boycott-riaa.com - Article: Offspring Receives Cease-and-Desist

Offspring Receives Cease-and-Desist

Posted by jark on June 4, 2000 at 10:54 PM (printer friendly)

In a move that would probably not surprise many people, Napster Inc. sent a cease-and-desist letter to The Offspring, and ArtistsDirect, asking for the removal of the Napster related merchandise that is being sold from The Offspring website.

This move that should not be a surprise for anyone involved as The Offspring never received permission from Napster Inc. in order to utilize their trademark in the selling of the merchandise. As a company and a business, it would have been a bad move for Napster to allow this to continue, no matter how cool we all think it is.

According to a spokesman for the band, speaking on the condition of anonymity, "The band were totally taken by surprise and reluctant to do anything to disappoint Napster fans and the Napster community." Apparently they will think about this throughout the weekend and make a decision on what to do this coming week. Even though they support Napster and decided to partake in this venture because they, "think that it is funny to fuck with people," the fact remains that they had no legal right to utilize the trademark. One could also argue that Napster does not have the right to "use" the copywritten songs of The Offspring, but that is a whole seperate debate altogether.

User Comments (These do not necessarily reflect the beliefs of this site)


spyed	Date: June 4, 2000 @ 11:06 PM Offspring forced them into that position ... now people will focus on the irony and not the issues. This isn't a point against Napster at all, and I don't think the Offspring realize what an ass hole-ish move this was. Especially if they're pro-napster.

jark	Date: June 4, 2000 @ 11:17 PM I fully agree with you. They tried to capitalize on something that was not theirs to capitalize on. However, the same could be said for the way that Napster Inc. currently works business-wise. Nonetheless, one has nothing to do with the other - and two wrongs do not make a right (didn't your mommies and daddies all teach you this before?). --[ jark ]--

Anonymous	Date: June 5, 2000 @ 12:43 AM agree, it's napster's trademark and if the want to be taken seriously, they have to protect it but can't they get permission from napster to use it or no?

Anonymous	Date: June 5, 2000 @ 1:12 AM "now people will focus on the irony and not the issues." no, the issue here is the irony. napster could have granted permission if they'd wanted to. the fact that they instead chose to pursue litigation is pretty hypocritical. "This isn't a point against Napster at all, and I don't think the Offspring realize what an ass hole-ish move this was." i don't think napster realise what an asshole-ish move this was. they're working at the same level as metallica & friends, yet dmusic supports napster? why is this? oh yeah, sorry, it's 'cos "music is free", isn't it? "two wrongs do not make a right" so why does dmusic advocate piracy as a way of blackmailing record companies into lowering prices? high cd prices: morally wrong. music piracy: legally wrong. can you see where i'm going with this?

Anonymous	Date: June 5, 2000 @ 1:15 AM ack, it's too early, maybe next time i'll actually close my tags. it'll be interesting to see how many people address my point and how many flame me for bad html (although i suspect most messages are just going to ignore me altogether and will be along the lines of "OFFSPRING YUO SUX" ;)

Anonymous	Date: June 5, 2000 @ 2:51 AM The offspring should have, instead of offering the merchandise themselves, provided people with a place to sell their own napster merchandise (using copyrighted logos) Like say a person creates 500 t-shirts with the napster logo on it, then they link that person on their site... that model seems much closer to napster's position

Anonymous	Date: June 5, 2000 @ 9:00 AM Just like Metallica has a right to say "don't use my stuff" Napster reserves the same right. Personally, I'm glad to hear that there is an established group or record company out there supporting Napster. And just in case somebody from Metallica reads this, if it weren't for Napster, I would have never heard Shortest Straw or Dyer's Eve, and if I never heard those, I would have never purchased "...And Justice For All", so stop this BS you're saying about people not buying Metallica albums because of Napster.

Anonymous	Date: June 5, 2000 @ 9:00 AM come on free come on free oh wait not me hahaha..... geeze

Anonymous	Date: June 5, 2000 @ 11:54 AM blah blah blah blah. blah blah.... blah blah blah... blah blah blah blah blah blah... hmmm mmm hummm mmm hmm hmm mmh hum humm muh err hmmm blah blah. humm... mm hum.

Anonymous	Date: June 5, 2000 @ 12:07 PM Hypocracy. Nothing more, nothing less.

Anonymous	Date: June 5, 2000 @ 12:14 PM Hey Anon @ *.mcc.wwwcache.ja.net. I fully agree with you. I am pro napster but you have some excellent points. I was talking to my boss at a radio station yesterday and he basicly told me the same thing you did. I was like hey record labels rip off artists and cd sales are high so we are getting back at them in a way. ANd he was like 2 wrongs don't make a right and you realize your hurting the artist even more than the label by pirating their stuff.

Anonymous	Date: June 5, 2000 @ 1:27 PM visit Stormside.. http://stormside.cjb.net fuck off Metallica...

Anonymous	Date: June 5, 2000 @ 1:39 PM Napster does not pirate music. They have, in fact taken steps to stop it from occuring. Therefore it is not a hypocritical move to order The Offspring to stop using their logo without their permission. And in fact, it reinforces their position. Think: If they had allowed The Offspring to use the logos for free....what would the judge in the case think? 'Obviously, this Napster program is a "let-people-do-whatever-they-want" thing. Copyrights are meaningless, and everyone is pirating. Therefore it is illegal.' So I'm sure it was a no-brainer at Napster to put a stop to it.

Anonymous	Date: June 5, 2000 @ 5:41 PM I have created a program similar to mediaenforcer that stop piracy on gnutella. It searches automatically for pirated mp3s. Not only that but it will sabotage gnutella by returning bogus results when someone searches for mp3s. It will also track down pirated mp3s on napster. When users try to be "sneaky", little do they know that putting a false metallica title on a legal mp3 will only get them in trouble. After all, it is napster that will have to kick them off napster and they will keep getting kicked off if they come back on. The whole point is that those individuals who would steal other's hard work and be cheap about it, will have a much harder time pirating. In addition, it will make file sharing programs so bad for pirating that only the most advanced and determined users will use them. I am developing a similar program for cutemx, chat programs like mirc, scour exchange, I will continue developing my programs for new piray programs that are developed. Oh and by the way, pirate boys, its time to stop being cheap and get a real job!!!

Anonymous	Date: June 5, 2000 @ 6:00 PM As for the user above, everyone is well aware that a reg clean will get you back onto napster, and trying to sabatoge gnutella? Keep on coding dude, not enough people on your side to make your little program effective. Pirates way out number so called "Do Gooders" as yourself. As far as the the napster is concerned, no need to file a law suit. Maybe they should print up a bunch of offspring shirts and stickers and sell them on thier faq page. Hey sounds like a great business model to me!!!! out

Evilkow	Date: June 6, 2000 @ 1:35 AM Well said! If you can code a program to sabatoge Gnutella, you can code one to fix it. Keep wasting your time while thousands of people are working against you, moron. Good job to Napster for the compromise with The Offspring.