Realmfighter
Sergeant
Have you heard of the Bruce-Evony battle? The gist of it is that this http://www.bruceongames.com/ man wrote some articles about Evony. Obviously, it did not put them in a good light. And then, did you know what they did? The bastards are suing him! he's taking the articles down (i'm expecting him to) but not before telling people to copy and paste all of them all over the internet!
Evony is a new, free, browser MMO. And their marketing consists of spamming up the internet like crazy. This blog is receiving a huge number of spam “comments” from them. Fortunately Akismet anti spam puts them automatically into the bin. Here are some of the email addresses they are using for this spam:
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
And so on. They are doing this from the IP address 63.223.110.211
Whois Record
OrgName: Beyond The Network America, Inc.
OrgID: BNA-42
Address: 450 Springpark PL
Address: Suite 100
City: Herdon
StateProv: VA
PostalCode: 20170
Country: US
NetRange: 63.216.0.0 - 63.223.255.255
CIDR: 63.216.0.0/13
NetName: BTN-CIDR5
NetHandle: NET-63-216-0-0-1
Parent: NET-63-0-0-0-0
NetType: Direct Allocation
NameServer: NS.CAIS.COM
NameServer: NS2.CAIS.COM
Comment: ADDRESSES WITHIN THIS BLOCK ARE NON-PORTABLE
RegDate: 1999-12-09
Updated: 2004-11-12
OrgAbuseHandle: PAD13-ARIN
OrgAbuseName: PCCW AUP Department
OrgAbusePhone: +1-703-621-1637
OrgAbuseEmail:
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
tsenseless.evony.com/[email protected]
And so on. They are doing this from the IP address 63.223.110.211
Whois Record
OrgName: Beyond The Network America, Inc.
OrgID: BNA-42
Address: 450 Springpark PL
Address: Suite 100
City: Herdon
StateProv: VA
PostalCode: 20170
Country: US
NetRange: 63.216.0.0 - 63.223.255.255
CIDR: 63.216.0.0/13
NetName: BTN-CIDR5
NetHandle: NET-63-216-0-0-1
Parent: NET-63-0-0-0-0
NetType: Direct Allocation
NameServer: NS.CAIS.COM
NameServer: NS2.CAIS.COM
Comment: ADDRESSES WITHIN THIS BLOCK ARE NON-PORTABLE
RegDate: 1999-12-09
Updated: 2004-11-12
OrgAbuseHandle: PAD13-ARIN
OrgAbuseName: PCCW AUP Department
OrgAbusePhone: +1-703-621-1637
OrgAbuseEmail:
This is a massive story, so I thought that I would expand on the original article. If it was in the automobile industry or the banking industry it would be front page headlines. But the old people who are in charge of the media don’t understand games. So firstly I will do some explaining.
Gold farming I have written about before. It is the practice of playing games to generate valuable in game items which are then sold in the real world to lazy Western players who can’t be bothered playing the game properly themselves. It is a massive industry employing around 400,000 people in asia, mainly in China. Gold farmers are often on the edge of legality and they use every underhand internet technique to market themselves. They generate mountains of spam as they attack blogs and forums with their advertising. They are amongst the bad boys of the internet.
Free MMO (Massive, Multiplayer, Online) games are known as persistent world games because they are always running and provide an alternative reality. The big names are Runescape, Habbo, Club Pernguin, Maple Story and Free Realms. They have many millions of players each, all around the world. Whilst the game is free to play they have revenue models based on purchasing in game items, playing an enhanced version of the game, carrying advertising etc. They are a huge phenomenon of our times and many people you know play them.
Eric Lam is a Chinese businessman who owns or is associated with a whole cloud of companies and websites. He was sued by Microsoft for online advertising click fraud. It is thought that Lam owns the gold farming company Wowmine and that he could be earning as much as half a million dollars a day from this alone.
Now it looks like Lam has decided to go first party with his own MMO, thus cutting out the middleman. That game is Evony. And its heritage shows. When you play the game, just about everything in the game can be obtained by paying instead of playing. A blatantly exploitative business model never seen before.
The game itself is a rip off of some very well known games. The game mechanic and some in game content comes from Sid Meier’s highly successful Civilisation series. Much of the graphics came from Age of Empires.
The game itself is so flaky and bugged that it is very easy for things you have paid good money for to just disappear. Lots of people are losing money this way. And, surprise, surprise, Evony never give a refund.
Something very devious is iEvony. This is an application that you download into your PC to invite your friends to join the game in exchange for in game rewards. This could very well be a Trojan designed to harvest email addresses messenger passwords and much else. Would you trust a Chinese gold farmer inside your computer? Many gullible people are.
The advertising for Evony consists of fairly lurid female imagery. These images were mostly lifted from lingerie catalogues and, amazingly, have zero relevance whatsoever to the game. Evony are carpetbombing game websites with these adverts using multiple accounts of Google AdWords. When website owners block one source of these adverts another appears. Site owners have complained repeatedly to Google, but to no avail.
But advertising isn’t the only marketing going on. Evony are using automated spam programmes to add comments to articles on blog sites. Not once or twice. No, they are blanketing game related blogs with comments that advertise the game. Exactly what you would expect of a Chinese gold farmer.
This article just skims over what is going on here. There is enough to write a whole series of articles or even a book. What is for sure is that Evony is best avoided by everyone. Go and play Runescape, Habbo or Free Realms instead.
Gold farming I have written about before. It is the practice of playing games to generate valuable in game items which are then sold in the real world to lazy Western players who can’t be bothered playing the game properly themselves. It is a massive industry employing around 400,000 people in asia, mainly in China. Gold farmers are often on the edge of legality and they use every underhand internet technique to market themselves. They generate mountains of spam as they attack blogs and forums with their advertising. They are amongst the bad boys of the internet.
Free MMO (Massive, Multiplayer, Online) games are known as persistent world games because they are always running and provide an alternative reality. The big names are Runescape, Habbo, Club Pernguin, Maple Story and Free Realms. They have many millions of players each, all around the world. Whilst the game is free to play they have revenue models based on purchasing in game items, playing an enhanced version of the game, carrying advertising etc. They are a huge phenomenon of our times and many people you know play them.
Eric Lam is a Chinese businessman who owns or is associated with a whole cloud of companies and websites. He was sued by Microsoft for online advertising click fraud. It is thought that Lam owns the gold farming company Wowmine and that he could be earning as much as half a million dollars a day from this alone.
Now it looks like Lam has decided to go first party with his own MMO, thus cutting out the middleman. That game is Evony. And its heritage shows. When you play the game, just about everything in the game can be obtained by paying instead of playing. A blatantly exploitative business model never seen before.
The game itself is a rip off of some very well known games. The game mechanic and some in game content comes from Sid Meier’s highly successful Civilisation series. Much of the graphics came from Age of Empires.
The game itself is so flaky and bugged that it is very easy for things you have paid good money for to just disappear. Lots of people are losing money this way. And, surprise, surprise, Evony never give a refund.
Something very devious is iEvony. This is an application that you download into your PC to invite your friends to join the game in exchange for in game rewards. This could very well be a Trojan designed to harvest email addresses messenger passwords and much else. Would you trust a Chinese gold farmer inside your computer? Many gullible people are.
The advertising for Evony consists of fairly lurid female imagery. These images were mostly lifted from lingerie catalogues and, amazingly, have zero relevance whatsoever to the game. Evony are carpetbombing game websites with these adverts using multiple accounts of Google AdWords. When website owners block one source of these adverts another appears. Site owners have complained repeatedly to Google, but to no avail.
But advertising isn’t the only marketing going on. Evony are using automated spam programmes to add comments to articles on blog sites. Not once or twice. No, they are blanketing game related blogs with comments that advertise the game. Exactly what you would expect of a Chinese gold farmer.
This article just skims over what is going on here. There is enough to write a whole series of articles or even a book. What is for sure is that Evony is best avoided by everyone. Go and play Runescape, Habbo or Free Realms instead.
When you play a browser based game a number of things are happening. The game itself is running in a big remote computer, all your machine is doing is displaying the game and recording your inputs. It is being what is called a thin client. However in order to be a thin client for a game your computer needs to have in it the client software. So when you play a browser game like Runescape or Habbo the first thing that happens is that this client software is loaded into your machine. This is very trusting of you because anything could be included with that client software. Obviously legitimate western games like Runescape and Habbo can be trusted. But what about games from Chinese gold farmers like Evony and Empire Craft?
Malware is software that lives in your computer without your consent. Trojan horses are malware that gets into your computer by being part of something else, say the client software for a browser game. Malware can allow someone else to make use of your computer as part of a botnet, which are widely used for sending spam and other illegal activities where the real sender doesn’t want to be traceable. Or it can be used to spy on everything in your computer and everything you do with your computer and so harvest things like credit card details.
Tens of millions of computers have malware in them without their users realising. Currently 376,000 malware bots are activated every day in the world for malicious use. This is huge. The people who create and use malware have a wide range of tactics for getting it into your computer and they are getting ever more sophisticated. Client software for a browser game would be the perfect mechanism for infecting millions of computers with malware.
With the above in mind it is very interesting to read the comment by jonnycake on the article More about Evony: “Now I am wondering if you have any insight into how much damage the game does to your browser, and your system in general. What I thought was very flaky software appears as though it may have malicious content. In Firefox, shortcuts have been re-targeted and attempting to fill in text fields gives mixed results.”
There is this forum post from an Evony user: “Something happened this morning. Just when i logged in my account to play Evony, my Anti-Virus detected 4 trojans horse in explorer.exe. They came right when i entered my server. I am no expert about virus so I don<t know what happened there. Any help on the forum would be great as i do not want to join that server again until some admin tells me its clean. Took me 3 hours to clean my computer.”
And another one: “Hello, i would like to inform ye that your site is infested with Adaware. http://www.pctools.com/mrc/infection…e.Mostofate.E/ Every time i log onto evony this comes as part of it. I have tried it several times, deleting it THEN just opening up evony and presto its back on my Computer. Its the “monitors the users browsing activity.” that im not paticulary fond of !”
Now I am not saying that Evony has a trojan in its client software. This would take proper technical investigation. What I am saying is that the possibility of this being so is such that I would not let Evony anywhere near my computer. These people have already spammed the internet like crazy and stolen most of their game content, with behaviour like this I would not put anything past them.
Malware is software that lives in your computer without your consent. Trojan horses are malware that gets into your computer by being part of something else, say the client software for a browser game. Malware can allow someone else to make use of your computer as part of a botnet, which are widely used for sending spam and other illegal activities where the real sender doesn’t want to be traceable. Or it can be used to spy on everything in your computer and everything you do with your computer and so harvest things like credit card details.
Tens of millions of computers have malware in them without their users realising. Currently 376,000 malware bots are activated every day in the world for malicious use. This is huge. The people who create and use malware have a wide range of tactics for getting it into your computer and they are getting ever more sophisticated. Client software for a browser game would be the perfect mechanism for infecting millions of computers with malware.
With the above in mind it is very interesting to read the comment by jonnycake on the article More about Evony: “Now I am wondering if you have any insight into how much damage the game does to your browser, and your system in general. What I thought was very flaky software appears as though it may have malicious content. In Firefox, shortcuts have been re-targeted and attempting to fill in text fields gives mixed results.”
There is this forum post from an Evony user: “Something happened this morning. Just when i logged in my account to play Evony, my Anti-Virus detected 4 trojans horse in explorer.exe. They came right when i entered my server. I am no expert about virus so I don<t know what happened there. Any help on the forum would be great as i do not want to join that server again until some admin tells me its clean. Took me 3 hours to clean my computer.”
And another one: “Hello, i would like to inform ye that your site is infested with Adaware. http://www.pctools.com/mrc/infection…e.Mostofate.E/ Every time i log onto evony this comes as part of it. I have tried it several times, deleting it THEN just opening up evony and presto its back on my Computer. Its the “monitors the users browsing activity.” that im not paticulary fond of !”
Now I am not saying that Evony has a trojan in its client software. This would take proper technical investigation. What I am saying is that the possibility of this being so is such that I would not let Evony anywhere near my computer. These people have already spammed the internet like crazy and stolen most of their game content, with behaviour like this I would not put anything past them.
Evony (formerly known as Civony) have been distributing the following email and a few sites have published it. As you can see it makes defamatory accusations against my good name.
From: Valerie <[email protected]>
Date: Thu, Sep 3, 2009 at 11:17 PM
Subject: Update from Evony
To:
Dear Evony Supporter,
As you may have heard, Evony has recently been the victim of malicious
and libelous attacks by a UK blogger by the name of Bruce Everiss.
Through your previous online outreach efforts in support of Evony, we
know you share our commitment to the unique experience we have
developed for our fans and we wanted to reach out to you directly with
an update on the latest developments regarding these libelous
allegations.
Despite the numerous fraudulent statements made by Mr. Everiss to
date, we have tried for several weeks to avoid taking our grievances
into the legal courts, hoping instead to persuade Everiss to come
clean and stop his online campaign of untruths and outright falsities.
Unfortunately, he has ignored our requests.
As fans of Evony, you know better than most, that these attacks have
caused significant damage to our brand and the gaming experience for
Evony’s millions of users and fans around the world.
Unfortunately, we have been unable to reach a solution with Mr.
Everiss and in the coming days our legal team will be proceeding on
multiple fronts against the libelous assaults that been have leveled
against our company and our game.
As fans of the game and industry insiders, we wanted to reach out to
you in advance to address several of the clear violations of
international libel standards perpetrated by Everiss and his
supporters. Several of the most egregious violations are also the most
clearly dismissible and we hope that with your help we will be able to
finally clear the air. The facts are clear:
1. Evony, LLC has had at no time any association with a company
called WoWMine. In addition, the company is not owned nor has it ever
been owned or managed by an individual by the name of Eric Lam. To be
clear, Evony has absolutely no legal or financial connection to this
individual.
2. Further, despite the blatantly false claims of Mr. Everiss,
none of the owners, directors or employees of Evony has ever been, or
are currently parties to, any legal action by Microsoft Corp.
3. Evony and our developers have in no way ever infringed upon
the intellectual property of any other game or developer. There have
never been proceedings against our company for any such violations of
intellectual property and this accusation is entirely fabricated by
Mr. Everiss.
4. Evony has never distributed any form of malware to our users.
Any such action would directly impact the user experience of our
millions of fans and damage the credibility of both our corporate
reputation and diminish the fan base of Evony. Evony’s popularity
speaks for itself – more than five million users in dozens of
countries around the world have helped to grow the game in popularity
without any need for malicious software.
5. Evony is in no way a Chinese based company. Evony is a
registered corporation in the United States with millions of active
players in dozens of countries around the globe.
It is our hope that Mr. Everiss will now understand the error of his
ways and correct the public record for his readers.
As a blogger yourself, we know you understand that in the digital age
in which we now live, online journalists and bloggers must strive for
a higher standard of integrity and accuracy. Mr. Everiss’ complete
disregard for even the most basic tenants of journalistic integrity
and responsibility have left our company no alternative but to take
these legal actions.
Please do not hesitate to let us know if we can provide you or your
readers any additional information as to the facts about this case and
our efforts to hold Mr. Everiss accountable for his illegal actions.
For the most up-to-date news, announcements and tips be sure to follow
Evony on Twitter and join our fan community on Facebook.
On behalf of the entire Evony team, thank you for your continued support.
Kind Regards,
Valerie
Evony™ – Free Forever
www.evony.com
So lets look at the real facts.
1) Evony have been trying to deny their Chinese associations. However the internet doesn’t forget. As you can see in this Google cache for UMGE:
Welcome to UMGE!
Place Order for Ingame Items
1. Place an order
2. Pay for it
3. Get the goodies!
Game: Evony
Server: Evony Server Beta
UMGE is part of the WoWMine web of companies as you can read here. UMGE’s website has the url 59.37.4.244 and their service provider is China Telecom as you can see here. And here is an article about the development of Civony (Evony) by UMGE in China.
2) The owners of Evony live behind a web of companies and identities in many countries, with proxies and fronts that serve to disguise who really owns what and who controls what.
3) Evony have definitely infringed upon the intellectual property of 2K Games. Evony is largely a clone of Sid Meier’s Civilisation IV as any google search of independent reviews shows. Typical is this: “The game is a standard online strategy game, looking like Sid Meier’s Civilization, actually looking TOO much alike, so much that lots of gamers question the IP of the game and think it’s just a rip off.” And this: “Like Civilization 4, each technology description begins with a quote. In fact, like Civ 4, each technology description begins with the quote from Civ 4.”
Evony also stole images from costume catalogues for their advertising as you can read here.
4) I have never said that Evony is malware. However in this article I collected a lot of suspicious user experiences. However I very clearly state “Now I am not saying that Evony has a trojan in its client software.”
However Evony have distributed iEvony, according to them: iEvony Client is software that easily, quickly and safely delivers a private game invitation to your friends. With just a simple click, iEvony Client will automatically import your entire buddy list from MSN, Yahoo or Skype IM. iEvony Client allows users to choose their selected friends and send them a short invitation. The software will record all the invitations and translate them to credits for you!
This is something I definitely wouldn’t let near my computer.
5) Evony is definitely American, in that they have registered a Delaware company. This can be done over the internet for $99.
However we know that the game comes from UMGE in China.
More interesting than the Delaware company would be knowing where the millions of dollars came from to finance the Google advertising campaign. Anyone who has done any research into this knows what the answer is.
So as you can see Evony are spreading misinformation in an attempt to cover the real facts and in the process have committed heinous libels against myself.
From: Valerie <[email protected]>
Date: Thu, Sep 3, 2009 at 11:17 PM
Subject: Update from Evony
To:
Dear Evony Supporter,
As you may have heard, Evony has recently been the victim of malicious
and libelous attacks by a UK blogger by the name of Bruce Everiss.
Through your previous online outreach efforts in support of Evony, we
know you share our commitment to the unique experience we have
developed for our fans and we wanted to reach out to you directly with
an update on the latest developments regarding these libelous
allegations.
Despite the numerous fraudulent statements made by Mr. Everiss to
date, we have tried for several weeks to avoid taking our grievances
into the legal courts, hoping instead to persuade Everiss to come
clean and stop his online campaign of untruths and outright falsities.
Unfortunately, he has ignored our requests.
As fans of Evony, you know better than most, that these attacks have
caused significant damage to our brand and the gaming experience for
Evony’s millions of users and fans around the world.
Unfortunately, we have been unable to reach a solution with Mr.
Everiss and in the coming days our legal team will be proceeding on
multiple fronts against the libelous assaults that been have leveled
against our company and our game.
As fans of the game and industry insiders, we wanted to reach out to
you in advance to address several of the clear violations of
international libel standards perpetrated by Everiss and his
supporters. Several of the most egregious violations are also the most
clearly dismissible and we hope that with your help we will be able to
finally clear the air. The facts are clear:
1. Evony, LLC has had at no time any association with a company
called WoWMine. In addition, the company is not owned nor has it ever
been owned or managed by an individual by the name of Eric Lam. To be
clear, Evony has absolutely no legal or financial connection to this
individual.
2. Further, despite the blatantly false claims of Mr. Everiss,
none of the owners, directors or employees of Evony has ever been, or
are currently parties to, any legal action by Microsoft Corp.
3. Evony and our developers have in no way ever infringed upon
the intellectual property of any other game or developer. There have
never been proceedings against our company for any such violations of
intellectual property and this accusation is entirely fabricated by
Mr. Everiss.
4. Evony has never distributed any form of malware to our users.
Any such action would directly impact the user experience of our
millions of fans and damage the credibility of both our corporate
reputation and diminish the fan base of Evony. Evony’s popularity
speaks for itself – more than five million users in dozens of
countries around the world have helped to grow the game in popularity
without any need for malicious software.
5. Evony is in no way a Chinese based company. Evony is a
registered corporation in the United States with millions of active
players in dozens of countries around the globe.
It is our hope that Mr. Everiss will now understand the error of his
ways and correct the public record for his readers.
As a blogger yourself, we know you understand that in the digital age
in which we now live, online journalists and bloggers must strive for
a higher standard of integrity and accuracy. Mr. Everiss’ complete
disregard for even the most basic tenants of journalistic integrity
and responsibility have left our company no alternative but to take
these legal actions.
Please do not hesitate to let us know if we can provide you or your
readers any additional information as to the facts about this case and
our efforts to hold Mr. Everiss accountable for his illegal actions.
For the most up-to-date news, announcements and tips be sure to follow
Evony on Twitter and join our fan community on Facebook.
On behalf of the entire Evony team, thank you for your continued support.
Kind Regards,
Valerie
Evony™ – Free Forever
www.evony.com
So lets look at the real facts.
1) Evony have been trying to deny their Chinese associations. However the internet doesn’t forget. As you can see in this Google cache for UMGE:
Welcome to UMGE!
Place Order for Ingame Items
1. Place an order
2. Pay for it
3. Get the goodies!
Game: Evony
Server: Evony Server Beta
UMGE is part of the WoWMine web of companies as you can read here. UMGE’s website has the url 59.37.4.244 and their service provider is China Telecom as you can see here. And here is an article about the development of Civony (Evony) by UMGE in China.
2) The owners of Evony live behind a web of companies and identities in many countries, with proxies and fronts that serve to disguise who really owns what and who controls what.
3) Evony have definitely infringed upon the intellectual property of 2K Games. Evony is largely a clone of Sid Meier’s Civilisation IV as any google search of independent reviews shows. Typical is this: “The game is a standard online strategy game, looking like Sid Meier’s Civilization, actually looking TOO much alike, so much that lots of gamers question the IP of the game and think it’s just a rip off.” And this: “Like Civilization 4, each technology description begins with a quote. In fact, like Civ 4, each technology description begins with the quote from Civ 4.”
Evony also stole images from costume catalogues for their advertising as you can read here.
4) I have never said that Evony is malware. However in this article I collected a lot of suspicious user experiences. However I very clearly state “Now I am not saying that Evony has a trojan in its client software.”
However Evony have distributed iEvony, according to them: iEvony Client is software that easily, quickly and safely delivers a private game invitation to your friends. With just a simple click, iEvony Client will automatically import your entire buddy list from MSN, Yahoo or Skype IM. iEvony Client allows users to choose their selected friends and send them a short invitation. The software will record all the invitations and translate them to credits for you!
This is something I definitely wouldn’t let near my computer.
5) Evony is definitely American, in that they have registered a Delaware company. This can be done over the internet for $99.
However we know that the game comes from UMGE in China.
More interesting than the Delaware company would be knowing where the millions of dollars came from to finance the Google advertising campaign. Anyone who has done any research into this knows what the answer is.
So as you can see Evony are spreading misinformation in an attempt to cover the real facts and in the process have committed heinous libels against myself.
I have written a number of articles on here telling the truth about what Chinese gold farmers are doing with the game Evony. What I wrote was the truth and is supported by massive evidence from elsewhere. They are just trying to bully me, for instance threatening to sue in Australia in order to make things as difficult as possible. And it is ironic that they try to use the legal system against me when they blatantly stole other people’s game mechanics and graphics in order to make Evony. Also I wonder if they are trying to be so heavy handed against the Guardian? And cheek of all cheeks they are trying to deny comment spamming this blog.
I just received this:
And this was my reply:
Jacqui,
I just thought that I would bring the Australian law to your attention, you seem to be threatening me without substance:
Defamation Act 2005 – SECT 9
Certain corporations do not have cause of action for defamation
9. Certain corporations do not have cause of action for defamation
(1) A corporation has no cause of action for defamation in relation to the
publication of defamatory matter about the corporation unless it was an
excluded corporation at the time of the publication.
(2) A corporation is an excluded corporation if-
(a) the objects for which it is formed do not include obtaining financial
gain for its members or corporators; or
(b) it employs fewer than 10 persons and is not related to another
corporation-
and the corporation is not a public body.
(3) In counting employees for the purposes of subsection (2)(b), part-time
employees are to be taken into account as an appropriate fraction of a
full-time equivalent.
(4) In determining whether a corporation is related to another corporation for
the purposes of subsection (2)(b), section 50 of the Corporations Act applies
as if references to bodies corporate in that section were references to
corporations within the meaning of this section.
(5) subsection (1) does not affect any cause of action for defamation that an
individual associated with a corporation has in relation to the publication of
defamatory matter about the individual even if the publication of the same
matter also defames the corporation.
(6) In this section-
corporation includes any body corporate or corporation constituted by or under
a law of any country (including by exercise of a prerogative right), whether
or not a public body; public body means a local government body or other
governmental or public authority constituted by or under a law of any country.
Also you quote Gutnick v Dow Jones, this is a false precedent as you are probably aware. The damage to Gutnick’s reputation occurred in Victoria when subscribers in Victoria to the online magazine published by Dow Jones read a defamatory article about Gutnick. So Victoria was the correct jurisdiction. In this case the overwhelming number of readers of my blog are not in NSW and Evony is not in NSW, so NSW is not the correct jurisdiction for hearing the case.
Also everything I have written is either easily proven truth or fair comment. Which you would know if you looked at the facts.
I am just about to catch a plane and will be back in the UK on 14th September.
regards,
Bruce
And this was my reply:
Jacqui,
I just thought that I would bring the Australian law to your attention, you seem to be threatening me without substance:
Defamation Act 2005 – SECT 9
Certain corporations do not have cause of action for defamation
9. Certain corporations do not have cause of action for defamation
(1) A corporation has no cause of action for defamation in relation to the
publication of defamatory matter about the corporation unless it was an
excluded corporation at the time of the publication.
(2) A corporation is an excluded corporation if-
(a) the objects for which it is formed do not include obtaining financial
gain for its members or corporators; or
(b) it employs fewer than 10 persons and is not related to another
corporation-
and the corporation is not a public body.
(3) In counting employees for the purposes of subsection (2)(b), part-time
employees are to be taken into account as an appropriate fraction of a
full-time equivalent.
(4) In determining whether a corporation is related to another corporation for
the purposes of subsection (2)(b), section 50 of the Corporations Act applies
as if references to bodies corporate in that section were references to
corporations within the meaning of this section.
(5) subsection (1) does not affect any cause of action for defamation that an
individual associated with a corporation has in relation to the publication of
defamatory matter about the individual even if the publication of the same
matter also defames the corporation.
(6) In this section-
corporation includes any body corporate or corporation constituted by or under
a law of any country (including by exercise of a prerogative right), whether
or not a public body; public body means a local government body or other
governmental or public authority constituted by or under a law of any country.
Also you quote Gutnick v Dow Jones, this is a false precedent as you are probably aware. The damage to Gutnick’s reputation occurred in Victoria when subscribers in Victoria to the online magazine published by Dow Jones read a defamatory article about Gutnick. So Victoria was the correct jurisdiction. In this case the overwhelming number of readers of my blog are not in NSW and Evony is not in NSW, so NSW is not the correct jurisdiction for hearing the case.
Also everything I have written is either easily proven truth or fair comment. Which you would know if you looked at the facts.
I am just about to catch a plane and will be back in the UK on 14th September.
regards,
Bruce
EVONY, LLC ISSUES LAWSUIT AGAINST “MALICIOUS” BLOGGER FOR MULTIPLE VIOLATIONS OF INTERNATIONAL LIBEL STANDARDS
Video Game Developer Seeks Damages from Blogger for “Gross Disregard for the Truth”
NEW SOUTH WALES, AUSTRALIA, September 14, 2009 – The developer for the popular online video game Evony has filed suit against blogger Bruce Everiss for posting defamatory and false statements online about the company and the game. The lawsuit follows multiple rebuffed attempts to reconcile the matter out of court.
Evony’s Australia based legal counsel has proceeded on multiple fronts internationally against the libelous assaults that Bruce Everiss has leveled against Evony, LLC (http://www.evony.net), its game “Evony: Age I”, and its corporate leadership on his weblog and in publications worldwide in recent weeks.
Evony’s attorneys said Bruce Everiss’ attacks have caused significant damage to the company’s brand and the gaming experience for Evony’s users and millions of fans around the world.
“For weeks, we have worked to avoid taking our case into the legal courts, hoping instead to persuade Mr. Everiss to see the error of his ways and correct the multiple fraudulent and false claims he has made against Evony,” said Dean Groundwater, Evony’s chief legal counsel and a principle with the Australian firm Warren McKeon Dickson. “In the more than 15 years I have been practicing law, I have never seen such a gross disregard for the truth as that displayed by Mr. Everiss. His actions bring an enormous discredit to all online journalists internationally and have substantially impacted Evony’s reputation in Australia. I am confident the Supreme Court of New South Wales will see through the falsehoods being perpetrated by Mr. Everiss and will hold him accountable for his blatantly illegal and libelous actions.”
“Mr. Everiss’ attempts to spread his patently false charges to others in the online community cannot be allowed to go unanswered,” said Benjamin Gifford, Vice Development Director for the Legal IP Strategic Division for Delaware based Evony, LLC.
“In the digital age in which we now live, online journalists and bloggers – and the traditional media outlets that may rely upon them as sources – must strive for a higher standard of integrity and accuracy. Mr. Everiss’ complete disregard for even the most basic tenets of journalistic responsibility have left our company no alternative but to take these legal actions. We hope now, in facing the full light of day before the Supreme Court, that Mr. Everiss will finally come clean and clear the record,” said Gifford.
The suit, which was filed in the Supreme Court of New South Wales, Australia comes after weeks of attempts to convince Bruce Everiss of the false nature of his information.
Video Game Developer Seeks Damages from Blogger for “Gross Disregard for the Truth”
NEW SOUTH WALES, AUSTRALIA, September 14, 2009 – The developer for the popular online video game Evony has filed suit against blogger Bruce Everiss for posting defamatory and false statements online about the company and the game. The lawsuit follows multiple rebuffed attempts to reconcile the matter out of court.
Evony’s Australia based legal counsel has proceeded on multiple fronts internationally against the libelous assaults that Bruce Everiss has leveled against Evony, LLC (http://www.evony.net), its game “Evony: Age I”, and its corporate leadership on his weblog and in publications worldwide in recent weeks.
Evony’s attorneys said Bruce Everiss’ attacks have caused significant damage to the company’s brand and the gaming experience for Evony’s users and millions of fans around the world.
“For weeks, we have worked to avoid taking our case into the legal courts, hoping instead to persuade Mr. Everiss to see the error of his ways and correct the multiple fraudulent and false claims he has made against Evony,” said Dean Groundwater, Evony’s chief legal counsel and a principle with the Australian firm Warren McKeon Dickson. “In the more than 15 years I have been practicing law, I have never seen such a gross disregard for the truth as that displayed by Mr. Everiss. His actions bring an enormous discredit to all online journalists internationally and have substantially impacted Evony’s reputation in Australia. I am confident the Supreme Court of New South Wales will see through the falsehoods being perpetrated by Mr. Everiss and will hold him accountable for his blatantly illegal and libelous actions.”
“Mr. Everiss’ attempts to spread his patently false charges to others in the online community cannot be allowed to go unanswered,” said Benjamin Gifford, Vice Development Director for the Legal IP Strategic Division for Delaware based Evony, LLC.
“In the digital age in which we now live, online journalists and bloggers – and the traditional media outlets that may rely upon them as sources – must strive for a higher standard of integrity and accuracy. Mr. Everiss’ complete disregard for even the most basic tenets of journalistic responsibility have left our company no alternative but to take these legal actions. We hope now, in facing the full light of day before the Supreme Court, that Mr. Everiss will finally come clean and clear the record,” said Gifford.
The suit, which was filed in the Supreme Court of New South Wales, Australia comes after weeks of attempts to convince Bruce Everiss of the false nature of his information.
As you know I have had a threatening letter from Warren McKeon Dickson, a firm of Australian solicitors, because they object to some articles about Evony on this blog. You might be wondering why a Chinese company is threatening a British blog using an Australian solicitor. They can do this because the libel is supposedly committed anywhere that the blog is read. And that is pretty much everywhere on earth.
By using an Australian solicitor Evony make it very difficult for me to defend myself. I have to fly myself and my legal team halfway round the world for every hearing and bringing witnesses in would be extremely expensive. Also Australia has a very old fashioned libel law where the person who thinks they are libeled doesn’t have to prove anything. They can make all the accusations they want and the onus is on me to bring evidence to disprove every one. This is why Warren McKeon Dickson have listed so many silly and obvious things which everyone knows aren’t libel in their letter. For instance they claim that “Evony sends massive amounts of intrusive and offensive spam as part of its advertising the game Evony” is libellous. But everyone has seen the adverts. And in this thread you can read how Evony spammed the Google advertising system.
It is the same with virtually all their claims. Anyone reading my articles and following the links can see the evidence to back up what I say. But still, even though what I say is obviously the truth, I would have to fly all the witnesses to Australia to prove every point.
Libel is incredibly expensive to defend in court. Many people in the UK end up spending over a million pounds. So the idea of me being able to defend this in court in Australia is a non starter. But some gold farmers are earning as much as half a million dollars a day, so to Evony going for me like this is petty cash. So you can see what Evony are doing. They are using Warren McKeon Dickson to try and suppress fair criticism about them on the internet. They are using the expensive steamroller of the Australian legal system in an attempt to stop free speech.
And it is not just me that they have gone for, Warren McKeon Dickson have also threatened the Guardian and presumably other people who have fairly criticised their activities. If we back down and remove our fair criticism from the web then it is a blow for human freedom. Anyone will be able to get away with anything knowing they can use Australian lawyers to stop criticism of their activities. And everyone will have to be immensely careful about what they say anywhere on the internet. It doesn’t matter if you write the truth, the Australian trap can still get you.
It is surprising that Evony are using Warren McKeon Dickson. Libel is a very specialist area of the law with specialist and very highly expensive legal practices who do nothing else. But Warren McKeon Dickson are small town general solicitors more accustomed to helping people buy and sell property, they don’t even list libel as an area of expertise on their website. So it looks like Evony have gone to a less expensive lawyer so as to be able to cost effectively carpet bomb their critics.
So what can I do? If I remove the articles it is a victory for censorship and oppression. If I leave the articles Evony will bring a case against me that I cannot defend, even though I have told the truth. The only answer is the Streisand effect, where an attempt at censorship backfires because the resultant publicity brings the story to an even bigger audience. This is already happening as Warren McKeon Dickson’s heavy handed bullying has received far more publicity than the original Evony story.
If you want to help beat these people you can. Just cut and paste anything I have ever said about Evony on here and put it anywhere and everywhere on the web. You don’t even have to credit the source if you don’t want to. They cannot threaten everybody! The more that the truth about Evony is propagated the better the Streisand effect will be.
By using an Australian solicitor Evony make it very difficult for me to defend myself. I have to fly myself and my legal team halfway round the world for every hearing and bringing witnesses in would be extremely expensive. Also Australia has a very old fashioned libel law where the person who thinks they are libeled doesn’t have to prove anything. They can make all the accusations they want and the onus is on me to bring evidence to disprove every one. This is why Warren McKeon Dickson have listed so many silly and obvious things which everyone knows aren’t libel in their letter. For instance they claim that “Evony sends massive amounts of intrusive and offensive spam as part of its advertising the game Evony” is libellous. But everyone has seen the adverts. And in this thread you can read how Evony spammed the Google advertising system.
It is the same with virtually all their claims. Anyone reading my articles and following the links can see the evidence to back up what I say. But still, even though what I say is obviously the truth, I would have to fly all the witnesses to Australia to prove every point.
Libel is incredibly expensive to defend in court. Many people in the UK end up spending over a million pounds. So the idea of me being able to defend this in court in Australia is a non starter. But some gold farmers are earning as much as half a million dollars a day, so to Evony going for me like this is petty cash. So you can see what Evony are doing. They are using Warren McKeon Dickson to try and suppress fair criticism about them on the internet. They are using the expensive steamroller of the Australian legal system in an attempt to stop free speech.
And it is not just me that they have gone for, Warren McKeon Dickson have also threatened the Guardian and presumably other people who have fairly criticised their activities. If we back down and remove our fair criticism from the web then it is a blow for human freedom. Anyone will be able to get away with anything knowing they can use Australian lawyers to stop criticism of their activities. And everyone will have to be immensely careful about what they say anywhere on the internet. It doesn’t matter if you write the truth, the Australian trap can still get you.
It is surprising that Evony are using Warren McKeon Dickson. Libel is a very specialist area of the law with specialist and very highly expensive legal practices who do nothing else. But Warren McKeon Dickson are small town general solicitors more accustomed to helping people buy and sell property, they don’t even list libel as an area of expertise on their website. So it looks like Evony have gone to a less expensive lawyer so as to be able to cost effectively carpet bomb their critics.
So what can I do? If I remove the articles it is a victory for censorship and oppression. If I leave the articles Evony will bring a case against me that I cannot defend, even though I have told the truth. The only answer is the Streisand effect, where an attempt at censorship backfires because the resultant publicity brings the story to an even bigger audience. This is already happening as Warren McKeon Dickson’s heavy handed bullying has received far more publicity than the original Evony story.
If you want to help beat these people you can. Just cut and paste anything I have ever said about Evony on here and put it anywhere and everywhere on the web. You don’t even have to credit the source if you don’t want to. They cannot threaten everybody! The more that the truth about Evony is propagated the better the Streisand effect will be.
