FunnyJunk threatens lawsuit against The Oatmeal

[em_te]

Remember FunnyJunk? Almost exactly a year ago I [The Oatmeal] published a blog post about my comics being stolen, re-hosted, and monetized on FunnyJunk's website. The owner of the site responded and some of the comics were taken down, He still had a ton of my comics hosted without credit, but the energy it would take to get him to take them down wasn't worth it. I thought the issue was done and over with so I let him be.

A few days ago I was served papers informing me that the owner of FunnyJunk is going to file a federal lawsuit against me unless I pay him $20,000 in damages. You can read the full letter here.

The owner of FunnyJunk hired Charles Carreon, a lawyer who became famous in the 90s after successfully litigating sex.com. Charles does a bit of modeling too, apparently.

I don't want to get tied up in courtroom nonsense. I don't want to pay more money to my lawyer. Don't you miss the days when I posted 2 comics a week, instead of writing rebuttals to Forbes and dealing with bull**** like this?

So do I.

I've annotated the letter below as well as outlined how I'm going to deal with this.

http://theoatmeal.com/blog/funnyjunk_letter

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

that link is hilarious - good read.

and this lawsuit is ri-god-damn-diculous

[Denis W. Veteran]

Tempting as it is to write up a piece about this latest development, I'd bet the same lawyer would go after any site that covers this letter.

[andrewbares]

Tempting as it is to write up a piece about this latest development, I'd bet the same lawyer would go after any site that covers this letter.

That's true, and just by commenting on this post I bet I'm going to be sued by that lawyer.

"I hope you lose oatmeal I never liked eating you anyways!" *yelled Andrew in a forced and paniced voice* Maybe that'll protect me from crazy lawyer.

Anyways, on a serious note, it's not at all legal for a website to request you remove mentions of another website. What a joke...

[Twiddle]

What is more impressive is the charity donations as the $20,000.

I run a comedy website called The Oatmeal.

Last year I wrote a blog post about another website called FunnyJunk which stole a bunch of my comics and hosted them on their website without giving me credit. They apparently didn?t like my blog post and recently FunnyJunk sent me a letter stating that unless I pay them $20,000 in damages they?re going to file a federal lawsuit against me. You can view the letter along with my response here.

Instead of mailing the owner of FunnyJunk the money, I'm going to send the above drawing of his mother. I'm going to try and raise $20,000 and instead send it to the National Wildlife Federation and the American Cancer Society.

I?m hoping that philanthropy trumps douchebaggery and greed.

Good for you Oatmeal.

[Denis W. Veteran]

What is more impressive is the charity donations as the $20,000.

Good for you Oatmeal.

Very nice. (Y)

Ah, might as well cover this, in light of that donation milestone.

[The Laughing Man]

$166,098 !

[Twiddle]

Very nice. (Y)

Ah, might as well cover this, in light of that donation milestone.

It's OK. I'll donate to you if you need a lawyer in the future. :p

(Y)

[Lucas]

Nice stuff, he probably is banging his head against the wall for trying to sue him lol.

[articuno1au]

I think he might find himself in hot water if this goes to court..

I hope he wins, but I think what he said was fairly blatantly defamatory..

Either way, the funny junk admin needs a good kicking in the head.

I also realised upon reading all of this (I got it off ars a few days ago) that a ton of comics I had read and thought were brilliant were written by him and I just didn't know D:

[remixedcat]

yey nice way to do it and do some good.

I also realised upon reading all of this (I got it off ars a few days ago) that a ton of comics I had read and thought were brilliant were written by him and I just didn't know D:

the printer one is the best as well as the kitteh ones.

[moloko]

I can't believe he (funkyjunks) thinks this is ok.

[andrewbares]

I can't believe he (funkyjunks) thinks this is ok.

FunnyJunks isn't a human, it's ran by an inhuman money ###### incapable of functioning in real life.

[xpablo]

The point is Funnyjunk is stealing The Oatmeal's content and making revenue from the content.

Matt should counter sue FJ for 50% of the ad revenue FJ made from the comics.

probably not anywhere near the $160k The Oatmeal's project is collecting, I think advertisers should boycott

FJ since this site is like The Pirate Bay of comics.

[Ci7]

how about this LOLLL

[FloatingFatMan]

The point is Funnyjunk is stealing The Oatmeal's content and making revenue from the content.

Matt should counter sue FJ for 50% of the ad revenue FJ made from the comics.

Seeing as FJ stole his comics, he should counter sue for ALL of the revenue made from the stolen works, plus damages of a minimum of $20k per comic stolen. Plus legal fees, of course. ;)

[Dot Matrix]

Dbag lawyer is now blaming his problems on Oatmeal's Matt Inman.

[+M2Ys4U Subscriber¹]

Dbag lawyer is now blaming his problems on Oatmeal's Matt Inman.

Some lawyer he is then, that's a libel case right there.

[Ambroos]

Dbag lawyer is now blaming his problems on Oatmeal's Matt Inman.

Matthew Inman should use that to counter-sue for slander.

[Denis W. Veteran]

That's pretty hilarious.

He's the next Jack Thompson.