Burzynski Patients, Legal Threats, and a False DMCA Takedown Notice

Over the last few days, I (Bob) have been contacted by a handful of parents whose stories are on The OTHER Burzynski Patient Group. I have received two legal threats. First was an email from a father who ended his angry email: “I suggest you take down the personal blog that I wrote about my son […].” (The story, by the way, was by any measure the most horrifying illustration of alternative medicine’s predatory nature I have ever encountered.) I replied that I do not take stories down. Ever. He repeated the threat:

I expect it taken down – PERIOD – or you’ll be hearing from MY lawyer …

You have absolutely NO right to republish my blog …

Just try me – you can look up my current company [website] to see that I’ve been building another successful business and I’ll gladly use ALL the resources I have to fight this unlawful use of my personal story.

You have NO idea who you’re messing with!!

The second threat came and went while I slept. On the morning of March 3rd I received an email from my host, WordPress, which read in part:

We have received a DMCA notice (https://www.eff.org/issues/bloggers/legal/liability/IP#dmca) for material published on your WordPress.com site.

Normally this would mean that we’d have to disable access to the material. However, because we believe that this instance falls under fair use protections, we will not be removing it at this time. (emphasis added)

Section 107 of US copyright law identifies various purposes for which the reproduction of a particular work may be considered fair, such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. You can learn more about that here:

http://www.copyright.gov/title17

http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl102.html

While we believe that your use of the material is protected (we have fought for our users in similar cases in the past –http://en.blog.wordpress.com/2013/11/21/striking-back-against-censorship/), please keep in mind that the complainant may choose to continue to pursue this matter, perhaps directly with you. If you would prefer, you are still able to delete the content from your site yourself.

The question of whether or not I will take down posts is a non-starter. I have tried very hard to balance patient privacy and responsibly publishing information that I believe is in the public interest while also citing my sources. That so few patients have contacted me over the course of the last few years (and despite the fact that TOBPG appeared in a feature-length Burzynski-themed infomercial by Eric Merola) suggests that I have largely succeeded.

The night before the DMCA notice arrived, the following comment appeared in the comments of the “About TOBPG” page:

I just want to thank you so much for this site. My best pal is two years into a most likely fatal cancer diagnosis. As the traditional treatments have failed to cure her, we are searching far and wide for the next possible step, and Burzynski’s name came up. Seeing the facts laid out on your site (and others) made it so easy to understand that this is nothing more than quackery. Thanks for helping us avoid what could have been a horrible misstep.

The site and all the stories stay.

I have retained counsel, Ken White of Brown White & Osborne LLC, who writes at @Popehat and who represents me pro bono on First Amendment and free speech issues.