Wal-Mart Good neighbour act
p2pnet.net News:- “Doing the good things neighbours do,” is one of the slogans that rotates through when you hit the Wal-Mart Foundation, a subsidiary that promotes community development.
Not at all incidentally, C&D notices, or Cease and Desist orders are wonderful weapons used by the likes of the entertainment industry cartels to stomp anyone who gets in their way, preferably individuals and entities who are easily intimidated and who don’t have the financial or legal resources to contest the notices.
They’re also used by Big Music cartel customerWal-Mart which probably thought they’d cause Carnegie Mellon University student Daniel Papasian, who’d had the nerve to put up a site that lampooned Wal-Mart’s ‘good neighbor’ web page, to cave in when Wal-Mart’s lawyers ordered him to take it down. Immediately.
image /p2pnet
The site was a project for the College of Fine Arts ‘Parasitic Media’class that encourages students to participate in political criticism through the tactical use of satire in the mainstream media.
Other class projects include mcactive.com, a parody of McDonald’s Go Active campaign, and 700-club.org, which announces the online sale of indulgences for Catholics.”
"The site was a form of ‘identity correction,’ in which I used a parody to highlight real problems with companies like Wal-Mart,” says Papasian. “My site was designed to get people thinking about the consequences of importing goods from countries with poor labor laws, the environmental effects of big-box stores, and whether Wal-Mart is as benign as some would like us to believe.
"The site was designed to look like a page belonging to the real Foundation, but I can’t imagine anyone who read the site didn’t realize it was a parody."
The C&D shot alleges copyright infringement, claiming Papasian’s usage of graphics found on the real Wal-Mart Foundation site broke the DMCA (to Digital Millennium Copyright Act), another tool much-loved by the entertainment cartels and their adherents, often when the phrase ‘fair use’ crops up.
And indeed, Papasian believes the content of his site is protected as "fair use" and says Wal-Mart is trying to shut him down by going after him for copyright infringement,
“But I have a hard time believing that’s what they care about,” he says.
“They didn’t even bother to contact me to ask thatanything be removed from my site. They’re not worried because my page has a similar layout or design. They’re worried because my ideas are a threat to them. They’re threatened by my belief that big corporations like Wal-Mart have too much influence on the world. Multinational corporations have won immense powers over governments with recent international trade agreements, so it’s no surprise they’re going to start going after people directly."
Papasian is not, however, giving up, and intends to post his experiences.
"I don’t want to get sued," he states, "But I won’t be silenced."
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See:-
post his experiences – Wal-Mart attempts to censor parody website, April 28, 2005
April 29th, 2005 at 12:59 am
being in walmart for six years and in the managment training program I am not a bit suprised at this. they may be a fun place for people to shop but they are not the people and family oriented business they proclaim to be. Sam Waltons Kids are a group of spoiled brats who took their inheitence to live the life of luxury off their fathers hard work and left it up to the lawyers and accountants to run the company. it’s a very cut throat company. Sam would be turning over in his grave if he saw what was being done in his name.
Rick
April 29th, 2005 at 1:52 am
So, what does the pic have to do with anything?
Every coporate chain that has ever been formed does business in the most favorable way possible towards itself. That involves putting the competition out of business. How many places do you think malls put of of business. Grocery chains? K-Mart? Barnes&Noble? Anyone remember A&P? Once they were so large, only GM was bigger. I particularly loved it here in Ohio when a mall put another one out of business. Everyone complained about how the new mall was taking stores away from the community, until someone pointed out how many little stores went away when the first mall came in.
If you’re going to gripe, dump the tired “Wal-Mart destroys small business” tirade. Every corporation in existance survives by putting it’s competitors out of business. Let’s focus on the fact that Wally World is a crappy place to work.