely in cyberspace Author holds standard copyright Full issue of eye available in archive ==> gopher.io.org or ftp.io.org Mailing list available http://www.io.org/eye eye@io.org "Break the Gutenberg Lock..." 416-971-8421