PETA Website Owner Has to Give Up Domain

from the no-parodies-when-it-comes-to-animals dept

The owner of a parody site at peta.org which mocks People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals lost his court case. He’s now supposed to turn over the domain, and stop publishing the site, which is for the (fictitious) group “People Eating Tasty Animals”. I can sort of see both sides on this one, but I’m sure some sort of agreement could be made (a very clear and obvious link?).


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Comments on “PETA Website Owner Has to Give Up Domain”

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3 Comments
Other Ryan says:

PC hardliners don't like to be mocked

You expect a group that is so narrowly focused, so totally self-absorbed that they protested people eating rats on Survivor, to tolerate someone mocking them? These people have no sense of humour. They are consumed by righteousness to the point that they lose any sense of perspective. Which is why the sued. But as to why they won, that I can’t figure out. It’s right there in black and white, parody is protected from slander/libel law. A parody can’t be guilty of copyright infringement unless it’s obviously malicious. Somebody dropped the ball on this.

Ed says:

PC hardliners don't like to be mocked

I’m not trying to defend PETA’s actions in general but…

Trademark != Copyright != Patent. I’d like to just ignore everybody who mixes these up, but then there’d be nobody left.

A parody word/phrase/name is a lot easier to defend if it isn’t EXACTLY the same as the item being parodied. PETA attacks McDonalds with an

Ed says:

Re: PC hardliners don't like to be mocked

last comment got cut off, probably by double quotes:

PETA has their own parody, an Unhappy Meal. If they tried to call it a Happy Meal I’m sure McDonalds would have something to say about it. If the guy parodying PETA called his site pEATa then PETA wouldn’t have a legal leg to stand on.

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