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Response from Norm to Mac & Bumble
"Google is currently displaying without authorization hundreds of
thousands, if not millions, of images from Perfect 10, Playboy,
Macandbumble.com, Hegre Archives, and other major copyright holders, in
an attempt to attract massive traffic and generate huge advertising
revenues. In the process, it is directly competing with, and
supplanting all legitimate pay sites, as there is no reason for
consumers to pay to join paysites when they can see hundreds of
thousands of images for free by going to Google.com and viewing images
via Google's image search.
Perfect 10 has been trying for years to stop massive theft on the
internet, which is drastically affecting the income of all legitimate
players. Perfect 10 has sent to Google 40 DMCA notices covering about
10,000 infringing URLs since May 31, 2004. To the best of Perfect 10's
knowledge, Google has NEVER acted to block access to such infringing
URLs, and has in most cases actually ADDED links to such URLs and in
many cases, starting placing ads on such infringing webpages. Google
currently places ads next to infringing images of every major celebrity
and supermodel -- millions of unauthorized copyrighted images.
On December 22, 2005, Perfect 10 sent to Google a DMCA notice, its 40th
DMCA notice since May of 2004. In that notice, Perfect 10 listed some of
the URLs below images that Google was displaying without authorization,
some of which were the URLs of Macandbumble.com affiliates. The notice
was directed at GOOGLE, and was intended for GOOGLE to remove those
images from its unauthorized display. However, Google elected to (we
believe) intentionally misinterpret the notice to start affecting
Macandbumble.com affiliates without providing them with the ability to
file counternotifications. I have emailed to Google a list of the
Macandbumble.com affiliated URLs listed in Perfect 10's December 22
notice and Google now knows that those URLs are not alleged to be
infringing.
I am sorry for the confusion and I hope that my email to Google will
correct any misunderstanding on Google's part. Hopefully all legitimate
webmasters will understand that if Perfect 10 succeeds in its efforts to
stop widespread infringement on the internet, all legitimate webmasters
will benefit enormously.
Sincerely,
Norm Zada, Ph.D.
PERFECT 10
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