Prince Strikes Back!

Prince Fans United is, according to CNN, "an amalgamation of his fan groups," protesting lawyers representing Prince for threatening "to take legal action against fan-run web sites unless they remove photos of him."

In response to the outcry, Prince has written a song and created a website of his own called Prince Fams United ( http://www.princefamsunited.com/ ). The song is actually really good and sounds a bit like a throwback to his Camille days.

Prince is notorious for sending his legal team at fan sites with cease-and-desist orders.

Prince.org went to great lengths, after receiving one such order, to monitor the dialogue between fans, barring any discussion of bootlegged material and even barring “fake tracklists” (of all things). Just stepping inside the “Prince: Music and More” forum to see yellow and pink highlighted legal warning and threats of being “permanently deleted” for violating any of their many rules became enough for me to just stop visiting the site altogether. It is, however, nice to see that they’re finally standing up to the “attorney’s representing Prince” for what they consider to be “bullying tactics designed to stifle freedom of speech.”

I used to go to Housequake.com until Prince demanded recently they remove all videos; which was a real shame because they had an amazing collection of rare, hard-to-find live video / music videos of Prince. Apparently Prince has a “vault” of videos and unreleased music that will probably never see the light of day. Of course he has every right to keep any or all of his unreleased work from the public but it’s a shame all the same ...

It almost goes without saying that he got a little strange in the 90’s during his contract war with Warner Bros., but I always respected the fact that he never quite went overboard in the way that say Michael Jackson went overboard. He never became too weird and he was never the center of any weird, over publicized scandal (and perhaps it’s because he always stayed busy), but this drive of late to protect his copyright has become unsettling to the point that I can’t even listen to his music without feeling like I’m violating his lawyers wishes.

Of course John Giacobbi, managing director of Web Sheriff, tried to reassure Prince’s fans that it isn’t a direct attack on their freedom of speech so much as it is an “issue between Prince’s record label and three unofficial websites that relates to the use of Prince trademarks and copyright.” Though with the removal of said items, I can see how fans might feel that their freedom-of-speech is being stifled by a man who made a career out of testing the waters of the First Amendment.

This cease-and-desist order has gone as far as to demand the “removal of fan’s own photographs of their Prince-inspired tattoos.”

I mean, how far does Web Sheriff go with this?

If they happen to catch a Prince tattoo on someone’s body on their Facebook for instance, are they entitled to demand the user remove the photograph?

Doesn't entirely seem right.