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Us Chamber Of Commerce Falls Victim To 'Fraud' Over Climate Hoax
| Good [+1]Toggle ReplyLink» databoy replied on Tue Oct 20, 2009 @ 10:27am |
 Coolness: 106120 | Environmental activists held spoof press conference announcing U-turn in the organisation's stance on climate legislation
It looked – at first – eerily like a routine news event. A man in a nondescript dark suit standing at a podium in one of the smaller meeting rooms on the 13th floor of the National Press Club. But then suddenly it wasn't. "There is only one way to do business and that is to pass a climate bill quickly so this December President Obama can go to Copenhagen and negotiate with a strong position," said the speaker – who said he represented the US Chamber of Commerce. The statement represented a complete repudiation of the Chamber's earlier opposition to climate change legislation. The hard line had triggered walk-outs from Apple and a handful of other high-profile companies in the past few weeks. The companies are trying to press the business organisation to support the bill by the senators John Kerry and Barbara Boxer that is to be debated by the Senate next week. Or maybe not. Barely 20 minutes into the Q&A section of the press conference, an agitated spokesman for the Chamber burst into the room, screaming that the event was a hoax. In today's instant news era, that wasn't quite soon enough. Several green organisations tweeted or blogged on the about-face. Reuters news agency put out a straight news story about the Chamber's apparent U-turn, and the Washington Post and New York Times put the story on their news sites (both later removed the stories from their websites). CNBC actually sought – and got – comment from analysts. It also broke its programming to have a reporter read out the fake press release. The spoof got under way with a press release inviting journalists to a morning news conference. Most reporters overlooked the misspelling of the Chamber president's name. The phony spokesman said the Chamber was not happy with the bill before the Senate and would push for a carbon tax – not the greenest of positions. But he added: "If cap and trade is all we can get we have to take it so at least we can have something to put in President Obama's hands when he goes to Copenhagen." He went out even further on a limb when he called clean coal "a hoax", saying the money would be better spent on solar energy research. "Clean technology has not only not been proven. It basically doesn't exist," he said. It was about that time, the real Chamber spokesman burst into the room – and had a mild shoving match at the podium. "What happened today was a fraud and I believe illegal," Eric Wohlschlegel said. The spokesman said he learned of the hoax when a reporter came to the Chamber office looking for the press conference. Wohlschlegel said he immediately leaped into a taxi. The spoof appears to be the work of the Avaaz Action Factory, which put a post on its website promising to "make this the worst Monday ever for the anti-climate PR machine at the US chamber of commerce". And while a number of reporters still pressed Wohlschlegel for signs of a shift in the Chamber's position, he soon set them straight. The Chamber was as opposed to climate change legislation as ever. [ www.commondreams.org ] Update » databoy wrote on Sun Oct 25, 2009 @ 1:04am Chamber Unleashes Lawyers on Yes Men
by Kate Sheppard After the Yes Men pulled their now-famous prank earlier this week on the US Chamber of Commerce, the Chamber issued a vague threat of "law-enforcement action." The group doesn't appear to have called the cops on the Yes Men just yet, but on Wednesday it issued a Digital Millennium Copyright Act take-down demand notice for the parody site that the Yes Men set up to publicize their fake event, in which the "Chamber" announced that it would support a sane global warming policy after all. The Chamber's attorney at the intellectual property law firm Kenyon & Kenyon issued a notice to the Yes Men's internet service provider, Hurricane Electric, asking them to take down the site. "The website infringes the Chamber of Commerce's copyrights by directly copying the images, logos, design, and layout of the Chamber of Commerce's copyright-protected official website, located at [ www.uschamber.com ] they wrote. They ask Hurricane to "take down all such infringing material" and/or end their business relationship with the Yes Men. "Continuing to be the ISP for this material could subject Hurricane Electric to legal liability," the letter states. "We are certain you can understand our client's concerns, and its need to protect its intellectual property," it continues. And now the Electronic Frontiers Foundation is jumping in, telling the Chamber to take a chill pill. The site, they say, fits within the accepted fair use and parody rights. "We are very disappointed the Chamber of Commerce decided to respond to political criticism with legal threats," said EFF staff attorney Corynne McSherry in a statement. "The site is obviously intended to highlight and parody the Chamber's controversial views, which have sparked political debate and led high-profile members to withdraw their support from the Chamber." [ arstechnica.com ] |
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Us Chamber Of Commerce Falls Victim To 'Fraud' Over Climate Hoax
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