23-year-old Kate Wagner has at least temporarily shuttered McMansion Hell, a popular blog on which she posted photos of modern houses overlaid with sarcastic comments about their perceived design shortcomings. Real estate aggregator Zillow sent Wagner a cease and desist order because she used photos taken from its site. (Zillow itself borrows photos from other providers under license.) Jim Dalrymple, BuzzFeed:
Ken White, an attorney who writes for the legal blog Popehat, agreed that McMansion Hell would qualify as fair use. Because Zillow and McMansion Hell aren’t competing businesses, he said, “all of the fair use factors are in the bloggers’ favor.”
Zillow appears to have been trying to “make a satirical blogger shut up rather than face the costs of vexatious litigation,” White told BuzzFeed News.
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I wonder if turnabout is fair play—maybe Ms. Wagener ought to file a bar complaint against Zillow’s lawyers.
Good news. The EFF got involved and Zillow backed down. BBC link.
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-40456033
The same article says that she backed down and agreed not to use the photos from the site.