Thursday, February 7, 2008

oh my god

i think i am going to head back home next week.

money's finally running out, i kinda miss home, and stuff seems to be worked out with Samantha.

this trip's been awesome, but apparently not awesome enough that i'm still willing to trade the warm weather of South Carolina for the freezer that's Ontario, haha.

naw, this has been awesome actually. especially the cougars.


EDITED BECAUSE IT TURNS OUT THIS WHOLE THING IS FUCKED.

It turns out Across Five Aprils and Victory Records ACTUALLY ARE GOING TO SUE ME.
I just got a Cease and Desist letter in my email from Victory's attorneys.

I am going to post a picture of the letter in a little bit have posted pics as proof that i am about to lose my mind. i don't knwo what to do. I CANNOT BELIEVE THIS CRAP!




=============================

MELONI & MCCAFFREY, P.C.
ATTORNEYS AT LAW
1350 Avenue of the Americas
Suite 3100
New York, N.Y. 10019
Telephone: (212)957-5577
Facsimile: (800)659-3985


BY E-MAIL February 7, 2008

Mr. Chris Xavier
chrisX519@gmail.com
Ontario, Canada

Re: “Lonesome Traveler” Web Blog

Dear Mr. Xavier:

This firm is litigation counsel for Victory Records, Inc. (“Victory”). I am writing in connection with the series of recent postings on your “Lonesome Traveler” web blog. In those postings you have published and/or provided access to videos and/or sound recordings of live and/or unreleased versions of songs owned and controlled by Victory, including, but not limited to Farewell to Freeways’ song “Lemmings”, Secret Lives of Freemasons’ song “Airplane”, Dead to Fall's song "Cropgrower" and Across Five Aprils’ song “This Means Not Welcome” (the “Songs”). In addition to owning the sound recordings and musical compositions, Victory also owns and controls all rights to the name and likenesses of each of those bands.

Your conduct constitutes, among other things, copyright infringement under the laws of the United States.

We will assume, for purposes of this letter only, that until now you have been unaware that your conduct exposes you to legal liability. However, you are hereby placed on notice that Victory will hold you fully responsible for any damages arising from the illegal publication of the Songs, unless, by 5 P.M. Eastern Time, on February 8, 2008, you: (i) remove the Songs from the Lonesome Traveler website and any other websites maintained, owned, controlled or operated by you, including, without limitation, your MySpace website; (ii) that you disable all links to those Songs on those websites; and (iii) that you provide us with written confirmation that you have done so. We also demand that you identify the sources that provided you with the video and/or audio recordings of the Songs that you have posted on your websites.

Your failure to comply with the foregoing demands will leave our client with no choice other than to commence legal proceedings against you and all other parties responsible for these copyright infringements in a court of appropriate jurisdiction. Should that occur, our client shall seek, without limitation, injunctive relief and money damages, including statutory damages and attorneys fees.

This letter is not intended to be a complete statement of the facts or the law relevant to this matter and is written without prejudice to the legal and/or equitable rights and remedies of our clients. Any and all such rights and/or remedies, whether or not referred to in this letter, are hereby expressly reserved.

Very truly yours,

MELONI & McCAFFREY, P.C.

31 comments:

Anonymous said...

MAYBE YOU SHOULDN'T BE SUCH A FUCKING DOUCHEBAG AND TRY TO PUT OUT SHIT THAT YOU DON'T HAVE THE RIGHT PUTTING UP.

YOU ONLY GET WHAT YOU DESERVE, ASSHOLE!

-love,
mallorie ;]

Anonymous said...

dude,
i don't even know why i'm helping you.
because it's horrible what you did.
but to be fair, i've only heard their side.
so...

you're not completely fucked.
just delete all the links and everything byy 5 PM tomorrow.
and let them know i guess?
just do what they said and you won't have any problems...or you shouldn't according to the letter.

i dunno where you got the stuff from, a5a said you stole it directly, but i don't know really what happened so i guess just tell them the truth.

and good luck dude.
at first i thought you were an asshole for doing this.
and you kinda are.
but i feel really bad.
because you just made a mistake.
and now people are doing everything they can to fuck your life up.

i hope i helped a little.
good luck with all this.
i'm sorry.

Andy Baio said...

A cease-and-desist doesn't carry any legal weight. It's just a strongly-worded letter, it's NOT a lawsuit.

If you're sure the material is copyrighted and belongs to them, just take it down. If it's not, leave it up. Regardless, I'd highly recommend NOT replying to the letter. Just take the file down and keep on keeping on.

Anonymous said...

just take the songs down you clown, the bands and label have asked you nicely, you get like 50 visitors to this blog, is it really going to be that big a deal if you delete links in some old posts?? professional mp3 blogs deal with this sort of thing all the time and they comply.. grow up kid, youre causing yourself all kinds of unnecessary problems

Anonymous said...

you tried fighting the good fight. victory is a douchebag about promoting their bands by sharing their music which nobody may have been previously interested in anyway. one more reason not support any of their crappy emo bands.

Anonymous said...

dude stop being a prick and take the songs down!!! your whats wrong with the music industery today. Have some god damn respect for the hard work thats gone into this music to be created!!!

Anonymous said...

They asked you nicely and the guys from Dead to Fall are friends of mine i've partied with them plenty and you were just being a fuckin asshole guess you should have just done it when they asked you are getting what you deserve Victory Records is going to sue you!? Well that is great to hear you fuck.

Anonymous said...

not here to harass you, but seriously. it's common sense. these songs are property of victory and the artists AND they're unreleased. it shouldn't take genius to realize that posting that shit is illegal. this isn't even a lawsuit letter, they're asking you to TAKE IT DOWN. if you don't, they have every fucking right to sue your ass for it. i don't see what the big problem is with removing them.

Anonymous said...

I have an idea. Instead of being a dick you should just listen to them. Or she your shit via torrent or p2p software. I mean Ill be the first to admit I pirate shit but really. On a public website. Not smart.

Anonymous said...

Don't steal music asshole

Anonymous said...

take it down jackass. what do you expect? I mean, whatever, you put some pirated shit on the internet....some bands wouldnt care, but when bands ask you to take it down, take it the fuck down. The utter disrespect you have shown for bands you claim to be a fan of is horrible. If you get sued you get what you deserve for being a wise ass little punk who thinks he is untouchable.....grow up.

Anonymous said...

MUSIC SHOULD BE FREE.

SOMETIMES IT TAKES A PERSON LIKE YOU TO STAND UP FOR THE MILLIONS OF PEOPLE THAT AGREE WITH THAT.

KEEP ON TRUCKIN

Anonymous said...

Victory uses Cease and Desist.

It's super effective!

Anonymous said...

That's just straight fucked up and disrespectful what you're doing. You deserve everything you have coming to you, asshole.

Vince Neilstein said...

Dude, you're fine. As people have already noted above, just comply with the request to take down the referenced material and you'll be clear.

Anonymous said...

why do you think music should be free? your an idiot.It should be up to the artist to decide weather its free or not...not YOU. Do you ever think about all the money that goes into making a record? Or how much it costs a band to tour? When you are in a fulltime band, you cant work a normal job....if music was free, how would these guys/girls making it make a living? The answer is, they wouldnt....and then you would not have music. Think before you speak.

Bryan said...

Dude, this entire thing is hillarious in my honest opinion.

Victory is going after you for what, three unreleased songs and a youtube video?

First off, almost all of these bands have had youtube vids of their new song. Across Five Aprils even posted a bulletin about hearing a new song on youtube when someone uploaded a video.

And yeah, you put up one song from a few albums. But once again, its ONE song and I can name off a number of web blogs that have posted the ENTIRE albums for the mentioned bands.

Ironically, Victory has never made a deal about sites/blogs that post the full albums.

Why weren't they making a stand on privacy earlier this year when the Auditions CD leaked 3-4 weeks before its release date. Or hell, all of their cds tend to leak online in their entirety 2-5 weeks before their release date.

So this is just funny.

Anonymous said...

All the freeness in the world won't make me listen to those bands.

Maybe if they paid me...

Anonymous said...

tools like you are the reason bands break up, bands make no money, and the reason why labels have to shut down and stop helping their own bands, go kill yourself dude, How would you like it if people came to your house and robbed you and stole everything you liked, hmm, not a bad idea, everyone on this blog is going to rob you now, k thanks,lol, don't say we didn't warn you :-D

Anonymous said...

do it anyways, screw victory

chrisX519 said...

i dont know about taking a stand or whatever. i don't believe Victory's gonna follow through with their threat anyway. they are just trying to make an example of me and i am not going to let them bully me around.

they can fuck off, i think they're all talk. i just want to give teh bands more exposure, and gee, LOOKS LIKE THEY ARE GETTING IT.

if anything, Victory should HIRE me, not SUE me.

i bet you nothing happens if i don't do anything.

i have been getting advice from people on what to do, and yeah i know i can just take the songs down, but they also could have asked me BEFORE sending all you kids to harass me.

it's no crusade, i am not on some mission, i am just going to be a prick, like the title of the blog says. i am not removing anything

Anonymous said...

Well i actually think this is all too funny.... i know hundreds of people who download music illegally every day. not to mention people on here giving shit about this also download illegally via torrents or limrewire or another p2p sharing system. so thanks for the song buddy but i already have all the cds. and its not your fault the cds are leaked, why doesn't victory look into their "people" and see who is doing it, instead of bothering some kid via teh internets.Also bands get shit from the record companies anyways they get a very small percent of album sales, they have to play what they want them to play, and i want to ask secret lives..... what happened to the screaming?? is it not cool enough now...? so you wirte soft music?? (soft refering to the previous record with various screaming songs and harder riffs) now they sound just like every other band on the lable... good job. and lonesome traveller i say FUCK victory records

Anonymous said...

So really, get a life,,, and stop trying to leak music that many people have been waiting for and are anticipated for.. you ocmpletly fucked up, many people chances to go and wait for the suprise of the new secret lives cd.
FUCKING ASS HOLE.
get a life..
and stop, doing shit u shouldnt.

Anonymous said...

You are fucked
Welcome to America

have a nice fucking time dealing with that
shoulda just taken the shit down

Dumbass

Anonymous said...

sucks to be you but on a side note. fuck tony victory.

Anonymous said...

Fuck Victory Records. Tony B is worse than Jim Jones. Fight the power brother! <3

Anonymous said...

I see both sides of the issue. Labels do tend to jack up the price on cds, making it harder for kids to afford the music they love to hear. But on the other side, having toured for several years in various bands, i do feel the need to say no matter whether you like these bands or not, all bands start out as nobody's. They work hard to get to where they have, and no one has the right to post their music without permission. It is unfair to say they deserve it because it is a certain label or a certain band. Just think, what if this happened to your favorite band? How would you react?

Anonymous said...

just so you know...

A5A is using the images of the letter you where sent on their website.. now i don't know much about legal bullshit, but i'm willing to wager pretty heavily that you didn't send them the consent and rights to post those images. COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT.

i'd attack that topic with all hands flailing, buddy.

Anonymous said...

Make you life easier bro, just take down the crap and move on!

The letter is just a strong way of saying please do what they are asking or we will sue you.

Now if you don not take them down they will throw a petty law suit on you which is no biggie and they know that but they will get the feds involved and thats would eally screw you man!

no matte what happened the music is copy written thats a given all labels do that first thing after they get the mix tacks.

The feds can slap a $20,000 fine per song on you with out a doubt and if you cant pay I think its 3 months in prison for every $20,000 you can not pay.

I know this all sounds stupid but thats just how it is. this is not just some myspace feud its little guy versus the man and the man will have the feds on his side!

Take care man.

Anonymous said...

your a fucking douchebag
putting stuff up that doesnt belong to you!
you little shit!

linlinhime said...

Seriously. Fuck all these litle emo kids on here. I seriously doubt any of these kids can offer legal advice or know any knowledge of such. They're all stupid anyways just like the shit Victory puts out. Who the hell cares? The reason bands don't make money isn't from lack of exposure, it's because they down right suck ass.

Keep doing what you're doing. Fuck them all.