The Aftershock Of Stupidity: Lendink Reopens Only To Receive Trolling DMCA Notices
from the effects-and-after-effects dept
It is easy at times to look at some of the stories of the misinformed or abusive on Techdirt, shake our heads at the stupidity of them, and then move on, assuming the issue is passed. This is a misunderstanding of how things work. Rather, when we take into account factors like chilling effects of these cases, they are more like earthquakes in that there is the initial burst of activity followed by the rippling effect and aftershock.
Take, for instance, the story of Lendink Tim Cushing brilliantly outlined a few weeks back. That story helped to create a firestorm in which a large swath of authors were caught up in the backlash of the internet, all because they couldn't be bothered to both know their own contracts and do even a modicum of investigation into the site they decided to lynch. One would think that such a well-publicized backlash, coupled with what was a fairly impressive number of knowledgeable authors who did know their stuff trying to educate the rest, might have a positive ripple effect in favor of Lendink and sites like it. And, perhaps to some degree, it did. But the ignorance of the offending authors also created a negative ripple that has been felt immediately now that Lendink has reopened its site.
From Lendink's Facebook page we learn that they have reopened. And, upon reopening, they almost immediately received what appears to be a bogus DMCA takedown notice.
“Well, I t certainly did not take long before I received my first post-lynch mob DMCA Violation notice. I received the following email from an attorney this morning and promptly responded. I was afterwards advised that they are going to contact Amazon to have the lend status changed and they expect the books to be removed from my site. Yet another example of how people do not understand their agreements with Amazon and fail to realize that Amazon allows affiliate to sell their books even if they are not lendable.”
Lendink then promises to post every single DMCA notice they receive, perhaps banking on the previous internet backlash against authors and rights holders being a deterrent. Now, if this notice was just another ignorant author, that'd be one thing. But, a little sleuthing by the Slashdot crowd seems to indicate that this is just a troll.
A few folks dug and it appears that the “lawyer” who issued it is no lawyer at all, and probably an Internet troll (evidence includes not being listed as a lawyer in PA, using a home address, and sending the takedown from gmail). Or just a really bad lawyer.
The point is that these things don't occur in a vacuum. Regardless of whether the takedown notice is from a lawyer or a troll, the ignorance and overreaction of a group of authors has put Lendink in the sights of others either equally ignorant or else nefarious. The ripples continue and the damage done not completed.
As an author myself, I can't tell my peers how liberating it is to not give a damn about anyone who wishes to share my work. It alleviates me of all the drama against readers. It alleviates me of all potential missteps against legitimate services. It alleviates me of the responsibility for any ripple effects those missteps might cause. Have I read every word of the contracts I've signed? Yes. Do I understand every word of them. Of course not.
Because I don't have to.
Filed Under: dmca, ebooks, lending, takedown
Companies: lendink
Comments on “The Aftershock Of Stupidity: Lendink Reopens Only To Receive Trolling DMCA Notices”
Representing yourself as an attorney is a quick way to get the state bar association knocking at your door, often accompanied by folks dressed in blue and carrying sidearms. Someone’s days as a troll could be cut very short.
God bless and good luck to Lendink. They’ll need it.
In 3...2...1
” I can’t tell my peers how liberating it is to not give a damn about anyone who wishes to share my work. “
Que the trolling about Mike supporting piracy…
In 3...2...1
“Que the trolling about Mike supporting piracy…”
I read that, then looked back up at the headline and realized how insanely appropriate it was. “The Aftershock of Stupidity”. Perfectly sums up the actions/comments that will inevitably appear in this article from the usual critic(s).
my attorney once game me a business card with an AOL address on it. I got another attorney.
“As an author myself, I can’t tell my peers how liberating it is to not give a damn about anyone who wishes to share my work. It alleviates me of all the drama against readers.”
Two things here:
it’s your choice – but don’t make that choice for others who do not choose to go down your path.
(and)
What is good for you may not be good for others. Some people want to spent all their time writing and creating, not marketing and selling. You embrace a certain business model, and nobody gets upsets because you do.
Please stop supporting the very services that hurt the rights of others, it’s really not a great way to make your ideas look better.
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What the fuck does that even mean? Convoluted at best, just plain wrong on purpose at worst.
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This article is about Lendink. What is Lendink doing that is hurting others?
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I got an application for a technical position for which I was hiring that came from an AOL email address very recently. I didn’t call them for an interview.
Troll or shill put up to it to protect a poor author who can’t read?
These authors got to feel the heady rush of being able to force the world to do what they wanted, they are not likely to give up trying to find ways to keep flexing their muscle.
“Some people want to spent all their time writing and creating, not marketing and selling.”
I wish I could spend all my time doing what I want to do. But that’s not how the bills get paid.
Besides, even authors spending “all their time writing and creating” and relying on publishers for sales have to promote their own work from time to time – spreading the word is good for sales. Why are you against a service that cultivates interest in an author’s work?
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Argh, looks like I hit the wrong Reply. Meant in response to the AC above.
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If you want to be an author and only focus on writing not on marketing, then expect two things to happen. One: you will be ripped off by those who do the things you refuse to do. Two: your fans will share your stuff whether you want them to or not.
This is reality, this has always been reality, nothing has changed due to the introduction of the Internet. If you chose to ignore reality, what happens is your own damn fault. Please don’t drag others down with you.
What’s wrong with an AOL email address? It saves keystrokes, and most of the spelling-challenged out there can manage to get it right.
What a bunch of elitist wankers y’all are.
ttterk @ compuserve.com
“As an author myself, I can’t tell my peers how liberating it is to not give a damn about anyone who wishes to share my work. It alleviates me of all the drama against readers.”
The truth is that you’re a failed author who cannot make a living on his writing. How much of your living is derived from the sale of your books?
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“The truth is that you’re a failed author who cannot make a living on his writing.”
So can we expect an apology for this any time soon?
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I would prefer they just post a link to their own work.
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I still have my compuserve email addy I got back in ’92 for working at sears
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why do I owe you a living writing words???
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it’s your choice – but don’t make that choice for others who do not choose to go down your path.
How is LendInk doing that? Answer: It’s not. All of those authors agreed to allow lending in their contracts. So, uh, fail.
Some people want to spent all their time writing and creating, not marketing and selling
Lots of people would love to do that. But if they’re a published author, it’s not possible. You don’t seem to know squat about publishing, but every publisher today asks authors it talks to how THEY are going to handle the marketing and selling of their books.
Please stop supporting the very services that hurt the rights of others
How does LendInk do that?
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“How is LendInk doing that? Answer: It’s not. All of those authors agreed to allow lending in their contracts. So, uh, fail.”
Are you suggesting that authors sign the SPECIFIC right that their books are allowed for lending under their contracts? Or are you looking at the more general library exceptions?
Also, do you really think that the lending provisions of an authors contract, which are generally used to apply to library copies, would apply to individual purchased copies that are then lent through this system?
I don’t think so.
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Are you suggesting that authors sign the SPECIFIC right that their books are allowed for lending under their contracts? Or are you looking at the more general library exceptions?
When you list your ebook in Amazon’s store or B&N’s store, it’s specifically in the term.
So, no, not general exceptions, but explicitly in their contracts. As I said.
Also, do you really think that the lending provisions of an authors contract, which are generally used to apply to library copies, would apply to individual purchased copies that are then lent through this system?
No, the lending terms in the contract are SPECIFIC to the books on Amazon and B&N — and all LendInk does is enable that very thing to happen. It is not about library copies.
I don’t think so.
Because you don’t know what you’re talking about.
As usual.
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He’s getting his name out there with articles like this. I don’t see your name, which is probably a good thing, otherwise we would continue not buying your book, but if we knew your name it would be on purpose, not because you are otherwise a noname author.
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Well that’s about the biggest failure of a comment I’ve ever seen. You’ve already been burned by Mike, but damn, could have made it more obvious you haven’t been keeping up?
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And I want to spend all my time sitting on a warm sandy beach sipping a cool beverage, but you have to deal with the world the way it is, and not the way you wish it to be. They choose to do what they do, and if it requires them to change their way of doing things to fit with the current realities of the publishing business, well…that’s just life. Suck it up and deal with it–or quit.
Talk about a sense of entitlement…these guys got it it in spades.
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“Please stop supporting the very services that hurt the rights of other”
Other than in your fairly limited imagination, how does LendLink hurt anyone? What real rights are they stomping on, rather than the imaginary ones we’ve seen a stable of crap writers jumping up and down claiming they are owed by the world?
I mean it is possible it might hurt authors by allowing consumers to read the tripe many of these limited imagination types might be foisting onto the market, meaning less sales when people see the book is crap.
I notice you took advantage of hiding behind the mantle of an AC, which leads me to suspect your one of the torches and pitchfork set who feel that LendLink was somehow stealing from you. LendLink did NOTHING WRONG, and you can not seem to let the facts get in the way of your righteous indignation.
No books were, are, will be available on LendLink.
It was merely a service to allow people who owned books with the right to lend out the book they purchased to someone who wanted to see the book.
If the book did not offer lending, the site offered a link where the consumer could purchase it. Not a link to an evil website where they could get it for free, written with the blood of innocent babies.
So a service that benefited consumers and authors was taken down by a mass of small minded, huge ego bearing “authors” and even when they were shown they were incorrect they persisted. And now that this is settled than nothing illegal was being done, your still pretending LendLink hurts someones “rights”.
You have the right to post as an AC simply because I’m very certain you lack the moral fiber you demand in others to post your real name so consumers will know what demented author to stay the hell away from.
If at this point you still think you have some sort of special rights, do the world a favor and withdraw from it. You can’t seem to understand the difference between what you think they should be, what your contract and the law says they are.
You made accusations now back them up or, as I’ll politely suggest, shut the fuck up. Forgive my limited vocabulary, I am after all only a published author.
I’m TAC… who the hell are you?
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I am sorry – can you point me to the contract? That would seem to be out of line.
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https://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing/help?topicId=APILE934L348N
May not be the specific agreement any one author/publisher signed to, but it’s what all independent authors agree too, and is likely the baseline of any agreement Amazon makes, and BN probably has a similar one if I were to care enough to look.
5.2.2 deals with the lending program, and states that its an opt-out program, unless signed up for the 70% royalty option which makes the lending program a requirement.
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I LOVE COUPUN BUG DOT COM I LOVE COUPON BUG DOM COT!
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Yup, read that before. That seems to involve you personally lending the book to someone else, not using a service to find someone you don’t know to “borrow” your book.
There is a line crossed WAY BACK THERE, and Mike knows it. There is no provision in the contract to allow for third party “lending” agencies.
I thought you guys had something more than a contract that has already been addressed and debunked.
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Then where’s the line that was crossed? Do the two people lending books have to meet up, go on a date, and decide once and for all that this is the one… who I will lend my single, limited-time copy of book XYZ to?
Also there’s no provision stating that a third party cannot aid customers in finding or connecting with borrowers or lenders, either. And if there were, a number of forums, book clubs, etc, etc would be in a whole lot of trouble.
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Ha! You were proven totally 100% wrong, and so you pretend something different happened.
You’re too funny, dude.
No “line” was crossed. The books have lending enabled. LendInk just enables the lending which is 100% allowed by Amazon’s terms.
You just can’t admit that you rushed in to be a jerk — as you do every day on every post — and got your ass completely handed to you. It’s happened before, and it’ll happen again, but this time quite spectacularly.
Here’s a hint: there’s nothing wrong with saying “shit, guys, sorry, I never bother to understand what I comment on, I just come here to oppose everything said on the site.”
Would be the first honest thing you’ve said in a while.
Mike,
Perhaps you could explain what this means:
“The Kindle Book Lending feature allows users to lend digital books they have purchased through the Kindle Store to their friends and family. Each book may be lent once for a duration of 14 days and will not be readable by the lender during the loan period.”
How does Amazon even know who my friends and family are…
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So let me get this straight, you are attempting to say that because a description of the service (not a contract or agreement or terms of service) that uses the generic term “friends and family” means that Lendink is doing something wrong?
Let’s run with this stupid idea and ask “when would it be right?” do you have to use Lendink more like a dating service? It puts you in contact with some one who has the book you’d like to lend but before you can lend anything you have to spend time getting to know each other? Do you then have to pass some kind of “friendship” test? What makes you some ones friend? Do you have to meet up in real life or is “internet friends” good enough? Who is the grate arbiter of who counts as your freinds? You? Lendink? Amazon?
Try a little harder please
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“Ha! You were proven totally 100% wrong, and so you pretend something different happened.”
Wow Mike, are you desperate or what? I can just picture you dancing a jig and cheering because you think you caught me out, especially after your lousy record in August (including getting Google-exposed).
Anyway, let’s review.
Amazon’s terms to authors specifically allow lending. But they don’t suggest you can give them to a service to lend for you, especially not one that profits from it. I don’t think that the Amazon term considers this as a valid use.
So you can stop dancing the jig for now, at least until you can show where they allow commercial lending. Until then, well… so sorry!
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“The truth is that you’re a failed author who cannot make a living on his writing. How much of your living is derived from the sale of your books?”
I’ll leave what is likely our differing definitions of failure aside for the moment, and instead tell you that writing provides me with a significant percentage of my yearly income. What that percentage is will depend on the income I get from my “regular” job in technology, which fluctuates greatly from year to year, but suffice it so say that writing will generate five figures worth of income for me this year. Is that good enough for you?
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“Amazon’s terms to authors specifically allow lending. But they don’t suggest you can give them to a service to lend for you, especially not one that profits from it. I don’t think that the Amazon term considers this as a valid use.”
Sigh, you’re making the SAME DAMNED MISTAKE the stupid authors did! Let’s make this simple: Lendink is not “given” anything, they simply match lenders and borrowers. They have no content, they simply scrape the Amazon store and list ALL books, with a button next to those authors’ works that CHOSE to enable lending. This is EXACTLY how the program is supposed to work, as evidenced by the fact that Amazon is completely on board with Lendink.
Dude, just fucking admit you were wrong for once….
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Okay, for those in the class who are a bit slow, LENDLINK IS NOT BEING GIVEN ANY BOOKS OR ANYTHING AT ALL FOR THAT MATTER.
Amazon’s terms to authors, in the contract they sign, allow for lending of books. THE BOOKS ARE ALL HOSTED, SOLD AND LENT THROUGH AMAZON. EVEN THOSE ON LENDLINK.
Lendlink is basically like a dating site. You go, look for something that is to your taste and it connects you with someone with similar taste. Then on the book page, in order to lend the book, you click on the “lend” part and it sends you right back to Amazon where the actual lending takes place.
Oh, and there is no commercial lending. Lendlink used to be an Amazon affiliate, which might be the part you’re referring to, but as has been pointed out, by Lendlink itself and others, due to changes in the Amazon affiliate program, regarding California, the affiliate program no longer is available to those in California. As such, Lendlink does not in any way gain any financial compensation through it’s affiliate status.
To put even more simply, just for you, THEY DO NOT COMMERCIALLY PROFIT FROM SALES DIRECTED TO AMAZON OR THE LENDING CONNECTIONS THEY ALLOW USERS TO MAKE.
No one’s dancing a jig, people are just kind of pointing out that you were wrong, have been proven wrong, continue to be proven wrong, and rather than just give up and/or admit you were wrong… you keep digging your heels in and claiming things that A. aren’t true and B. changing your comments to try and still be right.
Face it, AC, you were wrong. Just admit it and get lost from this article already. It’s still early in the day, there’ll be plenty more articles and plenty more time for you to try and think you made a point and not look as ridiculous as you currently do.
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Writing books or does this include other writing?
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That’s deep man, I sometimes wonder myself who my real friends are.
In 3...2...1
“cue”
(or *possibly* ‘queue’, but that is a stretch…)
no thanks necessary…
hee hee hee
ho ho ho
ha ha ha
ak ak ak
art guerrilla
aka ann archy
eof
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Try lending them a Ebook, if you can then you have proof they are!… apparently.
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“Writing books or does this include other writing?”
Sorry if that wasn’t clear the first time (I mean that sincerely; reading back on my comment I can see it probably wasn’t), but I mean writing as a whole. My writing is all tangentially (sp?) intertwined. For instance, I write fiction based ALWAYS on a component of technology (Digilife is the best but not only example of this), I write about technology here, and even my writing as a whole is intertwined with my “real” job working as a technology consultant.
So, I meant writing as a whole. Am I making money hand over fist strictly from my three novels? No, but so what? I make SOME money from it, I make some from writing elsewhere, from my technology job (I should mention that I actually have clients that read Techdirt and have read my books), and a couple of other avenues, too 🙂
As a 30 year old man, I judge that I am doing well for myself. Part of that “well” is my writing. I’ve produced three books (four if you count the novel I wrote in college, but I don’t because it’s fucking AWFUL), I write here, and I work full time. The idea that works aren’t created without massive compensation due to copyright is the very ANTITHESIS of my life thus far.
Sorry for the long-winded answer to a short question, but there you have it….
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“Dude, just fucking admit you were wrong for once….”
In some ways, you are wrong as well – why can’t you admit it? Why can’t Mike admit it when he punts it?
I got certain things wrong, yes, but the terms were not posted here to verify. Having seen that, I can read the terms and understand their intent, which it to let people lend books to their friends and family members.
Lendink profits from connecting people to do this, making someone’s circle of “friends” into all of the billions of people online.
My feeling is that the authors were not considering this scale of lending when they signed up, and certainly the terms don’t seem to indicate it.
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You missed the point. Mike didn’t come into this discussion with his guns a’blazing to try and prove another person wrong, you did, and then you got mad because no one took you seriously.
Either way, here’s a quote from amazon abotu the lending policy: “Kindle books can be loaned to another reader for a period of 14 days.”
http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=200549320
“Friends and family” do not matter in this case.
On top of that, Lendink’s profits do not just come from referring people to Amazon. You are allowed to use the website as a service to lend out your own books, whether or not they’re on Amazon.
The fact remains that this is actually giving authors tons of free exposure fro their books not just through Amazon but also through Lendink. Whether it’s illegal to do so has not been commented on by Amazon, however if Lendink is data mining then it’s a whole other story.
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Another interesting tidbit…
“I have not made any income from Lendink.com. It was kept alive in the hopes that Amazon would some day open up the affiliate program to California businesses again.”
http://www.digitalmediamachine.com/2012/08/what-happened-to-lendink-owner-explains.html
False DMCA notices
should be charged a flat fee of $ 5,000 per notice. After filing a dozen or so, the trolls would be out of business.
Or maybe a flat fee of $5,000 to even send the notice, to be refunded if it really is a valid takedown?
So, one question to clear up a bit of confusion on my part. The headline says the site received DMCA notices, but the article only mentions one, that seems to be from a troll. Am I missing information suggesting there have been others, or is the headline misleading (intentionally or otherwise)?
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For your view pleasure, the first DMCA Violation Notice. They actually sent me this email numerous times. I guess to drive home their point.
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I assume that’s from one of the linked articles that I unfortunately can’t read at work. Evens so, that only indicates one notice. The fact that the sender sent the email multiple times doesn’t make it multiple notices
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Split hairs however you’d like.
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Yeah… is that before or after the “sponsorship / buy advertising” link on the site itself?
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Sorry, but you still have yet to point out where this legally conflicts with Amazon’s interests.
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“Okay, for those in the class who are a bit slow, LENDLINK IS NOT BEING GIVEN ANY BOOKS OR ANYTHING AT ALL FOR THAT MATTER.”
Let the legal tap dancing begin.
What is their business? Are they not in the business of helping people obtain a book for free? I know, they don’t PHYSICALLY handle the book. But at some point, they are key in people avoiding paying for a book. That counts for something in the deal. After all, people aren’t using the site for weather reports. They are there to get something for nothing.
So how wrong am I? They are middlemen, creating a business which doesn’t exist otherwise, for a product that they have no rights to. Hmmm!
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And so are the libraries your tax dollars help keep open.
Hasn’t this country been built on people creating businesses whish didn’t exist before. Besides that they don’t have any “Product”. They neither stock books, host books, or handle any books. In it’s most basic form, they’re a search engine for people looking for other people who have books to lend.
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The only legal tapdance seems to be coming from you. You’re being willfully ignorant. Kinda need to stop that.
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The product is connecting people, to use a service legally provided by another (Amazon and BN). And someone did pay for the book: the lender, who bought a lendable copy of the book. If they had bought a non-lendable version of the book, then you might have a point, but the right to lend the ebooks is given by the retailers as part of buying the book itself.
And even if that wasn’t the case, allowing this kind of service makes perfect sense. It can have the same effect as those special deals in certain restaurants: Eat this extremely large meal in X amount of time and its free! Some people may be able to finish a book in the 14-day period, some may not. Those who don’t finish will likely be emotionally invested in finishing the book and buy it without a second thought. And even if they do, its free marketing for future books by the author.
And if the author or publisher doesn’t like that, thats fine. Opt out of the lending program and it’ll never be an issue. The only people complaining are the ones who never read the contract.
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“What is their business? Are they not in the business of helping people obtain a book for free? I know, they don’t PHYSICALLY handle the book. But at some point, they are key in people avoiding paying for a book. That counts for something in the deal. After all, people aren’t using the site for weather reports. They are there to get something for nothing.
So how wrong am I? They are middlemen, creating a business which doesn’t exist otherwise, for a product that they have no rights to. Hmmm!”
Hmm…. So what you’re saying is Pixel of Ink and Kindle Nation Daily are illegal?
I submitted a related story a while back, An author I contacted in relation to this story and after having read how hard a time she was having promoting herself decided to share some of her works via torrent, she asked me for help as she is quite…..unskilled at such things.
full story here
http://ashentech.com/index.php?topic=3042.msg20253
torrent here
http://h33t.com/torrent/4073471/g-l-drummond-gayla-drummond-ebook-sampler-1
please feel free to comment on the torrent and/or forums post(its my forums), the author is posting in that thread as you can see.
and please, grab and share the books, I havent had time to give them a read yet, but i can say, shes a very nice woman, very polite, she also stood up against the twit mob as best she could….tried to stop the idiocy…..
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What is their business? Are they not in the business of helping people obtain a book for free?
Ok…so what’s illegal about that?
bagus mang