US Chamber of Commerce Takedown Notice Targets Parody Site

The United States Chamber of Commerce industry group has issued a Digital Millennium Copyright Act takedown notice against a ‘parody’ website that mocked the Chamber, according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

Earlier this week, a fake press briefing purportedly from the business lobby made international headlines for announcing an apparent about-face in the Chamber’s controversial opposition to a climate change bill before the US Congress. (The Chamber position made headlines in recent weeks when several large corporations pulled their membership over it.)

But it turned out to be a parody from the Yes Men, a group specialising in such things to bring a message.

The US Chamber, rather than taking the message of the spoof and changing its policy, is now charging copyright infringement against a website set up to support the prank, EFF said.

EFF has written a letter [pdf] in support of the Yes Men to the Chamber’s lawyer saying the DMCA notice is “without merit,” that parody “designed for purposes of criticism and comment” is protected by fair use doctrines, and that if the site is taken down the Chamber might be liable for misrepresentation of infringement.

On the Yes Men’s US Chamber site, currently available at the group makes the statement: “In business, as in life, we sometimes don’t look ahead. We seize the day while forgetting the year … We at the Chamber have tried to keep climate science from interfering with business. But without a stable climate, there will be no business,” and promises to put its weight behind a strong climate change bill.

The real US Chamber – which has more conservative view on climate change, calling for any climate legislation not to harm business interests, in particular the energy sector – was not amused. “Public relations hoaxes undermine the genuine effort to find solutions on the challenge of climate change,” they responded, and in an earlier statement called electricity “the “juice” that runs our country” and called on support for “the “juicers” – coal, natural gas, petroleum, nuclear, and hydropower.”

[Update: the EFF has taken the Yes Men’s case, and are defending them against a lawsuit filed by the Chamber].