Monday, April 14, 2014

Rob Riley Discovers Rogue Web Site and Cites It To Raise Questions About My Release From Jail

Alabama political figure Rob Riley has asked a judge to determine if I had any involvement with a Web site running articles that had been removed from Legal Schnauzer in order to purge a contempt finding and gain my release from jail.

The Web site in question is legalschnauzera.blogspot.com, with the addition of an "a" being the only difference between it and the title and address of my blog. "LegalSchnauzera" is filled with pop-up ads and pretty clearly appears to be a rogue Web site of some sort.

Riley is asking Judge Claud Neilson for a hearing--or to require my wife, Carol, and me to show cause concerning any involvement with "LegalSchnauzera." Carol removed certain items from Legal Schnauzer, plus my YouTube and Twitter accounts, in order to purge a contempt finding and gain my release after five months in the Shelby County Jail.

The answer to the primary question at hand is simple--neither Carol nor I have ever had any involvement with "LegalSchnauzera" or any Web site like it. We only learned of it upon receiving Riley's court documents on Saturday. In his March 26 release finding, Neilson noted Carol's "good faith efforts" to remove certain items from sites that were under our control. We have continued to act in good faith, but now a rogue blog of unknown origins has muddied the waters.

So where did "LegalSchnauzera" come from, and who is behind it? We don't know the answer to that question, but we certainly would like to find out.

I've never claimed to be an expert on abuse issues in the blogosphere, but some quick research shows that content theft has become a mounting problem. It's often called "scraping" or "splogging," and apparently can be easy to accomplish. Here is how one article on the Web describes the process:

Online content theft is, unfortunately, a common incident these days. As soon as a site becomes popular, it’s only a matter of time before someone reproduces it and tries to make a buck from it. One simply needs access to a RSS feed and an Google AdSense account in order to monetize from someone else’s work, and sadly, this happens all too often.

A quick visit to "LegalSchnauzera" shows that it is awash in ads. If you click on an article, it tends to call up an ad. In some cases, ads are superimposed so that an article cannot be read. It appears that the articles are there only as a vehicle to attract ad revenue.

Why did someone choose my articles as such a vehicle? I have no idea, but after spending five months in jail, this seems like another gross violation of my fundamental rights as a citizen. In terms of taste, I don't want anyone thinking I might be involved with a site like "LegalSchnauzera." More importantly, Carol and I have dealt with the court in an upfront and honest way throughout--and we will continue to do so; we aren't into playing shell games via a Web site that appears to be anything but upfront and honest.

Reporter Kent Faulk picked up on the story at al.com, and I told him that it felt like my site had been "hijacked." The rogue site appears to have articles on more than 100 subjects we've covered at Legal Schnauzer, with a small portion of them about Rob Riley. Here is part of the al.com article:

In an email Saturday evening responding to questions from AL.com, Shuler stated he had received a copy of the filings by Rob Riley's attorneys Saturday afternoon and stated he was "baffled" and denied having anything to do with the other website.

"I've never heard of legalschnauzera.blogspot.com, and I have no involvement with it," Shuler wrote in the email. "I took my first glance at it a few minutes ago, and it appears that someone has taken many of my posts and adopted them as their own. The author claims to be someone named Poonam Verma, and I have no idea who that is--or if it is even a real person.

"I'm sure Mr. Riley is upset to discover this Web site, and so am I. It looks as if my site has been hijacked," Shuler wrote. "I've never dealt with this sort of problem before, so I'm not an expert on it, but I think the key thing is to contact the hosting site and let them know that someone is using their service in a fraudulent way. I'm looking into doing that right now.

"I will be glad to help Rob Riley and his associates in any way that I can to straighten this out," Shuler wrote. "I'm concerned that this has happened, and I hope I can help get to the bottom of it."

I plan to file a formal response with the court shortly.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

That was an anon statement.

There is never going to be an absenteeism of a site of Murphy Schnauzer's spirit, and there is no stopping the electronic data sharing.

Aaron Swartz, Programmer, Aaron Hillel Swartz was an American computer programmer, writer, political organizer and Internet activist. Wikipedia

Born: November 8, 1986, Chicago, IL
Died: January 11, 2013, Brooklyn, NY
Nationality: American
Parents: Susan Swartz, Robert Swartz
Education: North Shore Country Day School, Stanford University

Supposedly Aaron hung himself because he could see the government after him, state to state, and all he did was bring freedom for all to have access to the web and our right to know.

There are more sites that tell the whole Alabama story and that is the way the world is, this is 21 Century and the "Deep State", that is the real name of the new government that owns America.

It is a Deep State. The Alabama people thought they could control the Don Siegelman atrocity but, there was this spirit that wasn't about to allow America to be in the place where we are.

Karl Rove and the entire gang of thugs, Bush Family and all the current so called United States "Federal Government". Deep, deep steeped in the deep state.

The horror has yet to be witnessed wholly. Murph's Spirit can't be an auto 'kill switch', and therefore, the Riley "Hope" to be staying in the century 12 or earlier?

Dark Ages happened and now that backwards death is not acceptable in the world that the Aaron Swartz and other enlightened brought to America in the greatest needed time, Fascist Deep State.

What is Riley going to do now? He has to keep finding rogue sites and then wonder what rogue did the deed, that could keep him in a position of job security.

Call Riley the new world internet cop for the new world, just like the US was the new world police for the whole planet, too.

Zacherydtaylor said...

First of all glad to see that your finally out; excuse me if I haven't been keeping up with all of this.

Rob Riley should have known this would happen when he took the actions that he did; I knew something like this was inevitable if you did take down some of that stuff!

His efforts to suppress it only makes people more interested and it set up a virtual guaranteed game of whack a mole trying to stop these stories from keeping coming back.

It shouldn't be your problem but then it shouldn't have been last October either. It is hard to imagine how they could have possibly not anticipated this would happen or something like it.

Anonymous said...

Sounds like the makings of "The Odd Couple" ! (The Schnauzer and Rob Riley Working As A Team)!!

Anonymous said...

So what about the story about big Luther's ongoing affair? Why is that one still up? What does all of this have to do with the price of China tea?

Anonymous said...

Take your whole blog down until this is solved.. Go seek professional help ( web designers) they can get to the bottom of who the site belongs to..

e.a.f. said...

why would anyone take their blog down simply because someone else has established a similar one and "borrowed" some of a writer's articles? At that rate, we could find any number of progressive blogs down. Not a good way to maintain the freedom of speech thing.

I think it reasonable to conclude Rob Riley is less than amused by Mr. Shuler's release from prison. He is simply trying to have him put back in prison. Rob Riley, is acting like a spoiled brat, who can't have his way.

If Rob Riley can not produce any evidence Mr. and Mrs. Shuler have any involvement in the other blog, he is simply s.o.l. Rob Riley needs to suck it up and live with freedom of speech.