Originally Posted by TheSquealer

I'm not an attorney.. but ...

An attorney might argue that publishers put their faith in you and your system and the promises you've made to them.

An attorney might argue that its idiotic to allow advertisers to make the choice whether or not to display adult ads on non adult sites when the publisher has already made an effort to display non-adult ads.

An attorney might argue that you incentivize people to advertise on non-adult sites because as I understand it, ads are displayed in the selected category and above. I.e. "non adult" ads can be displayed in softcore, hardcore. Therefore any damage done to the publisher was deliberate and where you then directly benefited in additional ad impressions or clicks.

An attorney might ask you to beg the mods to delete this idiotic thread and beg you to stop talking. You don't always need to respond to legal threats, but only a moron would take additional steps to continue to agitate and provoke with absolutely nothing to gain in doing so.



That said, depending on California law as well as that of his location, it certainly seems like an open and shut case of a criminal extortion attempt. The "out of the public eye" was not a smart thing to say (read: "pay me what I demand or I will embarrass you and your company"). Such a statement I believe would get any attorney disbarred in any state. Making any kind of threats and demanding unjustified compensation was very unwise. I would guess stating specifically that failure to pay means going to court, where damages again are not clear and the amount seems both excessive and arbitrary was also not a wise thing to say. Furthermore, California has a loser pays law I believe, so he cannot sue without the threat of a counter suit as well as having to pay all your reasonable attorney fees incurred in the defense. Had you just acted your age and fired back a tersely worded letter from a credible attorney, you could have most likely shut this all down before it started.