How Far Do You Go To Silence A Blogger And When Does It Become Too Far?
April 2, 2008 
When I received cease and desist notice from ePerks lawyer, I had a gut feeling that my problems associated with this company were far from over. I was not that far off. What I though would be a problem turned into a nightmare which I am still enduring.
When the commenting activity was at it’s peak on one of my posts, I had kept very close watch on those who commented on my blog. I warned few individuals that their behavior was unacceptable and if they did not stop, I would ban them from my website. I do find suspicious if a person leave more than one comment on my blog during one visit, leaving different name for each comment. When my warnings were ignored, I in fact banned some one who identified himself as “John”. I emailed this individual to notify him that he was banned, here is the answer I have received:
From: Jaffar Sadighi sadighij@yahoo.com
To: Vlad Zablotskyy vladzablotskyy@gmail.com
Sent: Friday, January 25, 2008 2:48:08 PM
Hehe. Vlad, I want you to know I eat people like you for breakfast. You are simply pouring fuel. I will enjoy this one.
—– Original Message —-
From: Vlad Zablotskyy vladzablotskyy@gmail.com
To: Jaffar Sadighi sadighij@yahoo.com
Sent: Thursday, January 24, 2008 2:48:08 PM
Subject: One word for you: BANNEDYou are banned from leaving further comments on my blogs. Enjoy your life.
It turns out that Mr. Jaffar did not stop there. Evidently he decided to use Yahoo! Answers as his weapon of choice:
Strangely enough, the cease and desist notice from ePerks lawyer included the following:
Our research also shows that negative remarks are not only invited, but are posted without a challenge. Conversely, favorable remarks are met with hostility and belittlement, including demands that the posting party either prove they are participating agents, or do not work for ePERKS.
I am very curious to know the methods employed to the above mentioned “research”. If Mr. Cook were to read the comment thread on the post in question, he would quickly realize that I did not challenge every “positive” remark. I challenged only those left by the suspicious individual like Mr. Sadighi.
The Yahoo! Answers had since deleted the despicable posts, and from what I can tell they have also deleted profile of “Jaffar S”. It will take a few days or maybe weeks for the search engines to delete these pages from their index. But I will never rest to protect myself and my family. I hope now you can understand how much I appreciate bloggers like Matt Brown who just few days ago have started a campaign he called Save Vlad Zablotskyy.
I hope I am the last blogger ever who had gone through this sort of vicious attacks. But the nature of the internet is such that no one really has any guarantee against finding themselves in a similar situation.
My hope is that my case, and maybe other cases out there would would result in some sort “bloggers coalition” that would allow us to defend ourselves against such disgusting tactics.
It is my opinion that no blogger who have ever made a remotely negative remarks about this company is safe. My advise to you is to immediately set up Google Alerts for your own name so you will be notified a soon as your name is mentioned on the Internet. In the past I thought it was too vain to have such an alert. You can see how mistaken my thinking was. I am in particular worried about Greg Swann of BloodhoundBlog, Marlow Harris of 360digest, Lydia Player of North Dallas Homes, Jay Thompson of Agentgenius, Matt Brown of The Fantastic Site Of Lord Matt, Pat and Wayne of Willingford Wired. These bloggers have either publicly supported me or were critical of ePerks, and I am afraid may have invited upon themselves the fury of individuals like “Mr. Jaffar Sadighi”. Please, I am begging you, set up Google alerts for your own name.
Am I inviting unnecessary attention to an issue that could go away on it’s own? I stopped believing it such a notion due to the above described attacks. As long as my case will prevent other bloggers from going through such and ordeal, it is all worthed. Silence on my part may do more damage not only to me, but to a larger community of bloggers.
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You're a great man, Vlad. Hang tough and you will prevail.
Greg,
It was an absolute ordeal. I hesitated whether or not to go ahead with this post. However I have no reason to believe such attacks against me will never occur in the future. I think it is despicable any one would engage such tactics.
I am worried about you in particular because of the article your wrote. I urge you to set a Google Alert for your name, if you have not done so already.
BTW I video blogged about it on my affiliate marketing blog:
http://sageblogger.com/back-on-track-with-video...
Wow Vlad, what some people won't do to mess with someone. I'm no lawyer, but I think you might be able to pursue a defamation case against Mr. Jaffar, perhaps even libel (see http://www.expertlaw.com/library/personal_injur... for more info). If you can, in fact, determine jaffar's identity, I can't see how he would have any legal basis for a defense. Also, I appreciate your concern that he may try to defame the rest of us who came to your defense. I already have Google alerts set up for my name and web sites, among others, so I'm ready for him should he try more smear tactics. My wife and I know enough lawyers through our real estate practice that I'm sure one or more of them would love to put the nefarious Jaffar in his place. And I can assure you that, should he do anything to sully our good name, we will NOT rest until he is properly dealt with. As you ably pointed out, the nature of the Internet gives no guarantees that these things won't happen, but that doesn't mean it can happen with impunity, either. I'm not a well-known blogger; hell, I'm barely a blip on the radar, but I will continue to support your right to speak your opinion until this issue is resolved in your favor. As Greg says, hang tough and you will prevail.
I doubt that "Jaffar" is a real person. But the IP addresses are real...
Things like this can not go on unchallenged, and I am doing everything in my power to protect my name and my family.
Thanks for stopping by Wharriman.
Wayne,
I did not realize it was you. I guess you have registered with Disqus. It's great little site that manages comments across my blogs. Some great features.
That's OK. Yes I registered with Disqus and added it to my blog ( not that I have any comments yet!), just to see how it works. Here's my Disqus info: http://disqus.com/people/wharriman/
Wayne
Wayne,
I am not sure how well the Disqus will integrate with Blogger or Blogspot.
All my blogs are powered by WordPress. I have been using Disqus just a few
days and am absolutely in love with it. It allows me to manage comments from
all my blog in one place. But also I can reply to comments via e-mail (a
huge time saver for me). In fact I am writing this from my e-mail client and
do not need to visit my blog.
I just saw your blog, I think you did not install the Disqus on your blog
yet. If you ever decide to, it all can be done under "configure" tab in
dashboard of your Disqus account.
I followed their instructions, but I don't think I'll see it until a new comment is added to the blog. Part of the installation was to change the Comments setting in Blogger to, "No Comments on New Posts", so you can still add comments on the old ones, but when a new post is made and commented on, that's when Disqus kicks in...at least that's my assumption! I'm also trying to add JargonFish (www.jargonfish.com) to the blog, but I'm having problems with the widget code. I've emailed them but no response yet.
I will comment on your blog as soon as I see a new post. I actually never
saw the Disqus in action on Blogger, so I am looking forward to see how it
is working for you. Again, I absolutely love it an would recommend it to any
blogger.
Google alerts might be a good idea in a general marketing sense anyway however attacking all of the bloggers you have listed would perhaps make it a crime suitable for public investigation (police) although I'm highly doubtful at this time. I'm not especially frightened of someone SEOing bad stuff at me as I have spent years SEOing myself by my screen name and the SEO would have to be quite good at their job. A blogger by the name of Spam Huntress might be able to offer tips on tracking down this guy.
I'd go after him to make an example out of him and a few hot legal letters in his real name would soon change his tune. email me the IPs if you want and I'll see what I can work out about them. I can blog it or email it back.
her url is http://spamhuntress.com/ - it's a good blog.
Matt,
I have "investigated" some IPs on my own. I am going to send you just one to see you results and compare them to mine. Look for an e-mail.
Matt,
Just sent you an e-mail with a subject "IP of the suspect". From what I can gather it is a static IP address- which is very bad news for the owner.
An thanks for pointing me to Spam Huntress- quiet and interesting blog.
Lord Matt, never make me angry! I am relentless..:)
Great post Vlad, and I am going to throw in my 2 cents here. There is more to his story here than he mentioned. I also had some posts on Vlad's original blog about eperks, then decided I wanted to distance myself from the situation and asked Vlad to remove my posts and explained why I decided to do so. I also had blogged about eperks and took those blogs down within a week or so.
When Jaffar Sadighi posted the above slanderous story on Yahoo, he also set up an account in MY name on Stirrdup.com (dennispease13) and linked to the Yahoo article. I don't have the information in front of me but the Yahoo article and Stirrdup account were set up within a couple hours of each other, so my guess would be Jaffar opened the account in my name.
I contacted stirrdup.com twice before they removed the link to the story (it was removed when I mentioned an attorney would be contacted if it wasn't), but the account remains open; http://www.stirrdup.com/member.php?u=1248. I think an email of this post will be supplied to them along with one more email before I have my attorney take over. I want that fictitious account removed!!!
Vlad is a good man, he did not mention this because I had let him know I wanted to stay out of this. But I think it is more important that people are aware of the tactics this group will go to.
Vlad's advice on setting up Google alerts is very good advice. I really hope you find out who Jaffar Sadighi is, and how he fits in with eperks.
Dennis,
You really did not have to do this. But I appreciate your testimony. I had been in touch with stirrdup.com myself and after few e-mails I convinced them to take the post down. I am sure the fact the you have contacted them as well helped.
If only the same amount of energy can be directed towards something good...
The message is going to be sent laud and clear. However, I feel like I completely am wasting my time and energy.... But as I said, I have a duty to defend my name. They have invited this upon themselves.
Vlad, I do not live in USA now, but I use to live there for 20 years. Even though everyone is a bit paranoid about law suits and stuff now days, I think the lawyer from ePerks is a freaking Troll. There is no way he or his company is going to go legally after every blogger that criticizes the company! It would not be financially viable to do so!
It does cost money to litigate, and think about the negative publicity ePerks would incur from the case. I do not know, if you are Donald Trump and you say some shit, they would go for the throat. Are you a heavy hitter like Donald..:)
Also criticizing a company is not libel, saying fictitious and false thing about a company is. So tell the Wanker lawyer to go Piss at The Wind, before you sue his purported client ePerks for distress. (I say purported, because I would think the lawyer has not produced a notarized affidavit that he is a legal representative of ePerks.)
Have you seen the latest April Fools joke by Michael Arrington? He is suing FaceBook for $25 million in Statutory Damages. He said it in hist post and even went on Twitter to fan the April Fools joke!
So, my man, have a Beer and Chill
Igor,
I only wish that I can make a joke of the situation. Not if a search for my own name brings up the page from Yahoo! Answers on the first page of the search results....
I guess the longer it is there, the more damages I can claim...
This is what I think took place. My original article ranked on first page of Google for word ePerks. It was their stupid way of "taking care of the problem". Now instead just of one critical post ranking high on Google, there will be several nasty posts on the first page of the results. At the end of the day the accomplished nothing. If the thought my article was to strong they should read the one from Bloohound Blog:
http://www.bloodhoundrealty.com/BloodhoundBlog/...
I do however believe that posts like the one made on Yahoo! Answers should not go unpunished...
Thanks for stopping by Igor!