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[Avelardo]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(strachwitz @ Jan 25 2007, 01:53 PM) [snapback]276446[/snapback]</div>

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Morrin @ Jan 25 2007, 08:32 AM) [snapback]276362[/snapback]

Let's just send him a cake with rat poison in it.
[/b]

Just force him to eat, where I had to eat, when I was in the army, that will do the job. [/b][/quote]

When I enlisted in the U.S. Army, I had a choice on Fridays: steak or lobster. What army did you join?

[horrorist]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(The Fourth @ Jan 29 2007, 06:19 PM) [snapback]277035[/snapback]</div>

When I enlisted in the U.S. Army, I had a choice on Fridays: steak or lobster. What army did you join?
[/b]

Of course in the "Wehrmacht", like any other brave German! And the only choice WE had was "[i]running 15km before doing the obstacle parcours or afterwards!

To be more precise: I served (we still have the duty to serve) in an NBC- defence- unit, but we were supplied by a tank unit, which had the worst kitchen of the whole garrison. Even the roaches refused to eat there (and there were some!). Our combat rations type I, which are a real challenge for your stomach seem to be delicatessen compared with this food.

[plix]

I knew I had seen more on this than the DFL thread:
http://www.the-underdogs.info/forum/...ic.php?t=46858
http://www.tnaaf.org/showthread.php?t=48

Apparently the guy is already using OCR (which pretty much defeats the CAPATCHA idea) and the rest of the points I made earlier have similarly been addressed. I apologize for sounding like a broken record, but in all honesty: everything I've seen suggested here has been tried before.

[win98]

I've emailed paypal.

[win98]

Sorry for the double post but I got a reply.
Dear Win98 (Nice try but you aren't gonna get my name)

Thank you for contacting PayPal with your concern. We appreciate your
business and will make every effort to facilitate the handling of this
matter.

Any person or business that requests PayPal assist in asserting its
copyright, patent, trademark, or any other work protected under federal
law, must first complete PayPals Request for Account Termination Form.
The completed form can be faxed to the attention of the Acceptable Use
Policy Team at (number taken out). Please keep in mind that once the
submitted information is confirmed, the reported partys PayPal account
may be placed in a limited status and may be unable to send or receive
payments through the PayPal system. Therefore, we ask that you consider
this decision carefully before moving forward.

Please keep in mind that generally only a copyright, patent, trademark
holder, or those deriving rights through the holder, can rightfully
claim a copyright infringement. It is for this reason that PayPal
encourages owners of intellectual property to contact the alleged
infringer directly to attempt to resolve the dispute in this manner. It
is also recommended that you contact your Internet service provider
(ISP) or hosting company to assist you in taking corrective measures
against the infringers website.

If you have any other questions, please feel free to email the
Acceptable Use Policy Department at aup(at)paypal.com.

Sincerely,
Acceptable Use Policy Department
PayPal, an eBay Company

Then they want me to fill in a stupid form and fax it to america no thanks. :angry:
So from now on be prepared to fill in a form. So only send the message if you are prepared to.

[Japo]

Well I wouldn't mind sending a couple of faxes if they resulted in this leech out of business. But since "only a copyright, patent, trademark holder, or those deriving rights through the holder, can rightfully claim a copyright infringement", this seems to concern Abandonia itself so there's little we can do without the admins' intervention. Still it's not only copyright infringement, it's also swindling and bandwidth stealing. I don't know how illegal those are but I'm pretty sure they're without PayPal's Acceptable Use Policy and that PayPal doesn't want to be involved in it. Well I'll just wait for a reply if it comes, and if it doesn't I'll resend the last mail (only once), since it was a forward and it might have ended in the spam bin because of its subject's starting with "Fw:".

[Frodo]

It seems basically that this guy can do what ever he wants then. :angry:
I still don't understand why ESA don't stop him. After all, he is selling games that are ESA protected. :wallbash:

[horrorist]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Frodo @ Jan 30 2007, 11:34 PM) [snapback]277203[/snapback]</div>

It seems basically that this guy can do what ever he wants then.
[/b]

Even if PayPal has a strict policy and by this strict general terms of agreement (as allready posted by Abi79 somewhere above), they are not the authorities. Adressed by someone with accusations against any of their customers they could just say:
"OK sounds pretty believable, the games might be stolen, the reviews as well. But we do not understand a heck about this copyright thingy, we are financial service providers and we do not want to occupy any of our employees with investigations about this because they are sleeping tightly and it costs us a lot to wake them up. Do you guys have any idea how many accusations like that are sent to us by people who menacely try to ruin their neigbours?"
Just to play the advocatus diaboli

I think one way to put a little pressure on PayPal would be an accusation of an other financial service provider (the foe of your foe is your friend) of supporting illegal activities. So PayPal might need to investigate.

The financial calculation for the ESA is a bit different (roughly estimated):
If this guy continues their members will lose perhaps $500 of sales each year. If they sue this guy it will cost them at least $5000. Even if they win, which is not garantueed, they cannot be sure to get any money from this guy back. He could just hide it somewhere or give everything away to his girlfriend and declare to own absolutly nothing. So shutting down his website will perhaps armortize in 10 years. Unless his girlfriend/ uncle/ stepbrother/ whatsoever opens a new one.
If there were more leechers sites the situation could be different... (sounds awfull!) :wallbash:

The only legal chance I see is of course accusing him to the authorities (this does not cost anything), but it depends from the legal situation in the Czech. Rep.: If commercial use of copyright violations is criminal in czech, we are in, if it is only illegal, it won't be that easy. Having this leecher punished only with a $200 fine, PayPal cannot refuse to ban him.

If there are no technical or legal means, what about propaganda? I read some very pointed texts in this thread, containing some very strong metaphors (Maybe Himmler could become a bit like Goebbels... )

[Moonypond]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(strachwitz @ Jan 31 2007, 02:53 PM) [snapback]277222[/snapback]</div>

The financial calculation for the ESA is a bit different (roughly estimated):
If this guy continues their members will lose perhaps $500 of sales each year. If they sue this guy it will cost them at least $5000. Even if they win, which is not garantueed, they cannot be sure to get any money from this guy back. He could just hide it somewhere or give everything away to his girlfriend and declare to own absolutly nothing. So shutting down his website will perhaps armortize in 10 years. Unless his girlfriend/ uncle/ stepbrother/ whatsoever opens a new one.
If there were more leechers sites the situation could be different... (sounds awfull!) :wallbash:
[/b]

Actually the ESA get nothing for shutting down sites. In their "Anti-Piracy FAQ" is says:

Does the ESA make money by shutting down a site?
No, the ESA derives no financial benefits from shutting down sites.[/b]

[Lulu_Jane]

*sigh*

Where do I get the fax form from, I'll send it.

(Also, yay Japofran for your emails!)

Win98, you might as well send the fax, otherwise this thread is just "hot air."

Incidentally, I find the petty beaurocracy that Paypal makes the user go through to complain disgusting. But, then again, why would they want to make it easy to close down accounts which they make money from. Yuk yuk yuk.