A couple of weeks back I wrote an entry called don’t ask jeeves. This title planted the seed of an idea in my head, and I was somewhat surprised to check and discover that no-one had registered the domain name. So I purchased dontaskjeeves.com myself. I built a page which ripped off the original Ask Jeeves design, replacing the super-efficient and helpful Jeeves character with one who, although looking identical, was much more cantankerous and unfriendly. You could insert a search term, and Jeeves would refuse to deliver any results, instead returning a rude message and a link to a random site completely unconnected to your search.
Although this sounds like the most hilarious thing ever, it didn’t really work too well in reality. I’m not too sure why, but I wasn’t happy with it, so I never linked to it. And now, you’ll never get to see it. Today I received an e-mail from my webhosts with a cease and desist order attached from Morrisson and Foerster, Attorneys at Law. MoFo, as they’re brilliantly known in real life, were acting on behalf of Ask Jeeves, and claimed that I had infringed the company’s copyright. Which I had. Obviously. Guilty as charged, your honour. So I took the page down, rather than have my webhost terminate my account.
Anyone want to buy a domain name? Good condition, one careful owner.
Came across your blog via Scary Duck and started to read – Good stuff – I’ve often thought about things like “Don’t ask” etc but as I’m new to the blogging world and fairly computer illiterate I’m sticking with just blogging on for a bit before getting radical.you’ve gained another reader
cheers
mog
Jeeves is a useless cunt.
100% of FACT!
boycottmofo.com? mofoisahomo.com? just thinking out loud ….
How’s about you ftp me the files. I’ll put it up for a couple of days, just enough time for Google to pick it up. Then I pass it on to the next person in the line.
And so on, and so on!
I would do, if I thought what I’d done was good enough to be seen by the masses. But it wasn’t. So you’ll just have to wait for the next installment of dontaskjeeves.com
I am sure you are covered (in the UK) by the fair use (parody and satire) get out. Unless they can show you are profiting from the infringement then it would be difficult for them to get you on copyright. (Much easier to bully your ISP into closing you down).
I however would not want to get into a legal battle unless the joke was either fabulous or about willies.