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Websites of SOPA-supporting congressmen redirect to Protest SOPA

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Re: Websites of SOPA-supporting congressmen redirect to Protest SOPA

#4
post #3

I don't think this is a good idea it's almost certainly passing off [1] which is illegal. Not to mention confusing. [1] http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passing_off

I don't think it can be passing-off without goods or services being involved. There's probably some tort here, though...

Re: Websites of SOPA-supporting congressmen redirect to Protest SOPA

#5

Couldn't this confuse people into thinking that those congresspeople don't support SOPA?

This was my first reaction. People visiting the web and seeing all kinds of SOPA/PIPA hate, now will automatically assume these same guys support SOPA.

Better would be to redirect them to a page that says, THIS GUY SUPPORTS SOPA/PIPA.

Best would probably be to not squat on the domains.

Re: Websites of SOPA-supporting congressmen redirect to Protest SOPA

#6
post #3

I don't think this is a good idea it's almost certainly passing off [1] which is illegal. Not to mention confusing. [1] http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passing_off

As a political protest, this would likely be protected speech. Free speech is after all supposed to be the rule, not the exception. I am surprised though that a professional politician and his staff could be so out of touch with the web that they never registered their names as domain names.

Re: Websites of SOPA-supporting congressmen redirect to Protest SOPA

#8
post #3

I don't think this is a good idea it's almost certainly passing off [1] which is illegal. Not to mention confusing. [1] http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passing_off

You can just append "?banner=none" to the URL to prevent the banner from appearing. The mobile version is annoying.

Re: Websites of SOPA-supporting congressmen redirect to Protest SOPA

#10
This is:

(a) unimpressive, because it's obvious that you went and registered a bunch of domains with a version of their name that they don't use (christopher, benjamin, melvin, middle initial, etc), and

(b) a bad idea, because at best it's lulz for geeks in the know, but at worst it's "SOPA opponents have gone too far: they hacked web sites of the U.S. government!"

Lose it.

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