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If I fully comply to the terms of a cease and desist notice, will I be left alone?

mahoganyslide — Fri, 16 May 2008 14:56:07 -0800

If I fully comply to the terms of a cease and desist notice, will I be left alone? I recently received a cease and desist notice from the legal representatives of a company. I was knowingly infringing upon the intellectual property owned by the company. The following is my response to the email I recently received (with sensitive information left out):

"(Name of Legal Representative):

Thank you for courteously notifying me of the matter. I have complied with the requests you made in your letter dated xx-xx-xxxx.

I used the xxxxx software for my own personal purposes. The software was originally obtained from an acquaintance who in turn downloaded the package online. The software has now been erased from my computer hard drive along with the original installation files that were stored on my external hard drive.

I am willing to comply and cooperate in any way that you, or the company that you represent, deem necessary. Please notify me of anything that I may be able to provide in order to satisfy the terms of your cease and desist notice.

Very Respectfully,
(My Name)"

Is this an appropriate response? What are the chances that they will just leave the matter alone and leave me be? I acknowledge that it was my fault, and I am not going to commit the same mistake in the future. I'm a little worried that this might result in me (a poor college student) paying a hefty fine of some sort.

Thanks for all of your help!

I've ceased and desisted. Now what?

Anonymous — Fri, 21 Mar 2008 14:20:11 -0800

My aunt recently received a cease and desist because she's selling a product called (new adjective) (adjective) (noun) (e.g. "really cool thing) on her web site. The cease and desist is because (adjective) (noun) (e.g. "cool thing") is supposedly trademarked. So no problem, it's just an honest mistake and she's changed the names of the product on her web site. The cease and desist then says she needs to provide written assurance that she's removed references to this combination of wording from her web site, flyers, packaging, etc. and that she won't do it again. No problem, as the web site is the only place that uses the particular word combination to describe the product.

She doesn't want to lawyer up because the amount of sales on this product is almost negligible, and she's not fighting it.

So the question is, is there any kind of wording to use, or to avoid, when writing up the response? She's leery of "admitting fault" because it's not like she did it on purpose and was unaware that the word combination was trademarked, and she's asking me for advice because her English isn't so good.

I was wondering if it would be appropriate/wise to simply rephrase the info from the cease and desist. e.g. if it says "assure that you've removed references from your web site" then respond with "I have removed references from my web site" etc.

I googled "how to respond to cease and desist" and checked mefi and found mostly info about what to do when you want to fight it, but couldn't find anything about a graceful way of "rolling over." Any advice?

My name and headshot showing up in unauthorized or illegal websites

infini — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 08:24:15 -0800

I'd appreciate some advice - I track myself in google blog search [whatever] and suddenly of late my name has been showing up in two porn sites. I sent them to my lawyer who said contact Privacyprotect.org cos they've blocked their Whois etc etc ok but now the latest infamy is MY headshot [which is saved as my fullname so it shows up] is showing up on very nasty ethnic pornsites. I haven't even clicked through I feel so sick just from the words that show up around the search. Is there anything I can do to prevent this happening rather than the constant back and forth with very good lawyer who is better served doing better work than chasing this crap down? plus is it possible that I've been targetted for this ? As I've never had a problem in the past two years and then boom 4 in one week?