Dear Mr. Morrison,
We note your correspondence dated September 26, 2014 titled "Re: Defamation and Threats Stemming From Your Website".
I believe the matter to which you are referring is known as "GrimoireGate" and as I understand it, is a dispute between your client Omniconnection LLC and Cleveland Mark Blakemore, who has been developing a title known as "Grimoire" for some two decades (a fact which has become a long-running joke on the rpgcodex.net).
I personally pay little attention to the comments of Mr Blakemore, a man who at times has stated everything from believing he is a "descendant of Neanderthals", to professing to have "titanium bones". His endless and unfulfilled predictions of doom, along with his hyperbole and claims of building his own bunker so as to save himself from the gangs of roaming survivors after the next apocalypse, have made him a figure of some ridicule on the Codex, and also someone not to be believed.
The rpgcodex.net has also had its own run-ins with him in the past. I am therefore not surprised to find that he has managed to involve himself in another debacle.
That said, I am certainly willing to work with you, in an attempt to resolve this matter amicably. To that end, your letter raises a number of points, which I will now address:
1. "I am writing to alert you to something you clearly already know. Members of your website, both users and staff, have been supporting, inciting, and creating many defamatory, untrue, and threatening claims to myself and my clients on various web services. Most recently, today, members of your website took part in a flaming process on an informational post where I attempt to help game developers probono."
While I have been vaguely aware of GrimoireGate (thanks mostly to the news post you refer to later), I have not been reading the GrimoireGate thread and was unaware of any "flaming process". I am however aware that comments have been made about your law firm, which mostly seemed to be about finding out information about your law firm and its staff from a series of publicly published websites which you control.
In terms of "staff" on the rpgcodex.net, we use the term loosely. No-one is paid for their work and the site is run by a series of community volunteers who post news and write articles in their spare time as they see fit.
2. On the matter of statements and / or claims that are "defamatory, untrue, threatening, and damaging" on the rpgcodex.net, I will require you to identify each of those statements that you feel fit this category and notify me of them, so that action can be taken. Our forum has rules against "illegal" behaviour and if your claims are true, these comments would fall under that category. As such, if you are able to identify the comments which you believe are illegal, they will be removed.
3. "I ask every single instance of mention of my name, my company name, my client Omniconnection, LLC, or any of its management, be removed from your site immediately."
I am not aware of any legislation which would allow you to enforce this request. The rpgcodex.net is mostly a gaming news website with an active forum community which has discussion on a wide range of topics. I am sorry that you have become one of the topics discussed due to your company's involvement with Omniconnection and its dispute with Mr Blakemore, but removing any and all mentions of you and your client will basically mean we could not discuss this issue. An issue which I note, has been discussed on a number of other relevant gaming websites including KickStarter and pcgamer.com. Disallowing the rpgcodex.net to mention your client or your firms own involvement in this matter, would be a restriction on our right to report - and one I doubt you would hold any other gaming news site to, as I assume your client would desire publicity for their product at some point.
As such, we will not be able to comply with this request.
4. "I do not see an attempt to follow proper DMCA takedown procedures or that you have a registered agent, so we are asking you to follow the procedures here now, as that will remove liability from your website from what your users are doing."
As I have been advised, DMCA take-down procedure is relevant only to copyrighted material. I am uncertain as to its relevance in this matter.
With regard to legal liability, please note that the rpgcodex.net takes no legal liability or responsibility for comments made by those who choose our forums as a place to air their views, in much the same way as you would not sue a pub or hotel for a comment someone may make inside that pub or hotel.
That does not mean that we will not take action but along similar lines, I have been advised that Mr Blakemore and his supporters have made various comments on your client's KickStarter and other pages on the internet and I doubt you are taking legal action against KickStarter for those comments.
If you have an issue with individuals who have chosen to register on the rpgcodex.net, I recommend you take the matter up personally with them. If you require contact details, including IP addresses and timestamps for certain posts or their registered email addresses, I will be happy to oblige, provided you are able to supply a legal ruling from a court entitling you to this information.
I do not "own" those who have chosen to register on rpgcodex.net, nor are they beholden to me. I am not their master. The best I can do, is ask them to refrain from making such comments, which I will do in a news post. Please note this does not prevent them from feeling aggrieved, or thinking similar things even if they are not posting them on the rpgcodex.net.
5. "If the requested posts and information are taken down, we will also assume the post made on the front page by your staff, and an agent of your website, was made in error in an attempt to report facts."
The news post I assume you refer to is the one titled "GrimoireGate: Cleve Blakemore in trademark dispute with impostor Grimoire", dated approx. 20 Sep 2014 (depending on time zone). Please be advised we will not be removing this news post. I believe it is factual, and in-line with previous news posting on the rpgcodex.net in that it combines opinion with information.
Furthermore, please be advised that as this matter affects users of the rpgcodex.net, I am required to notify them and will be making a news post to that fact.
6. "If the above mentioned information and references are not removed within 48 hours, we will take that as a sign that you do not wish to resolve this matter amicably. Again, we have done nothing to deserve this, and would have happily worked with Cleve if he reached out to us first. He did not, and your website supported these attacks."
Please do not take our disagreement on some of these matters as a sign that we do not wish to resolve this matter amicably. We are simply in disagreement as to how this matter should be resolved. From my own personal experience in dealing with Mr Blakemore, my advice would be for you and your client to simply ignore him. As your clients have already referred to in their article on pcgamer.com, "The word we’ve seen most often in researching this other 'Grimoire' is the term 'vaporware'—and there is every indication that the shoe fits. It seems that Mr. Blakemore’s game has been 'just around the corner' for more than a decade."
We see no advantage in either party taking the matter to court, and in fact only see a long drawn out battle which will benefit neither party. I'm sorry your client has a trademark dispute with Mr Blakemore over their similarly titled "Grimoire" game, but if you wish to address the matter further, it is something you will have to take up with Mr Blakemore himself.
If you have any further issues regarding this matter, please do not hesitate to contact me at your convenience.
Regards,
DarkUnderlord
