The Boy Who Cried Cease and Desist or
Why software companies, lawyers, music companies, and movie companies and everybody else should go a little easy on the Cease and Desists. For their own good.

Aside it from it being kind of bad p.r. when they Cease and Desist a 12 year-old or a poor grandma who doesn't own a computer, or a web site that doesn't even have a copy of Independence Day on their website, just a link to a 10k script they named independence_day.pl, these companies and organizations should stop Cease and Desistin' coz nowadays, everybody and their brother in the blogosphere's so open about the Cease and Desist letters they get in the mail, that getting a Cease and Desist letter just doesn't seem very serious anymore. It's kind of ho-hum, dig?

Example of both bad p.r., and diluting the value of Cease and Desist:

Last week Microsoft's Vista Beta 2 download site was so bogged down, that Microsoft suggested ordering physical media of the beta download. To the rescue, two Microsoft enthusiasts set up a torrent of the media, relieving Microsoft resources, and ensuring that the workflow of community QA could continue.

Their reward? A Cease and Desist. This post will not take the time to detail the community, business, and technical transgressions taking place here. This post is about how the Microsoft fans were so casual in their mention of the Cease an Desist they got.

Truthfully, Microsoft's exercise of the cease and desist is far from outrageous in this case, it's really not that "evil" of them. My point is only if intellectual property owners don't quickly revisit the hows and whens of Cease and Desistin', the day is coming soon when we will have ALL been Cease and Desist'd, and the message will be a bit watered down.  ¶ 11:23 AM