Canon Tries To Shut Down "Fake" Canon Blog 125
Thomas Hawk writes "An interesting twist over at the Fake Chuck Westfall Blog. Fake Chuck (like Fake Steve before him) has a blog out parodying Canon's real Technical Information Advisor Chuck Westfall. It seems that Canon and their lawyers over at Loeb & Loeb are none too fond of all the fun that Fake Chuck and DSLR geeks everywhere have been having at their expense and have sent Fake Chuck's blog hosting company, WordPress, a notice to take the blog down. Canon's lawyers cite that Fake Chuck's blog is 'calculated to mislead recipients,' even though the blog has 'fake' in the title, 'fake' in the URL and 'fake' just about everywhere else in the blog. What in the heck is wrong with Canon? Do they really think that trying to shut down a parody blog is going to make their new 5D Mark II ship any faster?" After Fake Chuck removed the Canon logo from his site, WordPress is standing behind him and has rebuffed Canon's demand.
Comment removed (Score:3, Informative)
Bad Summary (Score:5, Informative)
The take down letter asked for 4 things:
1. Stop using the Canon logo.
2. Remove references to violence.
3. Remove references to Chuck's family.
4. Changes to the look and feel of the blog so it would not be
confused with actual Canon corporate sites.
It wasn't a totally unreasonable blanket take-down demand, and as such Fake Chuck will easily be able to comply and continue as a source of satire and humor.
Re:WTF (Score:4, Informative)
Canon [luminous-landscape.com]
Re:You'd think by now... (Score:5, Informative)
He's not pretending to be a real person other than himself, he's pretending to be a fake person other than himself
Re:Bad Summary (Score:5, Informative)
I looked at the PDF of the takedown. Yes, it mentioned those four things as "particularly egregious" but it was a blanket take-down demand. Let's examine the basis they list for their complaint and their demand:
(emphasis mine)
If Wordpress hadn't exhibited some common sense, Fake Chuck would have had to find a new home.
I would not even have removed the logo (Score:5, Informative)
Re:You'd think by now... (Score:2, Informative)
Re:You'd think by now... (Score:5, Informative)
"Also, but I'm not sure if it's because of my browser's ineptitude, posting something to undo moderation doesn't give you the modpoints back."
That is intentional, check the moderation FAQ. The stated reason is that it allows an abusive mod to mod up/down a post in a new article, then post once it comes off the front page (making it a lot less important) and get the points back to use again.
Re:You'd think by now... (Score:3, Informative)
Just want to add that with the same two cameras, the 350D and my current 40D, I also haven't had problems.
I *have* had minor problems with lenses, especially third-party ones. That is where calibration/quality control is a major problem, even with Canon lenses (though I haven't had a problem with my Canon lenses, I know many others have.)
Re:WTF (Score:3, Informative)
I agree that it has been performing sub-par for many people, but I don't think the failure rate on that Antarctica trip is the right thing to point to. See my earlier comment at http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1128757&cid=26869539 [slashdot.org] for my analysis.
There are reports of earlier Antarctica trips on that site from previous years, with similar tallies of failed cameras. It doesn't tell you a whole lot other than that if you use your camera in extreme conditions it wasn't necessarily designed for, you have to expect that it may have problems.
The bigger issues (that haven't supposedly been fixed by firmware) - as discussed on the fake blog - are noise even at low ISOs and auto-focus performance. These are disappointing problems for this camera, especially the noise. This is marketed as a low-noise camera, even at high ISOs, yet many are saying the original 5D is better in that regard (I haven't looked into it too much myself, I can't afford an upgrade from my 40D anytime soon anyway.)