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Zillow forces McMansion Hell to delete posts

mcmansionhell.com

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Re: Zillow forces McMansion Hell to delete posts

#81

Post by chadgeidel »

uses wrote: post #69

I totally understand the whole "McMansions are bad architecture" thing... However, something about it really bothers me. There was an episode of 99% Invisible where the guest was talking about their McMansions blog and how it makes fun of these Horrid dwellings. The whole thing stank of classist elitism. The Wrong Type of people were getting the chance to design and build large houses, and of course they're applying…

The guest on that article and the blog author are the same person.

How can you "understand that mcmansions are bad architecture" and also say "the whole thing stank of classist elitism"? The blog points fun at clearly bad buildings. Fake columns, unnecessary rooms, poor placement of re-used furniture, etc. Sarcasm is funny. The blog is sarcastic in nature. What's wrong with that?

Re: Zillow forces McMansion Hell to delete posts

#84

Post by placeybordeaux »

Mithaldu wrote: post #72
OJFord wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It tries to load the images (that Zillow is purportedly threatening the author over) from Tumblr though...

Tumblr caches everything for a looooong time.

Be that as it may, it's kind of weak to say that it's hosted on ipfs if the majority of the content is actually not on ipfs and on tumblr.

Re: Zillow forces McMansion Hell to delete posts

#85

Post by acomjean »

JohnTHaller wrote: post #11
imkevinxu wrote: post #3

On what grounds can they sue? Isn't this pure free speech? It looks like the only references to Zillow ever are citations that the photos come from their website http://www.mcmansionhell.com/search/zillow

Likely copyright over the photographs. Realistically, it's fair use since it's transformative and used for critique. Unfortunately, fair use laws only apply in the US if you have lots of lawyer money, so they don't really matter for normal folks.

I'm curious how just using a photo makes it "transformative". Those photos look straight up taken from one site and used on the next.

(I ask as someones who's flickr photos ended up on the front page of a local paper... and was mildly annoyed, but it was promoting an event I work on.. had they just asked....)

News organizations and documentaries pay lots of money to clear and use old stock news photos.

I do enjoy the critique though...

Re: Zillow forces McMansion Hell to delete posts

#86

Post by sp332 »

imkevinxu wrote: post #3

On what grounds can they sue? Isn't this pure free speech? It looks like the only references to Zillow ever are citations that the photos come from their website http://www.mcmansionhell.com/search/zillow

They don't claim to own the copyright to the images. They just complain that it's a ToS violation, and also threaten her with the CFAA! https://twitter.com/mcmansionhell/status/879429709251137537

Re: Zillow forces McMansion Hell to delete posts

#87

Post by chadgeidel »

matttproud wrote: post #2

McMansion Hell is exactly the shock therapy the United States needs. Someone lend this blogger a hand!

She does have a Patreon. As much as I hate the fact that we now need to crowsource these things, I think this is one avenue for us non-lawyer-adjacent folks.

Re: Zillow forces McMansion Hell to delete posts

#88

Post by sp332 »

eddyb wrote: post #6
atonse wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Never heard of it before now. :( I bet it was enlightening.

http://www.mcmansionhell.com/ is still up, for now, at least not all the posts are gone, so have a look.

"url is down temporarily do not be alarmed" https://twitter.com/mcmansionhell/status/879437570471587844

Re: Zillow forces McMansion Hell to delete posts

#89

Post by mschaef »

angersock wrote: post #79
uses wrote: post #69

I totally understand the whole "McMansions are bad architecture" thing... However, something about it really bothers me. There was an episode of 99% Invisible where the guest was talking about their McMansions blog and how it makes fun of these Horrid dwellings. The whole thing stank of classist elitism. The Wrong Type of people were getting the chance to design and build large houses, and of course they're applying…

So, first, a lot of the architectural choices (especially if they were picked out by the homeowners and not by the architects) are done to ape (poorly) aristocratic and "Old Money" sorts of dwellings...so, making fun of them on a classist line is semi-acceptable. The real problem is that the architecture is just plain bad . Space is wasted, exterior are marred by design details meant only to suggest a style of buildi…

> there is no defending that.

There is a lot of space between defending bad ideas and putting up a website to mock them.

Re: Zillow forces McMansion Hell to delete posts

#90

Post by sp332 »

SomeCallMeTim wrote: post #73
ben174 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, I believe the content was removed when I first clicked. Looks like it's back now.

A few minutes ago it looked like the content had been deleted. Right now I tried twice; first time I got a Tumblr error page, the second time I got a redirect to an "Enter Password" field on a Tumblr blog page. I'm going to suggest that the owner is migrating the domain to point at a Tumblr page. Right Now. Maybe his servers were having trouble with the increased interest?

It was hosted on Tumblr all along. She says it's only down temporarily. https://twitter.com/mcmansionhell/status/879437570471587844
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