CENSORED! Yes, on December 27, a day that will now live in infamy, and just days after the premier of episode #108 (A Very Amy Christmas), I received a Christmas present in the form of an email from Alan Smithee productions informing me that I was in violation of "copyright and trademark" laws regarding the use of content from the show on this website.I was given the name and contact information for the Lifetime Networks legal department.

I started this web site with the intention of providing "All Things Amy" to a deserving fandom! Imagine how shocked I was when the email went on to inform me that I must "cease and desist" providing the episodes in streaming video format. Also mentioned were screen captures, sound clips, and the real time video feed from the woman's shower room at the gym where Rita Pietropinto (the voice of Aunt Amy)  is know to frequent!

And they call this a free country! One by one, all of the other Amy fan sites have folded from this  legal pressure! Now I find myself the target of persecution! I immediately called the Lifetime Network legal department, where no one was able to help me. Most of them claimed to have no knowledge of the show at all! After working my way through one corporate sycophant to the next, I found someone who claimed to have a post-it note from Alan Smithee himself, asking that my site specifically be shut down.

When I enquired why myself and my site were singled out for this heavy-handed legal treatment, he replied that Alan was infureated when he discovered that my site was using the actual scripts used in the production of the show! Well, I replied. Finders keepers! Maybe Alan shouldn't carry all the scripts around in a briefcase with him. Especially if he intends to keep frequenting the Route 3 Topless GoGo since things like briefcases tend to "disappear" in such places, and will only tend to "reappear" when someone offers the "performer" whose feet he threw up on a twenty for "finding" it. At this point, I noticed that legal toady on the other end of the line had hung up.

I called Alan Smithee productions and demanded to speak to him personally. I was informed that he had not been seen since being arrested for being drunk and disorderly at what was described as the notorious "barbecue sauce" incident at a local Hooters. I was asked for an address and phone number where I could be reached when he eventually returned.

Oh, how naive I was! Later that day I found my bank account and assets frozen, my belonging impounded, and worst of all, this beloved site shut down by the MAN! I did the only thing a red blooded American could do in the face of this fascist assault!

I changed my name, and now have my site on a server located in Cuba ! COME HAVE A CHAT WITH FEDEL IF YOU THINK IT WILL DO ANY GOOD, ALAN!!! No one there will lose any sleep over your silly legal badgering! I win!

Of course, since the bulk of my site consists of streaming videos of the show, these have to be shut down since I need at least 120K of bandwidth to display them, and it appears that 120K is the total aggregate Internet bandwidth for the entire island!

So, it's a moral victory right now, but OUTPOST AMY remains your source for ALL THINGS AMY!

Via la revolution!

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